Edward Drinker was born in a cottage in 1689, on the spot where the city
of Philadelphia now stands, which was inhabited at the time of his
birth, by Indians, a few Swedes, and Hollanders. He often talked of
picking blackberries, and catching wild rabbits, where this populous
city is now seated. He remembered William Penn arriving there the second
time, and used to point out the spot where the cabin stood in which Mr.
Penn and his friends were accommodated on their arrival.
The life of this aged citizen is marked with circumstances which never
befel any other man; for he saw greater events than any man, at least,
since the Patriarchs. He saw the same spot of earth, in the course of
his own life, covered with woods and bushes, the receptacles of wild
beasts and birds of prey, afterwards become the seat of a great city,
not only the first in wealth and arts in America, but equalled by few in
Europe; he saw great and regular streets, where he had often pursued
hares and wild rabbits; he saw fine churches rise upon morasses, where
he used to hear nothing but the croaking of frogs; great wharfs and
warehouses, where he had so often seen the Indian savages draw their
fish from the river; and that river afterwards full of great ships from
all the world, which in his youth had nothing bigger than a canoe; and
on the same spot, where he had so often gathered huckleberries, he saw
their magnificent city hall erected, and that hall filled with
legislators, astonishing the world with their wisdom and virtue. He also
saw the first treaty ratified between the united powers of America, and
the most powerful prince in Europe, with all the formality of parchment
and seal; and on the same spot where he once saw William Penn ratify his
first and last treaty with the Indians; and to conclude, he saw the
beginning and end of the British empire in Pensylvania. He had been the
subject of many crowned heads; but when he heard of the many oppressive
and unconstitutional acts passed in Britain, he bought them all, and
gave them to his great grandson to make kites of; and embracing the
liberty and independence of his country in his withered arms, and
triumphing in the last year of his life, in the salvation of his
country. He died on the 17th of November, 1782, aged 103 years.