Gentlemen,—The duties connected with the high office with which I am honoured cannot indeed be considered to impose any heavy burdens, when their performance leads me to visit populations so kindly in their sympathies as are those of this Province, where we meet men always glad to testify their affection for the institutions under which they live by their reception of the representatives of the Queen. Perhaps in no other country in the world is it possible for the representative of any sovereign to travel for thousands of miles, and to be everywhere greeted with the same assurances of contentment with political condition and affection for the throne. I thank you, especially on the Princess's behalf, for the words you have spoken in reference to her. She will always associate herself gladly in anything tending to the welfare of the people of this Dominion. In so doing she will fulfil the wish of her father the Prince Consort, whose desire it was that his children should identify themselves with the interests of our Colonial Empire. I hear with gladness the assurance you give of the firm and unswerving loyalty of the people of the county of Kings, and I desire to tender to them my sincere thanks.
The first visit to Toronto took place in 1879. A loyal and kindly address having been read, His Excellency replied:—
Mr. Mayor and Gentlemen,—I remember well that the first time I saw Toronto was when, a good many years ago, the city was pointed out to me, where far off, over the waters its houses were visible from a spot not distant from Niagara. This first gave me an idea of the size and importance of your town. Men who were then with me told me that thirty or forty years before there would not only have been nothing visible at that distance, but only a very small settlement when viewed much nearer. But just as the city can be seen from afar, so is its position now so important that you cannot think of Ontario, wide as are its limits, or indeed of Canada itself, without seeing in the mind Toronto, the capital of our most populous Province. Here are combined things rarely found closely united, namely, great commercial prosperity with great literary activity. If you are proving that you can lead the way in commerce, it is as great a distinction that you can, by the ability of your literary men, do much towards guiding and influencing the thoughts of your fellow-citizens of the Dominion. I thank you for your loyal words in our Queen's name. They express the feeling I expected to find among you, but I must speak my grateful acknowledgments for the cordial manner in which you have given utterance to them. Adhesion to our Empire and love for its Sovereign I knew I should find; but the character of this great reception, the magnificence of your preparations to welcome the representatives of the Sovereign, form a demonstration for which I confess I was not prepared. It has been our fortune to be kindly received by great communities, both in the old world and in the new; but I never returned my thanks with a more heartfelt gratitude than I do now to you, the citizens of Toronto, for the manner, at once so splendid and so sympathetic, in which you have been pleased to receive us. In December last, delegates from many of the towns of Ontario came to Ottawa to give us their greeting. Accompanying the addresses presented to us was an offering which, while it showed a feeling of personal regard, might well, I believe, serve as an emblem of the patriotism of Ontario. It was a wreath of that plant which in the old country loads the air with perfume wherever moss and mountain are most green with moisture. Reared among morasses, it grows only where around its roots the soil is firm; and where it springs, the foot may safely tread and securely stand. It was therefore, in olden days, taken as my clan's badge to signify a firm faith and steady trust, and with this signification I looked upon the wreath of marsh myrtle given to us on the part of so many communities in Ontario last December, as a fit emblem and just expression of that steady, firm, and faithful support which our Queen will ever find wherever a citizen of Ontario lives to assert his rights and freedom in upholding the honour, the dignity, and the power of our united Empire.
To an address in German, presented in 1879 at Berlin, Ontario, the
Governor-General answered:—
Meine Herren und Damen!—Die Prinzessin und ich finden es eine unserer angenehmsten Pflichten, Ihnen einen Besuch hier zu machen, um uns von der Fruchtbarkeit, welche Ihre Kolonie charakterisirt, zu überzeugen.
Wir freuen uns um so mehr, da Ihre Zuschrift uns in der lieben deutschen Sprache ein Willkommen sagt, und die Versicherung deutscher Treue aus deutschem Munde kommt.
Wir wissen, daß Sie als Zeichen der Gesinnung Ihrer deutschen
Bevölkerung in Kanada den Spruch, der seit Jahrhunderten dem
Sächsischen Hause angehört:—"Treu und fest," als ihr Motto nehmen
könnten.
Obgleich Sie uns in so treuer Weise empfangen, und der Königin Ihre
Ehrerbietung beweisen, bleiben Sie dennoch gute Deutsche, und sind
darauf stolz, daß Sie Ihre Kinder und Kindeskinder in der kräftigen
Muttersprache erziehen können.
Die Liebe für das alte, deutsche Vaterland sollte nie aussterben; es verhindert jedoch nicht, daß Sie auch die englische Sprache benützen, die doch so sehr mit der deutschen verwandt ist.
Die schönen Worte, die der Poet Arndt geschrieben hat, find Ihnen wohl alle bekannt und wir können sie hier, wo Sie ein anderes Land zu Ihrem Land gemacht haben, wohl gebrauchen: