HON. MARSHALL P. WILDER. 6 1 



Major Ben : Perley Poore, Past Commander of the 

 Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company, and Secretary 

 of the United States Agricultural Society, was called upon, 

 and spoke as follows : — 



Mr. President, — It has been asserted that no 

 general is a hero in the eyes of his orderly sergeant ; 

 but I, who have served in a subordinate capacity 

 under Colonel Wilder, in the United States Agricul- 

 tural Society and in the Ancient and Honorable 

 Artillery Company, regard him as a hero. He has 

 attained that distinction without having made a 

 widow or an orphan, without having caused the loss 

 of a drop of blood or a precious life ; he has been 

 the friend of religion and of education ; he is a 

 worthy and well-qualified brother of the mystic tie ; 

 he has activel}'' sustained our parent military or- 

 ganization ; he has secured the preservation of our 

 historical and genealogical archives ; he has im- 

 proved our trees, plants, fruits, and flowers ; and he 

 has " caused two blades of grass to grow where but 

 one grew before." What a noble record ! 



It has been my lot. Sir, as many at these tables 

 know, to pass nearly six months of each of the last fifty 

 years away from my ancestral acres in Massachusetts, 

 and to have occupied a position in connection with 



