MASS. HORTICULTURAL FESTIVAL. 



235 



to a mania. Why then New- York, which is a 

 niin<Tlinn; of these two races, slumld Ite thus dis- 

 tanced in the Held ol' horlicullure, is a problem 

 harder to me than the Plymouth rock itself. 



This minglin<T of the Dutch and Yankee blood 

 seems to me indeed, to produce a love for fancy 

 stocks — not for stock-i^iliys — a passion for A\ all- 

 street — not for Wall-flowers. 



Exhihitions, heautiful shows, we do occasional- 

 ly have — but not in a regular, not in a well-organ- 

 ised, systematic manner. The taste for horticul- 

 ture in New-York, is a litlnl flame, rather than 

 a clear, steady light. Our movements, sometimes 

 grand, sometimes feeble, resemble those of a 

 child's watch, whose hands go half round the 

 dial and then stop, as compared with the regu- 

 lar, steady, onward motions of this Massachusetts 

 chronoineier. 



Perhaps sir, we in New-York, need a more 

 zealous system of pushing, and might, in this 

 respect, more properly be compared to that cele- 

 brated watch of Caj>t. CvtlWs, which Dicke.vs 

 has made immortal, that huge, bulky old time- 

 keeper which the Captain drew out of his breeches 

 pocket with a noise not unlike pulling a hung 

 I'rona a barrel: — and. holding it out to Walter, just 

 as he was setting out on the sea-voyage, said to 

 him — "There Wal'er — take her for my sake — set 

 her for'ard half an hour every morning, and a 

 quarter every afternoon, and — she'll do j-ou 

 credit !" 



I see, sir. in these grand exhibition fairs, fruits 

 and beautiful flowers, without number. But this 

 is not all. They have to me, a deeper signiti- 

 cance than that conveyed to the senses by ricli fla- 

 vors, and delicious odors. I tind in them a stronger 

 spell than that which captivates the eye, or grati- 

 fies the palate. Yes — they speak to me — as I 

 trust they speak to all of us — of a religion of na- 

 ture — an original, innate sentiment of the heart, 

 ■which no change in our condition, no fall, no dark 

 ages, have ever been able wholly to obliterate from 

 the soul of man. 



This yearning after the lost garden, must indeed 

 be strong to force us, so many thousand years af- 

 terwards, to combat with the elements, to strug- 

 gle with barren soil, almost to war with nature, in 

 order to realise some of those early dreams of our 

 race — those recollections which ever haunt us of a 

 lost paradise. 



Mr. President, I thank God that it does remain 

 strong; for I look upon this beautiful art, and all 

 those it involves, as being next to religion, the 

 great humanizer of the age. Beneatti this deep- 

 rooted instinct for a garden — for a spot of earth 

 which we can call our own — lies the germ of that 

 love for home — I may say of that love of country, 

 which most strongly distinguishes civilized man 

 from the savage ; which especially distinguishes 

 him from the lisher — the hunter — and the rude 

 dwellers in tents and wigwams. 



I am, sir, an associationist, but it is such asso- 

 ciations as this which I advocate; associations that 

 teach men the beauty and value of rural life ; 

 where they may sit, not only under their own vine 

 and fig tree, but amid their own blossoming fruit- 

 ful orchards and gardens; homes created by their 



own industry — embellished by their own taste — 

 endeared to them by simple pleasures shared with 

 their own families. This, Mr- President, is the 

 true ideal of Horticulture; this is the good work 

 which it promises to accomplish, and which more 

 than any other pursuit, any other art, any other 

 recreation, it ilues accomplish, that of bringing 

 men into daily contact with nature — of giving 

 them pure, simple, rational jileasure; and, most 

 of all, of teaching them to tind happiness, not, in 

 the excitement of politics, not in the busy tumult 

 of life; but in their country and eoitaae homes — 

 there to understand and realise the truth of that 

 fine saying of Bur.ns, 



"To muki; a liajipy fire-side clime 

 Fur \A'i'aiis a]i(J wiie. 

 That's tlie true piiiiios and sublime, 

 or liiimaii life." 



The Delegation from the Pennsylvania Horticul- 

 tural Society, the oklest in the Unitei States, and 

 between which, and our own Society exist the 

 most friendly relations, was then called on — 



The Pennsijlvania HuriicuUural, Society: With a more 

 freiiiul cimiaic. a riclier .soil, aipl twii years innre growth lhai> 

 ourselves, it luiturully cmsis a shadow upou us. We are 

 williu'i; to repose ui us shade, il' we may s-> iietiiiies partake 

 ot'ils sui)staiice. 



MoKToN McMicHAEL, Esq., delegate from the 

 Society, and Editor of the North American, re- 

 sponded, as follows — 



Mr. President and Ladies and Gentlemen — I am 

 here to-night as the representative of the Pennsyl- 

 vania Horticultural Society ; but as this is the first 

 time the dignity of a furcign embassy has been con- 

 ferred upon me, and 1 find myself in the presence 

 not of one Prince merely, but of many sovereigns ; 

 in the presence, too, of a crowd of beauties such as 

 no court but the court of love could parallel, I feel 

 like the Irish Ambassador, alluded to by my friend, 

 Mr. Skinner, that " situated as I am, indeed, I may 

 say, sir, constrained as I am," my position requires* 

 " a deal of migiity nice consideration." The truth 

 is, ladies, and 1 make the levelation especially to 

 you. because I would not have it repeated out of 

 doors, I am about as ill qualified for the duties 

 which have devolved upon me, as Sir Patrick 

 O'Plenipo was for the duties which were thrust 

 upon him. Indeed. Mr. President, for since I have 

 entered the confessitmal I may as well make a clean 

 breast and disburden my conscience entirely, I am 

 but a counterfeit envoy, a soit of horticultural 

 Hayraddin Magraubin, with a borrowed herald's 

 coat sli))ped over my own every day wear; and aa 

 I am very confident I should be detected if I at- 

 tempted to persist in the imposture, and perhaps 

 made game of, as was the case with the vagabond 

 Bohemian, I own the " soft impeachment." Our 

 society, sir, not unmindful of its own character nor 

 insensible to the courtesies due to you, in addition 

 to my excellent and estimable colleagues, had se- 

 lected for this occasion a most accomplished and 

 able gentleman, (William H. Dillingham, Esq.,) 

 deeply skilled in all the mysteries of your noble 

 science, and of such sweet and voluble discourse 

 that had he been present he would have imjiarted 

 |)leasure to this good company, and reflected credit 

 on those by whom he v.as sent. Unhappily that 



