38 THE HORTICULTURE OF 



"Home Farm," with its world-renowned "Smuggler" 

 breed of horses, its extensive avenues of old oaks, wal- 

 nuts, elms, maples and pines, its broad landscape and 

 ornamental grounds. 



The town of Brookline has been celebrated, from an 

 early date for the elegant residences of our wealthy 

 merchants and opulent citizens, and for its gardens, 

 orchards, and ornamental grounds. " Brookline was, for 

 a long time, preeminent in the little cordon of towns 

 which have so long constituted the exquisite envi- 

 rons of Boston, embossing it with rich and varied mar- 

 gins of lawn and lake and meadow and wooded hillside, 

 and encircling its old "plain neck," as Wood called 

 it in his "New England's Prospect," with an unfading 

 wreath of bloom and verdure. 1 Here were the homes 

 of the Ainorys, the Aspinwalls, the Perkinses, Sulli- 

 vans, Sargents, Lees, Gardners, Tappans, of Gen. Theo- 

 dore Lyman, Benjamin Guild, Nathaniel Ingersoll Bow- 

 ditch, John E. Thayer, and others, who have been 

 patrons of horticultural improvement; and although 

 the citizens of Brookline protested in 1773 against 

 the introduction of the leaves of the Tea plant without 

 their consent, they have been proverbially friends of 

 rural taste and the adornment of their residences with 

 other beautiful trees and plants. 



In the very early part of this century the gardens 

 and greenhouses of Col. Thomas Handasyd Perkins 

 were particularly distinguished. Col. Perkins was one 

 of the most eminent merchants of our city, and his 

 public benefactions, especially in founding the Institu- 

 tion for the Blind, will ever be gratefully remembered. 

 He and his brother, Samuel G. Perkins, inherited a love 

 for fruits and flowers from their grandmother, Mrs. Ed- 



iMr. Winthrop's Address at the dedication of the new Town Hall of 

 Brookline. 



