Though receiving no marked token of respect from the government, yet other honors social and substantial, were not wanting. By the city of New York he was presented with a set of silver plate. The merchants of Boston had a medal struck in his honor. The original was presented to him in gold[[41]] the subscribers receiving copies in silver and bronze. From the city of Newport, his native place, he was tendered a reception by the municipal authorities.
Little Rhode Island, so justly proud of her many eminent sons, was not unmindful that the Perrys were of her own soil. She accordingly summoned Matthew Calbraith Perry to receive at the hands of her chief magistrate, and in presence of her legislature, a token of her regard in the form of a solid silver salver weighing three hundred and nineteen ounces, suitably chased and inscribed. The resolutions of the legislature ordering the token were passed February 25th 1855.
An open air ceremony or presentation was decided upon and took place at 5 o’clock in the afternoon of June 15th upon the balcony in front of the old State House, the legislators occupying the room within. In response to the governor’s address Perry, deeply moved, spoke as follows:—
“It was in my earliest boyhood, before the introduction of steamboats or railroads, that I often watched upon the shore for the first glimpse of the gaily decorated packet-sloop, that in those days usually brought the governor from Providence to this town, and witnessed with childlike delight, in sight of this very edifice, the pomp, parade and festivities of ‘Election Day.’ Since then I have traversed almost every part of the globe in the prosecution of the duties of a profession of which I am justly proud, and now, after a lapse of nearly half a century, when declining in life, to be called by the representatives of my native state back to these hallowed precincts, here to receive from the lips of its Chief Magistrate the commendation of my fellow-citizens, is an honor I little expected when as a boy midshipman, forty-six years ago, I first embarked upon an element, then and always the most congenial to my aspirations for honorable emprise.”
SILVER SALVER IN POSSESSION OF COMMODORE PERRY’S DAUGHTER,
MRS. AUGUST BELMONT.
Cherishing a keen remembrance and love of his boyhood’s home, he resolved to visit it, and also the ancestral farm and cemetery at South Kingston. In a call made upon one of his earliest friends he stated that his object was to purchase the Perry homestead, which he said would never have gone out of the family if he had not been at sea. He wished to erect a monument to his grandfather, Freeman Perry.
While thus on his native heather, the burly Commodore would visit also Tower Hill where his father once lived, and his youngest sister, Mrs. Jane Butler of South Carolina, was born. When offered a guide he said he thought he knew the way better than his guide. Every foot, indeed, was familiar ground. Miss Oprah Rose, in writing, March 15th 1883, of this visit, says further: “I had never seen the Commodore before, but had seen his younger brother and sister. His hair, I noticed, was handsome and grew well on his forehead. His eyes indicated thought, and, as he turned them rather slowly, seemed to take in or comprehend what he saw; in manner he was easy and natural. As he walked away, I saw that he expressed character in the manner he carried his shoulders. It was a military air. He looked as if he expected to do his duty even if he made sacrifices.”
Resuming his literary tasks during the months of June and July, between artists and engravers, he collected the illustrative matter for the text of his first volume. This, with the first part of the manuscript amounting to one hundred and fifty-nine pages, he sent to the printer on the 7th of August. He then hied away to Saratoga to forget the novel cares of authorship in drinking at the famed health-fountains and inhaling the air of the Kayaderosseras hills. He found much change and some improvement. The hostelry of the old Revolutionary soldier, Jacobus Barhyte, where all the famous people gathered to enjoy the host’s famous fish dinners, and in whose groves Poe elaborated his poem of The Raven, was gone, along with the well stocked preserves; but in grander hotels and on ampler porches, the gay throng chatted and enjoyed life. The Commodore after a ten day’s stay returned to New York, April 27.
When his first volume was out, Perry enjoyed the author’s genuine delight of sending autograph presentation copies of his book to personal friends and those most interested in the Japan enterprise. Among several autographs letters of acknowledgement, is one from Irving in which he says:—