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At 10.30 a. m. the members of the Diplomatic Corps, the representatives of the foreign governments to the exposition, and other official guests assembled at the St. Louis Club, and they were then conducted by military escort to the Liberal Arts Building.

At 12 o'clock m. the assembly was called to order by Mr. Corwin H.

Spencer, chairman of the committee on ceremonies of the Exposition

Company, and the following programme was carried out:

First. Invocation by Rev. Carl Swenson:

Great God, the God of our fathers and of their children, accept our heartfelt worship and gratitude. We bless Thy holy name for that wonderful providence of bountiful love and inspiring benevolence by which Thou hast made us a great and mighty nation out of an insignificant, struggling, and sorrow-laden beginning.

We render willing and adoring worship to Thee for that divine guidance and wisdom so admirably exhibited in the wide-visioned policy in the nation's most inspired leaders a hundred years ago, and to-day the policy which in one brief century has created an empire of a dozen magnificent Commonwealths of an unknown expanse of uninhabited wilderness and desert.

Vouchsafe ever to us as a people leaders of prophetic understanding, who in an uncertain present fathom the true inwardness of conditions pregnated with the greatest possibilities for a future of ever increasing proportions and realizations.

We thank Thee for the wealth of hope and promise implied in the dedication and completion of this unparalleled congress of peace, good will, and universal fraternity, made possible not only by the enterprise, patriotism, and gratitude of this splendid Commonwealth and our own entire people, but also by the responsive, generous, and helpful cooperation of the nations of the whole world.

We pray for Thy blessing, guidance, and love upon every national life here represented. May, in Thy beneficent providence, the inspiring competitions and tournaments so necessary between one people and another become an ennobling race for a higher culture of the human heart and mind; a more universal usage of the forces of nature for the best interests of man and for the full fruition for each and every one of the unexampled industrial and commercial activities which has taken possession of the civilized world.

We pray Thee that the forces ever jointly employed in producing the advance of a free people may learn better to understand their mutual relationship.

Liberate and save capital from every alleged and real form of a grasping, destructive, and disloyal selfishness, which may turn even the present midday of national prosperity and contentment into the threatening deepening gloom of an advancing cyclone of unavoidable loss and destruction.

Give to the possessors of our fabulous wealth an ever-increasing philanthropy, devoting a surplus of possessions unheard of by our fathers to education, literature, arts, and mercy, thereby making themselves the beloved and blessed favorites of a happy and grateful people.

We pray Thee that labor and toil may ever be held in due honor and respect in our broad land. Help us to realize that labor, be it of hand or brains, is the sinews and backbone alike of our past, present, and future as a free people.

Grant, O God, to the leaders in the world of labor the highest and most patriotic ideals of citizenship—ideals and purposes commending themselves to the intelligence and justice of the entire people.

And as neither capital alone, nor labor alone, could have built this wonderful exposition, grant, O God, that capital and labor all over our glorious land may learn to join hands in fair-minded cooperation for the upbuilding of such conditions of society which will prove an inspiration to ourselves and a worthy example to others, ending all forms of illegal coercion by one party or the other, and calling into permanent existence that truest and greatest America which is ever the dream of loyal and patriotic hearts.

We pray Thee help us to realize and profess, amidst the justifiable joy of a happy people, that Thou art God alone, and that there is salvation only in the name of the Blessed Redeemer. Grant that we may continually see in the cross on Calvary the tested emblem of a new life for time and eternity, a life of insight, energy, and the power of universally recognized leadership ever characterizing the nation whose boon is the Bible and whose master is Christ. Bless and protect the President of our nation, the governor of the State, the mayor of this city, and the president of this exposition, with all their associations. God of our fathers, give unto us all that sincerity of purpose, that rectitude of action so necessary for the preservation of our rights and privileges. Make us the toiling means for promulgating for Thee, and ever more successfully, the divine message of the Fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man, and to Thee, the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost, shall be glory now and forevermore. Amen.

Second. The following is a brief outline of the sentiments expressed by

Mr. Thurston, president of the day:

We are here to welcome the ambassadors, ministers, and

representatives of friendly foreign nations.

Here we gather to commemorate an event which changed the whole history of America, for the acquisition of the Louisiana Purchase extended the boundaries of the young Republic, which up to that time had no seacoast, except that of the Atlantic Ocean on the east, and gave us a continental domain extending from ocean to ocean.

