For, twenty-five years ago, when I ceased to be a citizen of California and a resident of your city, it was to become a member of the Army of the Potomac, and although disappointed in the hope with which I left the Pacific coast, of a speedy return and a permanent residence here, and compelled to cast my lines in other places, yet this city has always held the highest and warmest place in my affection. What were mere sand-hills in those days are crowned now with palatial structures, and more than tropical bloom and verdure have replaced what then were barren wastes, and while the city has become grand and beautiful and picturesque, it is a great pleasure to see what I recognize on every hand, that the people have not changed at all, but have remained till to-day what they were then, the most liberal, whole-souled, public-spirited and cosmopolitan community that America can boast of.

People of San Francisco, the old Army of the Potomac, to whom you sent in olden days not merely words of cheer and high encouragement, but gallant sons, many of whom never lived to revisit the golden shores and behold the modern splendor of their early home, thank you most heartily. We have come to you from the far east, over mountain barrier and desolate waste of desert, and not through the Golden Gate, typical of the land of promise.

Be assured that the memory of your greeting here shall remain a lifelong pleasure to each and every one of us until the rear guard of the good old Army of the Potomac shall have passed the gates of pearl and pitched their tents upon the more distant shores.

General McMahon then proposed the health of the President of the United States. All present rose, and the toast was drank amid cheers.

Governor Stoneman in reply to the toast of "The State of California," said: Comrades: I shall not attempt to make what is termed a speech, because I could not if I would and would not if I could.

General Sherman said last evening that he came into this country before any other man in the room. I did not know he was so old, for if that is so he must be older than I. I came to California on Christmas-day, 1846, with a body of men called the "Mormon Battalion." It made the longest march on record. It started in the dead of winter for California via Council Bluffs. The men composing it meant to settle on the bay of San Francisco, but some one forestalled them by offering to hire them and bring them across the plains as armed emigrants.

The Governor, after an interesting description of his journey across the plains, said:

I wonder if any man can tell me who named the Army of the Potomac or how it was named. It was thus: After the battle of Bull Run General McClellan went east and I went with him. We found General Mansfield in command of the forces around Washington. We drove to see him. In doing so we passed the quarters of General Scott, God bless him! [Applause.] We went to see him, and while we were discussing the name which should be applied to the army, and after several names were discussed, the name Potomac was mentioned. The old hero, raising his finger as his habit was, said, “Potomac, Potomac, appropriate and euphonious. Let it be called the Army of the Potomac." [Applause.]

Mayor Bartlett spoke to the toast, “The City of San Francisco," as follows: Gentlemen of the Army of the Potomac : Your president and other veterans of the Grand Army of the Republic have paid many eloquent tributes to our greatness, our goodness, our beauty, and many other virtues which they have observed in us.

They have told us how they remember our patriotism, our generosity, and our loyalty during the war, and we accept all they offer us with the inward consciousness that they cannot overestimate us. In fact, we begin to realize now what our modesty prevented our seeing before, that California really was at the head and front of all the great victories of the Army of the Potomac.

Did not General Sherman admit last evening that he had learned in California how to march into Georgia? Allow me to say here that although ordinarily I like to be at home when visitors call, I did not regret being absent from my native State during that memorable visit. Who can tell how much the other great generals learned from their visits to California?

One thing is certain, that San Francisco will hereafter reckon the Army of the Potomac as a part of the Grand Army of California.

It is with great diffidence and timidity that we speak of our glorious climate, our fertile soil and our luxurious fruits, but, gentlemen, I assure you that San Francisco has deeply concealed in her heart of hearts an enormous pride in the great American eagle, whose broad wings stretch from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and one of whose brilliant eyes flames towards the frozen north, while the other squints dreamingly southward to her sister republic.

San Francisco honors the brave and the patriotic. Our daily journals have furnished you abundant proof of the interest taken in your coming and reception here. The patient, enthusiastic multitudes that gathered in our streets yesterday from every part of our State are abundant witnesses to the intelligent appreciation with which our people regard your presence here, and I cannot avoid taking in the whole State when I speak for San Francisco on this occasion.

Gentlemen, California is all you say of her—a great, beautiful, bountiful, generous and hospitable State—but San Francisco is especially modest when speaking of herself. [Applause.]

General E. D. Keyes being called upon, as one of the generals of the Army of the Potomac, for a speech, said that it would be impossible for him, as it was indeed unnecessary, to speak at length on the Army of the Potomac. It was named as described by General Stoneman, but was organized by General McClellan. There was no one better man to organize, but one great difficulty was that the volunteers were very unfitted to rush into the field and carry everything before them, as the public expected them to do. The general then went somewhat minutely into the history of the operations of the army, in the course of which he was repeatedly and loudly applauded.

