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14

House as follows:

[Speaker acknowledge for the choice to ?]] Gentlemen It does not become me to pretend indifference towards an expression of favor, so honorable as that, which assigns to me the duty of presiding over your deliberations. This would be mere affection, and in opposition to that spirit and principle in man, which seek the elevation of his nature and readily return the expression of gratitude for every effort in aid of this object. But at the same time I cannot conceal from you the embarrassment under which I must necessarily labor in the discharge of these important duties. This results from a variety of considerations. We are convened at a season of the year, when the private and unavoidable concerns of almost every member cannot fail to produce a degree of solicitude to hasten the business of the session and hence the public expectation, that it will be transacted not only with accuracy, but with dispatch, that accuracy and dispatch, which surely cannot be effected by one, who is entirely without experience and knowledge in the rules and orders of parliamentary debate,