After the usual toasts had been given and responded to,
The Chairman said that if the approved order of their proceedings
had been observed, the Corporation of the City of London would no
doubt have considered themselves snubbed if they were not toasted
by themselves. He was sure that a distinguished member of the
Corporation who was present would tell the company what the
Corporation were going to do; and he had not the slightest doubt
they were going to do something highly creditable to themselves,
and something highly serviceable to the whole metropolis; and if
the secret were not at present locked up in the blue chamber, they
would be all deeply obliged to the gentleman who would immediately
follow him, if he let them into it in the same confidence as he had
observed with respect to the Corporation of the City of London
being snubbed. He begged to give the toast of "The Corporation of
the City of London."
Mr. Alderman Cotton, in replying to the toast, said for once, and
once only, had their chairman said an unkind word about the
Corporation of London. He had always reckoned Mr. Dickens to be
one of the warmest friends of the Corporation; and remembering that
he (Mr. Dickens) did really go through a Lord Mayor's Show in a
Lord Mayor's carriage, if he had not felt himself quite a Lord
Mayor, he must have at least considered himself next to one.
In proposing the toast of the evening Mr, Dickens said:-]
Ladies and gentlemen,--You receive me with so much cordiality that
I fear you believe that I really did once sit in a Lord Mayor's
state coach.
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