_Replies by His Majesty to the Congratulatory Addresses on the Birth of
a Son and Heir to His Throne, by A. P. Everett, Esq., for himself and
other Foreign Consuls; by H. R. H. Prince General Kamehameha; by the
Rev. Mr. Damon and other Clergymen; and by the U. S. Consul, A. Pratt,
Esq., for Foreign Residents generally._
His Majesty replied as follows:
GENTLEMEN:--I very kindly thank you for the congratulations
you have just offered to the Queen and myself, and for the
kind wishes you have expressed for the prosperity and
happiness of the infant Prince. I also thank you for the many
expressions of sympathy and good will which you have employed
towards my people and Government, and for the prosperity of
both. I assure you that the prosperity and happiness of my
country, and of all who live within my rule, are subjects dear
to my heart. And there is no greater encouragement afforded me
that the hopes so often expressed by the friends of the
Hawaiian people will be fulfilled, than the knowledge that I
have the support and sympathy of the great and powerful
nations whose officers I rejoice to see before me on this, to
me, particularly happy day.
PRINCE AND SOLDIERS:--The expressions of loyalty you have just
uttered are very welcome to me. There is no tie between the
head of a government and his troops like that of mutual good
wishes and a common object. Such exists between us, and may it
never cease to exist. So long as it does we have nothing to
fear of one another, but every thing to hope. In the Queen's
name and that of our infant son I thank you kindly for your
generous wishes.
Turning to Mr. Damon and the other reverend gentlemen present His
Majesty observed:
GENTLEMEN:--For your valuable present allow me to thank you in
the name of my son, whose advent into this life has been
greeted so kindly, so heartily, by the community at large, but
by none more sincerely, or with more ardent wishes for his
real happiness than by yourselves--of that I am sure. The
birth of the young Prince has placed me in a relationship to
which I have hitherto been a stranger, and it has imposed upon
me new responsibilities. I trust that in my conduct towards
him throughout my life, I may remember the particular offering
which your affection deemed most proper, and that as this
Bible is one of my boy's first possessions, so its contents
may be the longest remembered. In the Queen's name and my own
I thank you, and it shall be the task of both of us to teach
our first-born child to kindly regard you.
Then addressing himself more particularly to Mr. Consul Pratt, and from
him to the assembly in general, His Majesty added:
GENTLEMEN AND FRIENDS:--I receive your congratulations on this
occasion with mixed feelings of pleasure and pride. I take
pleasure in knowing that the event which has given so much
happiness in my own domestic circle, has caused a pleasure in
this whole community and brought to my house these unmistakable
marks of sympathy and good will; and I cannot but feel pride,
at such a time as this, in knowing that my first-born child,
the destined heir to the position I now occupy, enters the
world amidst your hearty acclamations. I thank you for those
expressions towards the Queen and myself, which are
reiterations of feelings often expressed, and more often
manifested than expressed, but which come doubly welcome at a
time when every parent's heart has a yearning for sympathy.
Gentlemen, you see me a proud father, and by these
manifestations of your love for me and mine you make me a
proud King. Such occasions as these make a throne worthy of
any man's envy, whilst the feelings uppermost in my heart will
establish and seal from this time forth a new tie between me
and every man who, like myself, can say he has a child.