DR. BRINCKLE 285 



" Soon after the establishment of the ' Horticulturist' 

 I introduced my much lamented friend Downing to 

 Dr. Brinckle, at the time residing in Girard Row, 

 Chestnut street, then the most distinguished range of 

 houses in Philadelphia. His dwelling was capacious 

 and fashionable, but its attraction to Downing was a 

 garden about as large as the parlor, and a fourth -story 

 front room looking south; in the former was con- 

 tained a few raspberry bushes, on which the Doctor 

 was experimenting ; and there stood the Brinckle 

 Orange, then bearing, for the first time, half a dozen 

 of its golden berries ; others were about, but the 

 Orange was evidently his pet, and it did not deceive 

 his hopes. That fruit alone is a passport to enduring 

 fame ; an acquisition in every sense to be proud of. 



"The up -stairs front room floor was covered with 

 pots of strawberries, on which hybridizing experiments 

 were in progress, and the Doctor told us, with evident 

 satisfaction, that he could pick a bowl of fruit for a 

 patient at all seasons. Much conversation ensued 

 between the two lovers of improvement, and when we 

 left, Downing said much what your correspondent has 

 written [page 284], that Brinckle had done more for 

 horticulture than any other person in America. If I 

 am not mistaken, he thought more than all the rest 

 of us put together. 



"Dr. Brinckle was eminently a genial man, and 

 loved to have his friends around him. He gave, on 

 one occasion, of a fruit-growers' exhibition, the most 

 superb fruit party ever seen in this country. All the 

 gardeners and amateurs vied with each other to fill his 

 noble table with their best fruits; these, combined 

 with the very recherche cookery of Philadelphia's best 



