16 MASSACHUSETTS HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



other members of the Society. As a young man he felt something 

 of awe towards them, but he singled out Mr. Wilder and formed 

 an intimate friendship with him. It soon became a custom with 

 him in winter frequently to ride out to Dorchester with Mr. Wilder 

 when he went home at night, and in the evening they would go out 

 to the greenhouse, each with a candle in his hand, and examine 

 the camellias, with their glistening foliage, and on returning to the 

 house they would look over the books on horticulture which Mr. 

 Wilder then possessed. At the close of the evening Mr. Wilder 

 would send him down to the Norfolk House in his carriage, to take 

 the omnibus for Boston on his way home to Cambridge. When, 

 in 1833, the speaker projected the " Magazine of Horticulture," his 

 first thought was of Mr. Wilder, and he asked him to write a paper 

 on the camellia. This he did, extending it through several num- 

 bers of the magazine, and it was the first thing he ever wrote 

 on horticulture. The camellia was then hardly known here except 

 to Mr. Wilder and the speaker. "You can judge from this," said 

 Mr. Hovey, " how much of a friend I have lost." 



Their association on the Flower, Library, and other Committees, 

 was early and long continued, but circumstances changed, and with 

 growing families to bring up their visits to each other necessarily 

 became less frequent. 



Mr. Wilder was one of those men whose magnetism was such 

 that you could not but do what he wanted you to do. Thus the 

 speaker accompanied him to the fair of the United States Agricul- 

 tural Society at Philadelphia, and made an exhibition of fruit 

 there. This enthusiasm was the key-note of his success. Mr. 

 Hovey closed by expressing his trust that the fund which Mr. 

 AVilder had left to the Society would be the means of perpetuating 

 his memory long after those who knew him personally should have 

 passed away. 



Benjamin G. Smith said that Mr. Wilder was his beau ideal of a 

 a man. No name of this century is written more iuiperishably 

 in the affection and esteem of Boston and Massachusetts than that 

 of Marshall 1\ Wilder. 



John C. Hove}' spoke of the long letter which he received from 

 Mr. Wilder, after the death of his father, full of the kindest ex- 

 pressions of sympathy. Though in one sense he was an old man, 

 in others he was still young. He kept up his interest in the culti- 

 vation of flowers to the last, as was evinced by the inquiries he 

 made of the speaker in regard to its details. 