We come here to celebrate, through this magnificent exposition, the centennial anniversary of the Louisiana Purchase. This is not an exposition of a city or of a State, or even of the United States; it is an exposition of and for the world.

Gentlemen, our visitors and our friends, in this temple of peace, dedicated to the progress of man, your presence is significant of the friendliness to us and toward each other of the nations of the world. May we not hope that in the electric splendor of the twentieth century there will come to all peoples a living exemplification of the words of the Master, "Peace on earth, good will toward men."

Third. Greeting to the representatives of foreign governments, from the

Universal Exposition of 1904, by Hon. David R. Francis, president of the

Exposition Company:

The Universal Exposition of 1904 extends a cordial greeting to

the distinguished representatives of foreign countries who favor

us with their presence on this memorable occasion.

An assembling of envoys of organized governments, however limited in their number and whatever its object may be, is characteristic of a high civilization; but when that convening is as general in its character as this, it indicates marked progress in the establishment of a better understanding between interests and policies long antagonistic and at variance.

And when the object of such a meeting is, as in this case, to establish and cement friendly relations between people who differ in form of government, in religion, and in race, it means a distinct step toward the organization of a parliament, an accomplishment worthy of highest endeavor, because its consummation would result in universal peace.

When the civilized nations of the earth meet in friendly rivalry, their better acquaintance engenders increased respect. The closer commercial relations that follow are conducive to mutual benefit. They efface prejudice, they broaden sympathies, they deepen and widen the foundations of human progress.

The civilization of past ages would have experienced no overthrows if they had been based on intelligence of the masses and had been imbued with broader humanity which distinguishes and ennobles the fraternal spirit of the twentieth century.

The cycle of one hundred years, whose close we have just passed, incomparable as it was in the discovery and the invention and the application of forces and methods in the physical world, and remarkable as it was for an advancement in every line of thought and research, will be surpassed and distanced by the new century upon which we have entered if the material potentialities and the intellectual faculties of mankind can be utilized and trained toward a common end, and that end the uplifting of the human race and the promotion of its happiness.

Concomitant with industrial progress is social development. The policy of engaging in foreign wars in order to prevent or to pacify domestic unrest may have been wise if not humane, but the time for such a policy has passed. That government is strongest whose subjects are intelligent and contented. Contentment follows the employment of intellectual faculties, in the development of natural resources, and in the production of those activities that result in greater comforts of living and higher planes of thought. The bringing together in a Universal Exposition of the best that all civilized countries have produced, opens to all who participate new lines of thought, better methods and better appliances, and, therefore, conduces to the material benefit of every country participating. It promotes universal economy of human endeavor by enabling the countries taking part to determine through a comparison of their exhibits the lines in which they can produce the best results.

The economy of the world for saving time and energy by the adaptation of physical and intellectual forces to pursuits in which they are most effective, is a profitable study for nations, as it is for individuals. Hand in hand, however, with such occupation should go the cultivation of the taste for the beautiful, and an abounding conviction that man is his brother's keeper and has an inalienable obligation to better the condition of his fellows.

The International Exposition whose dedication you honor by your presence, was conceived in an effort to commemorate a great achievement which has proven a potent factor in increasing our wealth and sustaining our institutions and perpetuating our independence.

The interest manifested by the governments and people whom you represent in pledges of participating has been encouraging and helpful in the highest degree, and we are glad of the opportunity to express our deep gratitude. Your coming enables us to show you the scope of the undertaking we have launched. Our plans are ambitious and our hopes high, but we are energetic and untiring, and with your recognition and assistance we expect to carry to a successful consummation an enterprise which will not only assemble the natural resources of the earth and bring together the best products of human skill, but will be the occasion for eliciting the expression of the best thought and for classifying and systematizing all human knowledge.

We hope this exposition will be an epitome of the progress of the world from the beginning of history. The nineteenth century was characterized by unprecedented and almost incomprehensible industrial advancement. The earth was made to reveal its hidden treasures. The unknown forces of nature were harnessed and utilized. Lines of commerce were established which encircle the earth.

