The Bay State Monthly, Volume 1, issue 1 | Page 7

Massachusetts Agricultural College, General Francis A. Walker, president of the Institute of Technology, the Honorable Francis B. Hayes, president of the Horticultural Society, the Reverend Edmund F. Slafter, corresponding secretary of the New England Historic Genealogical Society, John E. Russell, secretary of the State Board of Agriculture, and Major Ben: Perley Poore, secretary of the United States Agricultural Society, and ex-commander of the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company. Other societies with which Mr. Wilder is connected were also represented, as the Massachusetts Society for the Promotion of Agriculture, the New England Agricultural Society, the New England Life Insurance Company, the Hamilton Bank, the Home Savings Bank, the Grand Lodge of Masons, and the Second Church of Dorchester. Letters were received from the Honorable Robert C. Winthrop, president of the Massachusetts Historical Society, his Excellency Benjamin F. Butler, governor, and the Honorables John D. Long, William Claflin, and Thomas Talbot, ex-governors of the State, Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, the Honorable Dr. George B. Loring, United States Commissioner of Agriculture, and the Honorable Francis W. Bird, president of the Bird Club, The addresses and letters are to be printed in full. A few extracts follow:
Dr. Holmes referred to Mr. Wilder as: "The venerable and venerated friend who has outlived the fruits of fourscore seasons, and is still ripening as if his life were all summer."
Mr. Winthrop wrote: "No other man has done so much for our fields and gardens and orchards. He has distinguished himself in many other lines of life, and his relations to the Legislature of Massachusetts and to the Historic Genealogical Society will not soon be forgotten. But his name will have its most enduring and most enviable association with the flowers and fruits for whose culture he was foremost in striving, both by precept and example. He deserves a grateful remembrance as long as a fine pear is relished or a brilliant bouquet admired."
Governor Rice said: "There is hardly a public enterprise of the last three generations, scarcely a pursuit in life, or an institution of patriotism, discipline, or charity, that does not bear the signet of his touch and feel the vigor of his co-operation. Why, sir, it may be said, almost with literal truth, that the trees which this great arborist has planted and cultivated and loved are not more numerous than the evidences of his handiwork in all the useful and beneficent departments of life; and all the flowers that shall grow to the end of time ought to bear fragrance to his memory."
Mayor Palmer said: "Time would fail me to recount his great and honorable services to society and the State. It must suffice to say that no name of this century is written more imperishably in the affection and esteem of Boston and Massachusetts than the name of him, our honored guest."
Dr. Loring wrote: "It is with pride and satisfaction that the business associations of the city of Boston can point to him as a representative of that mercantile integrity which gives that city its distinguished position among the great commercial centres of the world."
Governor Banks said: "I can scarcely enumerate, much less analyze, the numerous and important social and national enterprises which make the character and career of our distinguished guest illustrious."
Governor Chamberlain said: "We rejoice in this honored old age,--this youth, rounded, beautified, and sweetened into supreme manhood; and we rejoice also that it shall remain for after times an example and inspiration for all who would live true lives, and win the honor that comes here and hereafter to noble character."
President Greenough thus spoke:--"The line of buildings which to-day at Amherst graces one of the fairest landscapes in New England, and the sound and practical education which they were built to secure, are to be a lasting monument to his foresight, his patriotism, and his eloquent persuasion."
Mr. Russell said: "To him the agriculture of the Commonwealth owes a debt that can never be paid; the records of our board are a monument of his good works more enduring than brass. And, sir, in view of his venerable years, so lightly borne, his interest in all the active affairs of men, and his continued powers of social enjoyment, I may well repeat the wish of the poet Horace, expressed in one of his invocations to the Emperor Augustus: 'Serus in coelum redeas.'"
Major Poore said: "Mr. President, I am confident that the distinguished gentlemen around these tables will long remember to-night, and recall with pleasure its varied homages to Colonel Wilder, thankful that we have so pure a shrine, so bright an oracle, as the common property of all who reverence virtue, admire manhood, or aspire to noble deeds. Succeeding years will not dim the freshness of Colonel Wilder's fame; and the more frequently we drink at this fountain, the sweeter we