74 THE HORTICULTURE OF 



from the first settlement of Boston, turned to use by 

 many of its citizens for farm and pasture-lands. In 

 due time, some of its wealthier owners, and more 

 enterprising occupants, introduced orchards and gar- 

 dens. Among these, besides the Adamses, Hancocks, 

 and William Ooddington, was the first comer of the 

 distinguished Quincy family, Edmund Quincy. His 

 estate originally consisted of a thousand acres. He 

 died in 1636, at the age of 33, just after he had built a 

 house on what is now Mt. Wollaston. His son, of the 

 same name, who died in 1697, inherited the estate, and 

 planted an orchard, of which some apple trees still 

 remain. Judge Edmund Quincy, its next owner, a fine 

 lime tree of whose planting has come down to our 

 time, dying in London, the property came to his son, 

 Col. Josiah Quincy, who, about the year 1770, had 

 upon it gardens and orchards, with a rich collection of 

 French pears. The son of the colonel, the eminent 

 patriot, known as Josiah Quincy, Jr., dying in early 

 manhood, left an only son, the late honored Josiah 

 Quincy, Mayor of Boston, and President of Harvard 

 University, to whom his grandfather, dying in 1784, 

 bequeathed the estate. The president, who lived to a 

 venerable age, devoted intervals during his public life, 

 and his retirement from it, to the care, adornment and 

 enrichment of the 350 acres which came to his posses- 

 sion. He was fond of natural beauty, and of agricul- 

 tural improvements, and laid out his grounds with 

 much taste. He planted in 1790 an avenue a third of 

 a mile in length, of six rows of elms, and two of ash 

 trees, still thriving, besides more than a mile and a 

 half of hedge. 1 When President Quincy was in con- 

 gress, in 1809, he obtained from an English gardener, 



1 Miss Eliza S. Quincy's letter. 



