THE CAPE COD CENTENNIAL CELEBRATION AT BARNSTABLE, Sept. 3, 1839, OF THE INCORPORATION OF THAT TOWN, Sept. 3, 1639. GIVING A FULL DETAIL OF THE PRELIMINARY PROCEED- INGS OF THE COMMITTEES, AND THE SPEECHES AND TOASTS AT THE DINNER. CORRECTLY REPORTED AND REVISED. BARNSTABLE: S. B. PHINNEY. 1840. Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1839, In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of Massachusetts. Printed at the BARNSTABLE PATRIOT OFFICE. PREFACE. THE GREAT CENTENNIAL AT BARNSTABLE, DEDICATED TO THE PRESENT GENERATION AND TO THEIR POSTERITY IN 1939. Is it not befitting that the relics of this ever memorable festival should be gathered up and preserved, as a memorial of those who partook of its intellectual bounties, to be transmitted to their descendants, when another Century shall have rolled away? With what delight should we have discovered an ancient pamphlet or manuscript, detailing the doings of the natives of Cape Cod, at the first Centennial observance of its settlement in 1739. No such record exists. Let it be our care that a third Centennial shall not be without such a document, establishing, as we believe this little pamphlet is destined to do, a precedent for all coming time, and going forth, with the force of a decree to posterity "in no case to let that day pass without solemnity, but to celebrate, in every hundredth year, the third day of that ninth month called September." These considerations and the very general call to preserve the doings of the 3d of September, 1839, in a more acceptable form, than through the scattered files of newspapers, have induced the Publisher to collect all the materials of interest, connected with that occasion, and embody them in a pamphlet, trusting, at least to defray the expense of the labor through those who participated in the pleasures of that day, and others who would have been but were not present. As a proof of the liberality and promptness with which the arrangements were concerted and carried out, it is proper to |