MR. MAYOR AND GENTLEMEN,--While I cannot but feel highly honored by the beautiful proof you have just given me that I am not forgotten by the ever-faithful city, I value even more the kindly sentiment which prompted it, and to which you have given such graceful expression. I am well aware that it is to what I represent far more than to any merit of my own that I owe this distinction, and that consciousness makes it doubly grateful to me. They who endured exile and danger and every form of hardship to found the great kindred commonwealth beyond the sea--and what that exile must have been they only can feel who know how beautiful and how justly dear was the land they left--took with them, not only such seeds as would bear good fruit for the body, but those also of many a familiar flower that could serve only as food for sentiment and affection. Yet the most precious gems of all were those of memory and tradition, that had the gift of fern-seed to go with them invisibly. They could not forget the land of their birth, nor can we, their descendants, forget the land of our ancestry. They fondly gave the old names to the new hamlets they were planting in the wilderness. The central county of my native State is a namesake of yours. It calls itself proudly the heart of the Commonwealth, and its beautiful chief city is Worcester. You knew how to touch a chord of tenderest association when, four years ago, you claimed me as of Worcestershire because my forefathers (the Lowells) had been so. You have been pleased, Sir, to say that I have done something to strengthen the good feeling between the two great households of the English family. I am glad to think that I in any way deserve this praise, for I look upon that good feeling as of vital interest to the best hopes and aspirations of mankind. I am sure that you will find my excellent successor animated by the same sentiment, and as happy as I have always been, while warmly loyal to the country that is and should be the dearest of all, to recognize ties of blood, of language, and of kindred institutions which make England the next dearest. As for me, Sir, the precious gift you have brought me, truly illuminated by its charming picture of buildings, some of them dear for their beauty, some because they recall your kindness or that of friends who have made me feel as if, when I went to Worcester, I was going home, is only another witness of that universal kindness (may I not say affection?) by which the land of my fathers has gone near to make me fancy that I was a son rather than a far-off cousin. As such it will always be justly dear to me and mine. Wishing continued prosperity to the city of Worcester, I remain, etc.,