Sections of the globe remote and almost unknown to each other were brought into close communication and friendly relation. It would seem that there is little to be done in the field of scientific effort. But every discovery and every advance opens a broader plane for the exercise of human ingenuity.

The problems, however, that seem to confront us most prominently to-day, and that require for their solution not only experience and intelligence, but fraternal sentiment as well, are those of a social character. The aggregation that we call society is bound together by ties of sympathy, strengthened it may be by culture, but often strained by selfishness and pride. The relation of man to nature and her physical forces commands the highest functions of the mind, but the relation of man to his fellows not only enlists the highest intellectual effort, but requires that it be tempered by impulses of human kindness. Those who have as the mainspring of their actions the elevation of their fellows live and move upon a higher plane and are better members of society than those who subordinate sentiment and sympathy to gain and power.

The earth in its fertility and resourcefulness furnishes material sufficient to maintain in comfort all of its sons. If their genius and energy could be devoted to the utilization of that material instead of to a continuous struggle between themselves for occupation and possession, the destiny of the human race would be higher and nobler and nearer in accord with the immortal principles enunciated by Him whose life and teachings have for nearly two thousand years been a rule of conduct for man, while broadening his usefulness and enhancing his happiness.

That this exposition may be a powerful aid in the elevation and advancement of the human race is the prayer of those who organized and have brought it to its present stage of progress. That the countries for which you stand may unite with us in promoting an undertaking fraught with much good to humanity is the earnest wish of the local management and the sincere hope of every right-thinking citizen of the American Republic.

Again, I welcome you as guests whom we delight to honor for your

personal worth, as well as for what you represent.

Fourth. Music, United States Marine Band, "Marseillaise Hymn of

Liberty."

Fifth. Address by the French ambassador, M. Jean J. Jusserand:

When the treaty signed in Paris one hundred years ago, and by which the area of the United States was to be more than doubled, stood for ratification before Congress, there were, contrary to what we might suppose, protracted discussions and objections of many sorts. Some thought that the title to the new acquisition was not a sufficient one; others were anxious on account of the very magnitude of the new territories, and expressed the fear that the federal tie would be loosened if extended to such remote and partially unknown regions. Many were the criticisms and long the speeches.

Senator Jackson, of Georgia, rose and turning toward one of the hostile parties, said: "In a century, sir, we shall be well populated * * * and instead of the description given of it by the honorable gentleman, instead of howling wilderness where no civilized foot shall ever tread, if we could return at the proper period, we should find it the seat of science and civilization."

Senator Jackson's time has come the very year he named; one century has just elapsed since he spoke. If he could return among us, he would see no howling wilderness, but one of the most brilliant gatherings which this country has ever beheld, including the Chief of the State and a former Chief of the State, representatives of all the powers of the globe, soldiers and sailors, priests, magistrates, savants, artists, tradesmen and agriculturists, workmen and citizens innumerable, all bent upon consecrating by their presence and homage the work done during the hundred years. Good work indeed; nay, stupendous.

Sanguine as he was, Senator Jackson would, I think, scarcely believe his eyes and ears if he saw the matchless sight we presently behold, and the preparation for the pending exhibition of the produce, all the discoveries, all the art of the wide earth.

He would scarcely believe his ears if he heard that we came in twenty-seven hours from the place where he had delivered his prophecy and which had become only two years before the seat of Government. No less would be his surprise, if he learned that the supposed "howling wilderness" had been turned into an immense garden, dotted with wealthy towns; that all the land called in his days Louisiana produces yearly now millions of bushels of various kinds of grain, and that the private belongings of the successors of the scattered settlers of his time are valued in ours at many millions of dollars.

But he would not be surprised if he learned that the federal tie has not been loosened; that the number of States has increased, their wealth, too, the number of their inhabitants, their importance in every respect, and that they consider as more and more sacred the bond which unites them to the older part of the community. Such are the effects of liberty and just laws.

In this triumphal day, amid the shouts of joy, the reports of the guns and ringing of the bells, considering the splendid results, it is only natural that we carry our look backward to the past and have a thought for the lonely pioneers of long ago, who came one by one to this then unknown land, and who tried among incredible difficulties to make it less unknown, to make it more productive and easier to reclaim for you, their distant inheritors. No one, I am sure, will think it amiss that I, a compatriot of theirs and a representative of their country, shall recall at this day their efforts, and express to-day's gratitude for yesterday's work. For they were hardy men, those children of distant France; they were plucky, enterprising, and courageous; they led strenuous lives indeed; all qualities for which you ever had a special regard. To say that they did not fear danger is to slander them; they loved it.

