ANNUAL MEETING.

MONDAY, OCTOBER 5, 1874.

THE Twenty-first Annual Meeting of the Boston Board of Trade was held in the parlor of the Merchants' Exchange, on Monday, October 5, 1874, at three o'clock, P. M., the President, Mr. JOSEPH S. ROPES, occupying the chair.

Upon the resolution offered at the last meeting, by Mr. ELIZUR WRIGHT, requesting the appointment of a Committee to consider and report on the best method of encouraging thrift in those whose capital is their labor, and particularly the question whether the functions of a savings bank and a life insurance company, can be usefully combined in the same institution, the Chair appointed the following:NATHANIEL C. NASH, ROBERT O. FULLER, EDWARD WHITNEY, JOHN BOTUME, JR., and ELIZUR WRIGHT.

The report of the Treasurer, Mr. T. QUINCY BROWNE, was read by the Secretary, showing the receipts of the year to have been $66,734.45, and the expenses, $70,715.77.

The report was accepted, and ordered to be placed on file.

Mr. EDWARD W. KINSLEY, Chairman of the Committee appointed at the last meeting of the Board to nominate officers for the ensuing year, presented his report, and the Board voted to proceed to a ballot.

MESSRS. DUPEE, SMITH and WEEKS were appointed as tellers, and they reported the election of the following list:

On motion of Mr. JAMES H. DANFORTH, it was unanimously

Resolved, That the thanks of the Boston Board of Trade be, and they are hereby tendered to JOSEPH S. ROPES, Esq., for the very faithful and efficient manner in which he has served the Board during the past two years.

In response to this action of the Board, Mr. ROPES said:

GENTLEMEN:

It was with much pride and pleasure that I learned a year ago, during my absence in Europe, that I had been re-elected President of this Board, and I need not say what sincere gratification it gives me now to receive this renewed token of your kindness and esteem. I cannot claim any merit, gentlemen, for the brilliant success which has been achieved during the past two years. I feel it due to myself and to my esteemed colleague to express my thanks to my friend Mr. FARNSWORTH, the Vice-President, for his kindness in supplying my lack of service. As you are aware of the personal infirmity which prevents my reading to you, I will take the liberty to ask your Secretary to read to you a few words which I have penned as a farewell address to this Board.

The Secretary then read the following paper:

GENTLEMEN:

In addressing you for the last time as your President, I cannot refrain from offering my hearty congratulations on the skill and success with which your recent enterprise has been carried out. Thanks to the ability and energy of your indefatigable Committees, the Boston Board of Trade now possesses accommodations and facilities for business which may compare favorably with those of any similar organization in this country or elsewhere. May it continue to enjoy them in increasing perfection, and to be sustained, as it has been hitherto, by the enlightened coöperation not only of the merchants of Boston, but of those numerous bankers, capitalists and corporations, whose interest, as well as that of the whole city, must ever be identified with their own. But, gentlemen, important as is the welfare and progress of our own city to us all, let me remind you that your influence and your action are far from being circumscribed by any such narrow limits — they are felt to-day in every part of our land, and they are recognized beyond the Atlantic. Those of us who have so frequently attended the sessions of the National Board of Trade can bear most emphatic testimony to the high appreciation with which your opinions and your delegates have always been received. Your honesty of purpose, your faithful attention to business,

and the entire absence of all selfish aims and sectional objects have been seen and known of all, and hence uniformly given to our delegations a power far greater than their numerical force would warrant. Permit me, gentlemen, to express the hope that this honorable field of usefulness may be more and more diligently cultivated in the future. Do not allow yourselves to be influenced by any fear of being called a debating society! What is the Congress of our nation but a debating society? And well indeed will it be for that august body when its discussions will even approximate in fairness, in decorum, in honesty, and in logical argument, to those conducted by this Board. Though we are nominally a free nation, we are really tied and bound to an enormous and unprecedented extent by the chains of monopoly. Monopolies of banking and currency, monopolies of transportation, monopolies of manufacture and production, rear their hydra heads on every side. It is for you, gentlemen, and for the great body of merchants in this country, to enter the lists against them, and to agitate persistently for such reforms in our legislation as will relieve the overburdened mass of laborers and consumers, while carefully avoiding any sudden shock or permanent injury to any legitimate branch of our National industry. First and foremost of these reforms must be that of our currency, and the restoration of a sound and uniform standard of value. Your persistent efforts have undoubtedly done much to improve the tone of public opinion on this important subject. Let them never be relaxed or intermitted till we are lifted out of the slough of National dishonor and disgrace, and made to stand on the firm basis of just weights, just balances, and a just measure of value. When this is accomplished, it will at once become evident to the meanest understanding that our present exorbitant scale of duties on imports can no longer be maintained, and the necessities of the National revenue, as well as those of the individual consumer, will imperatively demand its revision. Relieved from this double incubus, our great shipping interest will again revive; our foreign commerce will no longer be dependent on foreign merchants, foreign ships, and the protection of foreign flags. The various branches of our National industry, restored to a fair equilibrium, will spring into universal activity. The growing antagonism of capital and labor will have received its death blow, and the magnificent spectacle of National prosperity, hitherto so conspicuous on paper (unredeemed and depreciated paper,) will become an established reality. In retiring from this responsible and honorable office, I have much satisfaction in knowing that my place will be filled by one so competent in every