No-one would be audacious enough oven to hint a doubt that Scotsmen are very enterprising and thorough, especially in the Far Eust, or that when they undertake as a body to do a thing they do it with a will and command success. Memory takes a series of leaps each a year long from one 30th of November to another, till way back to the time when Scotsmen dined together at the Club and delivered carefully compiled speeches, leaving the lassies out in the cold altogether; but try as memory may, with all its traditional preference of the past, it cannot recall a more completely successful Caledonian Ball than that which was given at the Astor Hall on Monday. With such a strong Committee and such a capa ble company of Stewards the Ball could not fail to go well. The former, were Messrs. John Prentice, President, George Miller, Vice-President, W. B. Buyers, R. M. Campbell, Wade' Gard'ner, George Peebles, A. Wright, S. M. McLeish, Hon. iPreasurer, and W. G. Pirie, Hon. Secretary; while the latter included Messrs. C, Murray Adamson, A. S. Bremner, J. B. Cameron, Alex. Campbell, B. A: Clarke, G. D. Courts, D. W. Crawford, W. H, Drummond, A. B. Garriock, Duncan Glass, S. Groundwater, W. Hardie, E. Henderson, 'M.D., Henry Keswick, Alex. Laing, John Liddell, R. Macgregor, Capt. D. Mackenzie, H. A. J, Macray, A. J. MeClure, A. Me-Yeod, John Mitchell, W. C. Murray, J. W. S. Neeson, R. C. Renny, R. J. Sloan, IND., A. H. Stewart, G. Sutherland, R. Sutherland, and J. Tulloch; and a special mention should be made of the invaluable as well as indefatigable services rendered by the Hon. Sec., Mr. Pirie.
The cor Scotorum, as perfercidwm as their ingenium, had extended their invitations as widely as the community itself has expanded, and at the opening of the Ball the Astor Hall, large as it is, was crowded. Great pains had been taken with the decorations, from the illuminated representation of St. Andrew, smiling benignantly as is his wont, at one end, to the dais, backed by a substantial refreshment table, at the other; while garlands, ribbons, coloured lamps, and the shields of the clansbrightened every vacant place on the walls and ceiling. The faces of happy couples beamed down from the private boxes in the clerestory, and even the gallery was invaded, where Commander Vela conducted the Town Band through the following programme Ist—Extra Waltz—Catali Roeder.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.