Soldiers, missionaries, governors of cities, explorers came year after year from the time of Louis XIV, attracted by the chances or the beauty of the unknown and the opportunity of increasing their country's dominions, or of becoming famous, or of instructing souls, and of dying, if death was to be met, bravely and honorably. Very French they were, with all the qualities of their race, and something else, perhaps, some of them, than the qualities.

As they went down the great rivers from the regions of the Canadian lakes to the Mexican sea they gave them French names, and the reading of a map of that epoch reminds one of the century of the Sun King. There he is with all his court, figured in lands, cities, lakes, and rivers. Louisiana bears his own name; Lake Pontchartrain the name of his minister for marine; Fort Duquesne, the name of his famous sailor. There were also the rivers Colbert and Seigneley, better known nowadays as Mississippi and Illinois. One of the Great Lakes had been named after the Duke of Orleans; another, the great Conde, the winner of Rocroy; another after his brother, Prince de Conti; but this last inland sea, as indeed most of the others, soon resumed its Indian name, the homely name of Lake Erie, the Lake of the Cat.

Very French they were, those men—this Father Marquette, who, with Joliet, first beheld the magnificent water that washes your walls, the vast existence of which was then unknown, and who explored it down to the country of the Arkansas; this Robert Cavalier Sieur de la Salle, who had, long before our days, our days' notions of the importance of great commercial routes; whose purpose was to open one to China across this continent at the very spot where your northern lines of railways have opened theirs; who called his first house on American soil La China in order that he might never forget his initial purpose. He died in the quest, but not before he had explored the Mississippi down to its mouth; not before he had ascertained that its source was to the West, and that the river therefore could be used as a guiding thread toward the Pacific; not before he had made the first French settlement in this, your country, and given it a name, which has not been replaced by another, and is its present name of Louisiana.

Long is the roll and great were the hardships. To the same region, with the same object of discovering and improving, came that typical cadet De Gascogne, the Chevalier Antoine de la Mothe Cadillac, who, on the 21st of July, 1701, unfurled the French flag at a certain spot where he began the building of a town, now the town of Detroit. He became afterwards governor of Louisiana. Then such men came as Du Tissnet, as the brothers Le Moine de Iberville and Le Moine de Bienville, this last the founder of New Orleans; as Father de Charlevoix, who gave the best account we have of the country, and spoke most wisely about its future; as La Clede, worthier than anyone to be remembered at this day and this place, as he was the founder of your town.

The exploration of the coasts had been comparatively easy, and thousands had attempted it. Settlers from France were the first to try their chance inland; they traveled across a huge continent more unknown then to the civilized world than was in our time the Africa of Livingstone and Stanley. They did it in a cheerful, optimistic spirit that nothing daunted but death. Living as they did in truly "howling wildernesses," there remained yet with them something of the mother country; and that appeared not only in their speech and manners, but in their very attitudes. Charlevoix meets figures of dead men fabricated by Indians. He was glad to find that they were represented with falling arms, from which he concluded that the authors of the trophies had massacred some of their own kin. When Indians killed French people, the figures represented men with their fist on their hip, Versailles fashion.

How could it be otherwise when they lived, some of them, on a settlement owned by a gentleman called d'Artagnan and managed, as was appropriate, by two musketeers. One almost expects the names of those two to have been Porthos and Aramis; but they were d'Artiguidres and De Benac.

And these men recalled their country in more important things than names and attitudes. Cadillac had scarcely given a name to the spot where he meant to create a town than he sent for his wife and younger son. It was to be a town, indeed, with wives and children and family life, and it was so, and it has ever been so since Cadillac willed it. When La Salle was killed in his second journey to the Mississippi in 1687, he had with him his brother and two nephews. The newcomers soon discovered that the region was not the metallic eldorado they had heard of it in Europe, but that it was a matchless agricultural country, and they began cutting the trees and tilling the ground, with none of the modern instruments and helps, no harvesting machines from "Chicago," as the then desert spot was called in their days; no horses, no horned cattle. They led, indeed not in fiction, but in truth—and long before the famous "Mariner of York" was wrecked by the Orinoco River—the life of Robinson Crusoe. Unknown to Europe, far from any neighbors, by the shade of the pathless forest, they tried their best. They died, many of them obscurely, leaving no name to be engraved on the bronze tables of history, but leaving better than a mere name—families, many of which still subsist; better than families—examples of earnestness and endurance, creating a tradition which will never die out, "Rien ne se perd."

