Sir,--On behalf of the New Orleans Chess Club, and in compliance with the instructions of that body, we, the undersigned committee, have the honor to invite you to visit our city, and there meet Mr. Paul Morphy in a chess match. In transmitting this invitation, permit us to observe, that we are prompted no less by the desire to become personally acquainted with one whom we have so long admired, than by the very natural anxiety to ascertain the strength of our American players by the decisive criterion of actual conflict over the board.
We can see no valid reason why an exercise so intellectual and ennobling as chess, should be excluded from the generous rivalry which exists between the Old and the New World, in all branches of human knowledge and industry. That the spirit of emulation from which this rivalry arises has not, hitherto, been made to embrace our chivalrous game, may be mainly ascribed to the fact that, although the general attention paid to chess in the United States during the last fifteen years has produced a number of fine players, yet their relative force remained undetermined, and none could assert an indisputable right to pre-eminence. The late Chess Congress has, however, removed this obstacle, by finally settling the claims of the several aspirants to the championship; and it must now be a matter of general desire to fix, by actual contest with the best European amateurs, the rank which American players shall hold in the hierarchy of chess.
For this purpose it was suggested that Mr. Morphy, the winner at the late Congress and the present American champion, should cross the ocean, and boldly encounter the distinguished magnates of the transatlantic chess circles; but it unfortunately happens that serious family reasons forbid Mr. Morphy, for the present, to entertain the thought of visiting Europe. It, therefore, becomes necessary to arrange, if possible, a meeting between the latter and the acknowledged European champion, in regard to whom there can be no scope for choice or hesitation--the common voice of the chess world pronounces your name; and to us it is a subject of congratulation that the sceptre of transatlantic chess is wielded by one who, with respect to regularity of communication between the two countries, and for other reasons, enjoys facilities for accepting our invitation possessed by no other European player.