The band here struck up “Marching Through Georgia," which was enthusiastically joined in by the whole company.

In response to the toast of the Pacific branch of the Society of the Army of the Potomac, General E. S. Salomon said in effect that he had been so busy in preparing for the reception of the guests that he had no time to prepare a speech, but he acknowledged the toast and realized in it an appreciation of the work done to give them an appropriate welcome. In their admission that we have been successful in our efforts we find our reward. The organization of the Pacific branch of the society was due to Colonel Smedberg, and now over 300 members are found in this city. He hoped the branch would soon join the parent society. He would say that while the committee of arrangements were entitled to all credit, he could not say enough for

the zeal and devotion of General Backus, who was too modest to put himself forward to seek for thanks, but is satisfied with the success of his efforts. In conclusion he proposed that General Sherman should be elected an active member of the Army of the Potomac. Carried by acclamation.

General James A. Beaver, of Pennsylvania, replied to the toast of “Women in War," saying:

Any man who could fail to respond to this toast would be unworthy of the name of man. We have most of us crossed the continent to this slope. As I came up the Sierra Nevadas by the river Truckee, and as we came higher and saw Lake Donner, and finally reached the summit, I could hardly refrain from saying, “Great God, what a country!" and I shared in the glory of having helped to save it. This is the thought that must have occurred to all. But has it occurred to you that the power behind it all was your mothers and your wives, and your sweethearts, and your sisters? I have seen men lie down and die just because their wives could not write a cheerful letter to them. I have seen boys brave because their mothers could write and say, “My boy, God bless you!" He concluded by joining in the thanks offered to the branch society for the magnificent welcome which had been rendered, and the memory of the deeds, rather than mere words of kindness shown to the visiting comrades, would be carried with them to their graves.

General Barnes responded to "Bench and Bar," after which Colonel G. B. Dwyer made some remarks of a similar nature, bringing out in a jesting way the facts that he came from Pike County, Mo., and that he found that several Pike County men were in the penitentiary and he had made up his mind that he would get Governor Stoneman to pardon them out before he went back, for he stood up for California when he was in Pike County; he proposed to stand by Pike when in California. The rest of his speech was devoted to various subjects, anecdotal and otherwise more or less relevant to the subject of the toast. He said, in conclusion, for St. Louis, that it stands guard at the tomb of Abraham Lincoln, it was the home of Grant, and is now the home of Sherman, and in saying the last he claimed that St. Louis was the home of the greatest soldier on the top of God’s green earth to-day. [Applause.]

Colonel Smedberg was called upon to reply for the department of California, Grand Army of the Republic, and did so in choice and appropriate terms.

F. M. Pixley, of the Argonaut, in response for the press, said: Every one who knows me knows how deeply I love the press. So closely have I followed its course that I gave myself to be a common editor to reform it. The press is about as good, as a rule, as the people for whom it is published. When the grand old flag was fired upon and you enlisted in its defense, the press, to its credit, and I may say its only credit, supported you. I wish it had no till into which advertisements could throw the conscience of its publishers; for a free press is the backbone of a free republic. I feel the modesty of my position to-night. When you defended the life of the republic, I did not. Yet I was as a civilian with Grant in the bloody week before Petersburg. I saw the regiments, a little earthquake, march along the fence. I saw, in short, the pomp and circumstance of war from a distance, and I saw many of the touching and pathetic episodes of the war at Cold Harbor. I then

registered a vow that if there be honors to give or paying positions to bestow I will stand back when a fighting soldier seeks it. I fought under Hancock. The enemy opened a battery on us as we were riding along, and I thought it a mean thing. The arm of the man riding beside me was shot off, and I, with the reckless courage of a fool, turned and rode to the rear. When I met him afterward I upbraided him with his mean behavior. He said he was very sorry, for he did not know I was there. Mr. Pixley asked in conclusion whether the press did not urge the Army of the Potomac to go on to Richmond. Did it not urge you to do and die, and did not the Army of the Potomac do so? In the political field does not the press urge that the bloody chasm be closed, and the citizens of the South be restored again to the all-embracing and all-forgiving arms of the Union? He said, in closing, a good and excusing word for the South, saying that if he had been reared in the South he would also have probably “fit" for slavery.

The toast of “The Army of the United States was then proposed by General McMahon, and General Sherman responded as follows, having been received with repeated cheers.

