INTRODUCTION.
 This report is a sequel to one on the geography and vegetation of northern Florida, published in the Sixth Annual Report, late in 1'914, which covered.that part of the. state north of latitude 29'30'. The present investigation begins where the former left off and covers 15 counties on the peninsula, extending south to about latitude 27'40'. These. Central Florida* counties, from Levy, Marion and Volusia on the north to Hillsborough, Polk, Osceola and Brevard on the south, cover about 13,900 square miles or 26% of the area of the state, and included 31% of its total population and
 34% of its white population in 1915.
 In the six years that have elapsed since, the northern Florida report was written considerable additional information about the resources ofthe state has'accumulated, or been unearthed from various publications, and at the same time, a number of improvements in the methods of geographical description have been made. There
-are only half as many natural regions to be described in central as in northern Florida, and the regional descriptions in the present report are more condensed, especially as regards vegetation, for quantitative plant lists, although very significant to those who know how to interpret them, can- probably be fully appreciated only by a small minority of re.aders. Much greater use than before is here made of -statistics, and a multitude of fundamental facts about each region, which it would take at least ten times as long to write out in sentences, is presented in the form of tables, with enough explanation to bring out the salient features.
 On the other hand the general features of the whole area are now treated much more fully than was done for northern Florida, and some interesting general principles not widely* known hitherto are brought out by means of statistics and otherwise. Statistics indeed

 *This part of the State is sometimes arbitrarily called "Middle Florida" by persons unfamiliar with its traditions, but Middle Florida, by long-established usage (dating from a time when th-e peninsula was almost uninhabited) is that part of the State between the Suwannee and Apalachicola Rivers. Central Florida is a more or less arbitrary designation, but it is now used in the same sense by the State Agricultural Department in divididng the State into five groups of counties approximately equal in area.
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