At Delmonico’s, December 20, 1889, a dinner was given by the Spanish-American Commercial Union to the visiting delegates to the Pan-American Congress.  William M. Ivins, as the principal speaker, touched upon South American relations and international arbitration as a prevention of war.  Among those present were Mayor Hugh J. Grant, Elihu Root, Andrew Carnegie, Chauncey M. Depew, and Horace White.  On the walls were portraits of Washington and General Bolivar, and intertwined with the Stars and Stripes, the vividly coloured banners of the South American nations.  At the right of the chairman, William H.T.  Hughes, sat Senor F.C.C.  Zegarra of Peru, and at the left Mayor Grant.  The address of welcome was delivered first in English and then in Spanish by Mr. Hughes, who possessed a perfect command of both languages.  Senor Zegarra responded.  The toast “Our Next Neighbour” was answered by Senor Matias Romero of Mexico.  Other toasts and speakers were:  “International American Commerce,” William M. Ivins; “International Justice,” Elihu Root; “Our Homes,” Rev. Dr. John R. Paxton; “America—­All Republican,” John B. Henderson, and random addresses from the gallery by Mr. Depew and Judge Jose Alfonso of Chile.

The next Fifth Avenue reception of importance was that given by the Union League Club to General W.T.  Sherman on April 17, 1890.  It was a belated celebration of the old soldier’s seventieth birthday which had taken place on February 8.  In the centre of the decorations of the usual patriotic colours and design was the Daniel Huntington portrait of the General in uniform.  Regulars of the 5th U.S.  Artillery lined the stairway leading from the lobby to the reception hall.  The General, reaching the club-house at eight-thirty, was met by James Otis, J. Seaver Page, and General S. Van Vliet, and, between the lines of soldiers at present arms, conducted to a place beneath his own portrait.  There, surrounded by President Depew of the Club, Secretary of the Interior John W. Noble, and General Van Vliet, he greeted the six or seven hundred invited guests.  The gathering included representatives of the army, the navy, the bench, the clergy, as well as business, professional, and political life.  The Vice-President of the United States, Levi P. Morton, was there, and Secretary Noble, Senators W.M.  Evarts and Nelson W. Aldrich, Generals Schofield, Howard, Porter, and Breckenridge, and foreign diplomats from Russia, Chile, Brazil, and Peru.  Of the march to the sea Chauncey M. Depew said:  “It was a feat which captured the imagination of the country and of the world, because it was both the poetry of war and the supreme fact of the triumph over the rebellion.”