Comrades of the Army of the Potomac: When I was assigned a toast somewhat unfamiliar to me I was told that I might assume any subject I pleased. I will now suppose that the tattoo has sounded and that the regular army has gone to bed, and turn to the army which was called for by the people in its majesty and which poured forth from their homes in troops and brigades.

Of these the first to take a name was the Army of the Potomac. There was besides that of the Ohio and others. But I am delighted to be with the Army of the Potomac to-night. How short the way seemed between Washington and Richmond, but you, my comrades, thought it a hard and a long one. But now, looking back, how slight do the troubles appear which annoyed you then. I began with you in July, 1861, on my way to Richmond. Before I got there I had to go away around by the back door. [A voice, “You got there all the same."] We were all one, though with different insignia, and our grand flag was the same over us all.

Because of the first battle of Shiloh we got the whip hand of them, and we kept it. We were all marching for the same destination and we all got there at last. Your object, Army of the Potomac, was the tenacity of the bull-dog. I respected all our commanders, each in his own sphere, but when you were organized by McClellan and trained by battle you called for a little man named Grant. [Applause.] He was called to Washington for the first time by President Lincoln, and when they met, Lincoln felt that he had found a man he could trust. These two and Stanton sat down and had a talk. Grant objected at first to take the Army of the Potomac. Lincoln replied that he thought Grant’s success at Vicksburg and Chattanooga would heal the jealousies of the Army of the Potomac. “I will, of course, come," said Grant, "but I hear you have a practice here of sending orders from the rear. With us in the West the head of our army is usually in front."

Lincoln turned to Stanton and said: “You and I have been running this machine for three years and we have not made a success of it. Let us give up trying."'

They kept their word, and even when Early might have entered Washington if he had known, Lincoln refrained from giving any Order, and the city was saved by the Sixth Corps of the Army of the Potomac.

The general then went into reminiscences and moralizing on the divisions of the Army of the Potomac, and continued:

Grant said to me, "Sherman, you go for Joe Johnston, and I will take care of Lee;" and there was a straight fight from that time till we reached and held Atlanta. When the Army of the Potomac got stuck in Petersburg, we resolved to go and help them, and my boys said, “All right, Uncle Billy." and if any one asked them when they were on the way, the answer was, Uncle Bill knows." General Sherman concluded by saying that the pre-eminence of our country was due to the efforts of the Army of the Potomac, which did its share in securing the freedom of our country. "Not only," he said, “are the faces of the men and women and children smiling a greeting, but the very flowers bloom in honor of your presence in this city because you made it possible for us all to be proud of being American citizens." [Applause.]

Governor Alger, of Michigan, gave some personal reminiscences of General Grant, after which a toast to the memory of General U. S. Grant was drank in silence, all standing.

Governor Lucius Fairchild, of Wisconsin, in the absence of Captain F. V. McNair, commandant at Mare Island, responded to the toast of the navy. He said: We can never forget the gallant services the navy rendered in the war. But what of the future? I have seen the so-called navy of the United States—little tubs not fit for ferry-boats on this bay. It is said that the western members of Congress refused to vote for an appropriation, but it is well in time of peace to prepare for war. We have now the fishery trouble with Great Britain. and suppose she refuses to accede to our demands, what are you going to do about it on the sea? I want Congress to give us a navy that can defy the world, so that no nation shall dare to beard us on the water. [Applause.] For the first time in sixteen years I meet my friends of the Army of the Potomac. I followed the fortunes of that army for many weary months, until I was sent home by a rebel bullet. It does me good to meet them once again on the beloved soil of California. We are bound together as closely by our misfortunes as by our successes.

Admiral Farragut's memory was then drank in solemn silence. “John Brown's Body" was struck up by the hand, all the company joining in as before.

"The volunteers and kindred societies," were toasted, and General Horace C. King thus replied:

The request of the committee to respond to the toast of the volunteers and sister societies is received with diffidence. My natural impulse is to imitate the esthetic young student at Harvard, who, on the death of a comrade, placed at the foot of his coffin a wreath of evelastings, into which were woven the initials, S. Y. L.—" See you later." But the cordiality which accompanies the invitation left me little opportunity to decline with grace, and, although I am a stranger to many of you, though not a stranger to all, I am, nevertheless, in much the same happy frame of mind as Mark Twain, who, when asked whether he would rather go to heaven or to—that other place now superseded by the revised version—replied that he was not particular, as he had friends in both places.

Whether you have gained much by getting me from so far I must leave to your generous verdict, for I am rather inclined to think that you may be somewhat in