The greatness of their difficulties, the scantiness of their means, the wisdom of many of their views are equally striking. More than one did their utmost to teach and improve their Indian neighbor. They forbade at an early date the selling to them of the destructive "fire water." Cadillac did so from the first; the Marquis de Vaudreuil reissued the same orders later. They soon discovered that the northern regions alone could produce wheat enough to feed the whole country, "though it should be quite peopled down to the sea." The question of labor was one of prominent difficulty and importance. Should it be hired labor of freemen or the compulsory labor of the imported negro? On this, one of those early French explorers, Charlevoix, summed up his opinion in the following memorable sentence: "Hired servants should be preferred. When the time of their service is expired they become inhabitants and increase the number of the King's natural subjects, whereas the slaves are always strangers. And who can be assured that by continually increasing in our colonies they will not one day become formidable enemies? Can we depend upon slaves who are only attached to us by fear and for whom the very land where they are born has not the dear name of mother country?"

More striking than all was the observation of a Frenchman who never visited America, except in thought, but saw distinctly its future. When no one yet believed it, that great economist and statesman, Turgot, said: "America one day will be free."

Years went on. The dark shadows and splendid rays of light with which French history is interwoven shone and vanished in their grand and awful alternance. One day the French flag was lowered in Louisiana; that was at the close of the Seven Years War. Another day the same flag was seen on the mast of a small vessel leaving the harbor at Bordeaux and sailing for America. The ship happened to bear the auspicious name of La Victoire, and it bore Lafayette. Then it was the alliance of 1778, and the coming on the same year of the first envoy accredited by any nation to this country, my predecessor, Gerard de Rayneval, a staunch friend of America; then the peace of 1783, when, with the assent of the whole world, to the joy of every French heart, 13 stars shone on the American flag.

France recovered, then, neither Louisiana nor Canada, nor anything. But she never intended it. She won a friend, and such a friend is better than any province.

She was very happy, having exactly fulfilled without change, bargain, or extenuation the task she had mapped out for herself in 1778, when she declared in the alliance treaty that the "direct and essential object of the same was efficaciously to maintain the freedom, sovereignty, and absolute and illimited independence of the United States." The joy was such in Paris at the news of American independence that performances in the theaters were interrupted; the great event was announced, and audiences rose to their feet to cheer the new-born Republic. Festivities were given and colored prints were scattered all over France for the benefit of those who could not be present. Such souvenirs were proudly kept in families. One such came to the remote house of my own parents in the mountains, and it was carefully preserved and I possess it at this day.

France followed her destinies; in 1800 Louisiana was French again; three years later on the spontaneous proposal of the French Republic, not New Orleans alone, not a mere strip of land, but the whole country became forever American.

The treaty signed one hundred years and a day ago had little precedent in history; it dealt with territories larger than the Empire of Alexander; it followed no war; it was preceded by no shedding of human blood; the new possessions got a hundred times more than they even thought of demanding, and the negotiations were so simple, the good faith and mutual friendship so obvious, that all was concluded in a fortnight. The simplest protocol on postal or sanitary questions takes nowadays more time. Each party found its interest in the transaction, but something more than interest led the affair to a speedy conclusion and that was the deep-rooted sympathy of the French and American nations.

The French were simply continuing what they had begun; they had wished America to be free and they were glad to think that she would be great. Money was paid, it is true; had this been the main consideration, Louisiana would have been preserved, for the money was not by far the equivalent of the buildings and lands belonging to the State. Part of the money was employed in satisfying American claims. "Those," says the French negotiator, Marbois, "who knew the importance of a good understanding between these two countries, attached more importance to the $4,000,000 set apart for American claims than to the $12,000,000 offered to France."

