A few notes of my visit to America may be acceptable to your readers.
I offer only those which have some bearing on Vegetarianism.
It was my good fortune , on arriving in Philadelphia, to be received,
with my daughter into the hospitable home of Mr. and Mrs. Horrocks at
Frankford, where I found the memory of a previous visit five years before,
in company with my son, Ernest, Mr. & Mrs. Axon, Mr. Dixon, and
Mr. Hanson, had been kept green and pleasant. Many homes were opened
to me, and such overflowing goodwill as I never experienced before in
the same space of time. My first ministration was in the Bible Christian
Church. This visit was on May 7th, when I discoursed on the Bible and
Vegetarianism. This was followed by several week-night meetings, held
at Mr. Taylor's, Mr. Horrock's, and other houses, where questions were
proposed by many persons, several of whom were connected with other
churches, and answered to the best of my ability. Rev. H. S. Clubb helped
both by questions and answers, nearly the whole discourse beng on the
Vegetarian principle.
A meeting was held at Mr. Clubb's house, where I had the advantage
of hearing and meeting members of the Philadelphia Vegetarian Society,
including Dr. Lovell, Miss Oakey, and others. Among the guests were
Mr. and Mrs. Silliman, from Vineland. Mrs. Silliman, formerly Miss English,
will be remembered by some friends who met her at Washington.
The day before I left New York Mr. Scott, president of the New York
Vegetarian Society, gave a dinner in the "Eyrie," a restaurant,
on the twenty-third storey overlooking the city, at which thirty persons
attended. Afterwards we adjourned to a hall in Fifth Avenue, where a
meeting was held; addresses were delivered by the president, myself,
Rev. H. S. Clubb (Philadelphia), and others. In the course of my address
I mentioned a statement casually made to me by a non-Vegetarian, that
"we used to hear more of this subject forty years ago," which
brought from Mr. Clubb a warm and emphatic denial that the question
ever was so much heard of at any previous time as at the present. Mr.
Scott also spoke of his publication, The Vegetarian, by which
the propaganda was carried on fom New York. He kindly presented me with
a volume. In the company I found Mrs. Fred Douglass, widow of the great
advocate of Emancipation, with whom some of our Manchester friends formed
a personal acquaintance at Chicago five years ago.
About a dozen Philadelphia Vegetarians had come up to attend this meeting
and to say farewell.
I also noted an old fellow-voyager of that time, Miss Wilson, of New
York, and a good few new friends, most ardent and intellectual people.
It was a night to be remembered!
Next day, when we embarked, all our Philadelphia friends were there,
with Mr. and Mrs. Haviland, to whom we and the cause are under great
obligations, Mr. Scott, and others of the New York Society. Cheering
and waving of handkerchiefs were kept up as long as we were in sight,
and after that we looked and looked still to the place where we could
no longer distinguish their forms.
