MR. LUNT'S DEDICATION ADDRESS. 155 



" Flora's Invitation," by Thomas Power ; a hymn by the 

 Rev. William C. Croswell ; and an address by the Hon. 

 George Lunt of Newburyport. Mr. Maeder presided at 

 the piano, and was aided by Misses Stone and Emmons, 

 and Messrs. Marshall and Aiken, who sang with fine 

 effect the poetry contributed for the occasion. 



In his oration, Mr. Lunt discoursed of the benevolent 

 order of Nature ; of the rewards which she has for her 

 students ; of the infinite variety of her manifestations, 

 especially in flowers, with their domestic, public, and 

 religious associations ; of the illustrious names connected 

 with the history of gardening ; of the delight of child- 

 hood and old age in a garden; and of the influence 

 of rural scenes upon the literature of a nation. The 

 address abounded in classical and poetical allusions, and 

 concluded as follows : 



" It has been recently stated that the average value of the 

 plants in a single horticultural establishment of London is esti- 

 mated at a million of dollars. And oh, before this magnificent 

 result had been reached from the comparatively trifling beginning 

 of a few centuries ago, what infinite care and cost must have been 

 expended ; what love for the generous science must have been 

 fostered and encouraged ; what distant and unknown regions had 

 been visited, and rifled of the glories of the plains and woods ! 

 From solitary Lybian wastes and those paradises of Persia, the 

 Land of Roses, so eloquently described by Xenophon ; from 

 ' Isles that crown the JEgean deep,' 



to the boundless expanse of this bright heritage of ours ; from 

 Tartarian deserts to prairies of perpetual bloom ; from the fertile 

 breadth of fields beneath the southern skies: to the strange con- 

 tinents of foreign seas and verdant islands of the ocean, 



' Whose lonely race 

 Resign the setting sun to Indian worlds.' 



8 ' Combined with this adventurous spirit of modern discovery is 

 another principle, which has proved eminently favorable to the 