An impending war in Europe, the possibilities of an occupation of Louisiana by a foreign power was not, either, the main motive. In the council held at the Tuileries on Easter day, 1803, the Marshal and Prince of Wagram, Berthier, whose first war had been the war of American independence, said, as to this: "If Louisiana is taken from us by our rivals what does it matter? Other possessions would soon be in our hands, and by means of an exchange, we should quickly obtain a restitution." He concluded, "No navy without colonies, no colonies without a navy."

Add again that the value of Louisiana was much better understood than it had been before. "I know the worth of what I give up," said Bonaparte; and the French Government knew it indeed. They acted with open eyes, for they had taken care from the year 1800 to gather all available information. One of the memoirs with which they enlightened themselves had been asked of Louis Vilemont, former captain in the regiment of Louisiana. It is still unpublished; and it informed the Government that "from various reports of Canadian and Indian hunters it is possible to walk from Missouri to the sea in less than two months and a half."

An access to the Pacific was not so easy as now, but yet an access was practicable, and the wealth of the country was extraordinary. Warming at the souvenir of what he knew, the retired officer exclaimed, "What sources of wealth can we not expect to find in those parts! At each step made from east to west all produce, all things increase tenfold. It seems as if nature had made this corner of the globe the most favored one of our immense empire. The samples of all reigns have more beauty and majesty than anywhere else. The men born there look more like the descendants of Alcides than the kinsmen of the tribes who worship Manitou."

The main motive power, without which all the others would have been of no avail, was, indeed, mutual sympathy. When the treaty was signed the three negotiators, Barbe-Marbois, Monroe, and Livingston, who had known each other in America at the time of the war of Independence, rose, and, what is rare on such occasions, one of them was able to express in a single sentence the intimate feelings of the three. "The treaty which we have just signed," said Livingston, "will cause no tears; they prepare centuries of happiness to innumerable generations of human beings; from this day the United States take their place among the powers of the first rank."

I do not think that there is another example in the history of the world of a cession of such vast territories thus obtained by the representatives of one of the parties to the applause and with the heartfelt consent of the representatives of the other.

The treaty giving away in full possession and forever Louisiana to the United States, allowing them to spread without meeting any foreign neighbors from one ocean to the other, adding fourteen States to the original thirteen, was signed one hundred years ago, "au nom du peuple Francais" in the year XI of the French Republic. The results have passed the most sanguine hopes, but they have not gone beyond the extent of our friendly wishes for the sister Republic of America. The representative of France comes to this spot that was French in former times with a feeling of admiration for what you have done, and no feeling of regret. He sees splendid development, arts, sciences, trade, and agriculture equally prosperous; he applauds your success, and expresses from his heart his good wishes for your grand exhibition of next year.

As for his own country, if she no longer holds those immense domains, she has, on the other hand, found other territories for the peaceful employment of her inexhaustible energy, with results which will forever redound to the praise of the Government of the Republic. And as for Louisiana itself, France rests satisfied with remembering that she could not have more friendly nor more sympathetic intentions. She remembers also, not without pride, that her sons first discovered and tilled the soil, first described it, and first drew a map of it; that one of her most famous writers first revealed to the world the springs of poetry that lay concealed as much under the fir trees of the Mississippi Valley as under the plane trees of Tempe; the diplomat and literary artist who made all those who had a mind and heart weep for the fate of Atala.

Seeing the results, my countrymen have never ceased to approve of the treaty signed a hundred years ago "au nom de peuple Francais." Eighteen hundred and three is the third memorable date in the relations between France and America. In giving the United States, according to the words of your negotiator, its place among the greatest powers in the world, 1803 did nothing but perfect what had been gloriously begun in 1778 and 1783.

Sixth. Music by the Marine Band, playing the Spanish "Himno de Riego."

Seventh. Address by the Spanish minister, Señor de Ojeda:

MR. PRESIDENT, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN: I greatly regret my inability to respond to the very flattering recognition of the part played by Spain in the early history of this territory. I wish I were endowed with the same eloquence displayed by previous orators, which it has been our privilege to listen to and admire. Still, had not the national glories of Spain been so brilliantly alluded to, were I able to recall them now with colors as glowing as the warmth their memory brings to my Spanish heart, I feel I could not raise to them a loftier or more eloquent monument than has been raised by those immortal works of Washington Irving, Prescott, Lowell, and Ticknor, which have made of Spanish tradition a familiar household patrimony of this nation.

