Relations with Downing 91 



That the two men were regularly in correspondence on 

 subjects of professional interest may be inferred from a bit 

 in a letter to Charles Brace, not yet returned from the Con- 

 tinent, Jan. II, 1851: "I have written to Downing to tell 

 him who you are. He wants me to write him in familiar 

 letters Rough Impressions of Germany, etc. I find I cannot 

 do it. I saw and know too little of Germany to write dis- 

 tinctly upon it, but I agree with him that whoever could do 

 it would be in the way of doing a good deal of small good. " 



There is only a word to be found in the correspondence 

 of that period about Mr. Olmsted's visit to Downing, — in a 

 letter to Fred. Kingsbury, Aug. 5, 1851: "I liked Ossining 

 and Newburgh. ' There is a piece in my book in one of the 

 Horticulturists this summer, on Birkenhead Park mostly." 



In an article by Mrs. Van Rensselaer in the Century for 

 October, 1893, based directly on reminiscences which Mr. 

 Olmsted gave her in conversation, it is stated that he visited 

 Downing at Newburgh and made the acquaintance of Calvert 

 Vaux. 



The second volimie^ of Mr. Olmsted's first book, Walks 

 and Talks (1852), contained the following dedication : 



To the Memory of 



Andrew Jackson Downing: 



Whatever of good, true, and pleasant thought this 



volume may contain, is humbly and 



reverently inscribed. 



Mr. Olmsted left among his papers a jotting evidently 

 intended to be used in beginning an address for some occasion 

 or other. 



A. J. Downing 



This is not a rhetorical introduction to my subject ; it is 

 a plain statement of one of the conclusions of a special study 

 from which I have been led to regard Mr. Downing as a great 



' Downing 's home. 



* The first had been dedicated to Mr. George Geddes, of "Fairmount." 



