Major Thomas C. Elder was selected by the court to receive the portrait on behalf of the Board of Supervisors. The selection was a happy one. Never have we heard in that Court House an address so chaste, so scholarly, so rich in beautiful worded thought, so thoroughly impressive and appropriate. It was a literary gem. To sketch it would be to mar it, and we regret that our limited space does not permit its publication in full, together with the address to which it was a response. Col. John L. Peyton, son of Hon. John Howe Peyton, was present in the house, and calls were made for him to come to the stand. In recognition of this manifestation, the Colonel said he was taken by surprise in the call that was made, and could only say that he felt gratified with the enthusiastic manner the gift to the county had been received, and the elegant and affecting remarks which had accompanied the presentation of the portrait and its reception. That he was pleased to see his father's likeness on the walls of the hall where his eloquent voice had so often resounded, and suspended in the midst of a people he had loved so much and served so faithfully, for with him it always was "his country first, his country last, his country all the time." LETTERS. FROM THE REV. J. HENRY SMITH, D. D., PASTOR OF THE FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, GREENSBORO, N. C., ONE OF THE FEW SURVIVORS OF MR. PEYTON'S OLD FRIENDS. Greensboro, N. C., July 24th, 1894. _Col. John L. Peyton_: _My Dear Sir_--I have just received from your hand a copy of the "Staunton Daily News" of the 21st inst., and I have read with very great pleasure, the beautiful and eloquent and richly deserved tributes to your honored father at the public meeting in your town called for the acceptance of your father's portrait. It well deserves to be placed among the purest and ablest and noblest of his talented and honored associates and contemporaries. I congratulate _you_ on so interesting an occasion, and I sympathise with you in the filial joy and pride and gratitude to God that your heart, I know, felt, as those tributes were paid to your noble father's character and influence. Next to the fear of God, is the feeling we cherish for a father, who has taught us in the right way of virtue and honor, who has exemplified such a life and led us onward and upward. I think the _5th Commandment_ stands in the decalogue where it does, because the love and reverence to parents is next to the love and fear of God, in the estimation of God himself.