I am sure you will agree with me in thinking that I could do no better, that I could not pay a higher nor more honorable nor lasting tribute to our share in the history of this continent than by invoking the testimony of your own literary genius and by referring now to that grateful recognition which moved the founders of this Republic to associate the revered memory of Isabella, the soul-stirring deeds of Pizarro, Cortez, and Ojeda, with the temple of your nationality.

If ever the engrossing conclusions of your wonderful actual prosperity, the intensity of your life, made one of your strenuous citizens forget what your present owes to your past, let him ascend the steps of your national capitol, let him pause before its majestic gates, and there he will behold, carved in bronze on the threshold of your proudest monument, the effigies and the names of those Spanish heroes who discovered, conquered, and pointed to you the way in which path you have so successfully followed.

As a guest, sitting now for the first time at the hearth of the American nation, I feel bound to respond to that high tribute made to Spain by publicly acknowledging here the enviable kindness shown by all classes of your people since I landed on your shores.

As the representative of the nation whose ancient and honored flag was the first to be reflected in the majestic course of the father of American rivers, I am happy to feel that my first official appearance before an American audience is associated in both your minds and mine with the commemoration of an event which, although involving far-reaching issues in the respective histories of three great nations, has not and never was darkened by the rankling memories which war and international strife always leave in their wake.

For, Mr. President, Spain, exclusively devoted to-day to the task of developing her immense resources, is happy to be associated with you in this peaceful celebration of a peaceful event. Believe me, Mr. President, the Spanish people will enter into this noble competition for the prizes of progress and civilization with that same stubbornness with which during seven centuries they maintained the heroic struggle which saved Europe and the Christian world from the baneful invasion of African hordes.

Spain will apply to the arts of peace, to the conquests of progress, that same and indomitable spirit which enabled her to enrich the Old World with a new one, over whose brilliant destinies she watches and ever will watch with intense and undying interest.

Spain hails with pleasure an opportunity like your future exposition will afford of showing her peaceful conquests in the domains of labor, and is especially bent on attracting toward her the benefits to be derived from this growing tendency of her people to an everlasting commercial, agricultural, and industrial interchange. She, more than over anxious to cultivate and strengthen her friendly relations with the world, could not but welcome with sympathy the announcement of this vast enterprise as a right step toward that blending of her material and moral interests with those of other nations, to that better understanding among them which she will indefatigably strive to attain.

You can therefore rest assured, Mr. President, that my country will contribute to the World's Fair and enhance with its varied exhibits its universal and historical features. I am, in fact, authorized to inform you that His Majesty's Government has decided to ask for the requisite appropriation as soon as Parliament assembles. Spain will appear before you, if not in all the splendor that the requirements of her wise, economical programme now forbid, at least in the manly garb of a nation meaning to show you and to show the world that her gloriously checkered career, instead of impairing our vitality, has retempered the ever-elastic steel of our national fiber and concentrated and directed all its latent energies toward the modern conquests of progress, labor, and civilization to which the city of St. Louis is now erecting a temple worthy of the city itself and of the auspicious event we are now commemorating.

And now, Mr. President, in wishing success to your noble undertaking, in thanking you and this city for its cordial hospitality, I beg to acknowledge also my gratitude for the numerous tokens and expressions of good will toward Spain which have been uttered during this solemn celebration and which I so fully appreciate.

I beg to salute reverently in that new-born flag of your exhibition and august emblem of peace and labor, a touching appeal to fraternity among nations. In that flag are blended the past and the present with the glorious colors of the three nations representative of St. Louis's early and contemporary history. Let us welcome its appealing and eloquent symbolism like the herald of an ever-cloudless future.

Eighth. "Hallelujah Chorus" from The Messiah.

Ninth. Benediction by Rev. Samuel J. Niccolls:

Almighty God, Heavenly Father, whose all-wise Providence did lead our fathers across the seas to this land, and Who hath given their children a goodly heritage, let Thy blessing rest upon their children. Let Thy blessings rest upon all the nations represented here to-day and upon the representatives. May we continue in the bonds of peace for all time. May the grace of God, mercy, and peace be with us. Amen.

Tenth. Centennial salute of 100 guns.