STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 313 



First Vice President Berckmans then read the 



RESPONSE OF PRESIDENT WILDER. 



Mr. President; Words cannot express the regret I experience 

 in not being able to participate with you and my other friends of 

 our nation in the privileges and pleasures with which you are 

 crowning your courtesies to the American Pomological Society. I 

 should have rejoiced exceedingly could I once more personally ex- 

 press to the members of the society over which you so gracefully 

 preside the gratitude I feel for the aid which it has rendered in 

 promoting the interests of our association. This is the fourth time 

 that our society has been the recipient of your generous hospitali- 

 ties, and for which we now and ever will express our most grateful 

 acknowledgments. No place could be more appropriate for the 

 assembling of our national society than this city, so renowned for 

 its good deeds and good men ; here where some of the first sys- 

 tematic efforts were made for the promotion of the agriculture and 

 horticulture of our country ; here where our tree of American lib- 

 erty was planted, under whose wide spreading branches more than 

 fifty millions of souls are now rejoicing in the blessings of peace 

 and freedom. And let it ever be remembered that here were once 

 the homes of Brinckle, Buist and James, who were among the 

 founders of our society, and did so much to promote its progress 

 and prosperity. 



Mr. President, I rejoice most heartily in everything which has 

 for its object the promotion of the science of the soil, especially in 

 the growth and prosperity of our own association. When I reflect 

 on its remarkable growth and influence, that at its establish- 

 ment, there were only twelve states represented, and that it 

 now embraces in its organization more than fifty states, territories 

 and districts, all working harmoniously for the advancement of our 

 cause, my heart rises in gratitude to the Giver of all Good that He 

 has permitted me te see this day. 



No nation has such grand facilities for fruit culture, and no peo- 

 ple have made such rapid progress in that art. When I look for- 

 ward to the possibilities and probabilities of our vast territor y, 

 capable of producing almost all of the fruits of the known world, 

 and its rapid extension throughout our borders, my soul cries out, 

 ''Give me, Lord! a few more years that 1 may witness more of 

 the progress of pomology in America — more of the progress of lib- 

 ■erty, prosperity, and greatness of the American republic." 



