FLORIDA.


Our driver, a sociable sort
and chatted with this stran
learned that they were a
which was the climax of su
all appeared of the same
dance at a "cracker's," somi
they had already walked
woman-lovely, tender womr
miles to dance all night in a
ky-perfumed cracker males,
violin in the hands of an
with pine-knots; the feast o
tatoes, and likely a few vi
cheapest brown sugar, or si
bread." And, perhaps, that
two or three days and nights
and whisky is used up.
 The "cracker," when res


of fellow from Ohio, stopped
ge feminine quartet, and we
mother and three daughters,
Irprise to us, for the four faces
age. They were going to a
e fifteen miles farther on, and
about five miles. Think of
an!-walking barefoot twenty
close cracker cabin, with whis-
to the scraping of a wheezy
old darkey; the scene lighted


f hog, hominy, beef, sweet-po-
illainous compounds of flour,
rup, and called cake or "risin'-
Scracker ball will be kept up
i. until all the stock of eatables


olved to give a dance, shoots


some game and carves a hog, finds a market and sells his
game for a little cash, lays in a stock of whisky, a little
flour, cheap sugar, sirup, tobacco, hominy, or grits, more
whisky, coffee, or cheap tea, goes home, sets the "wimmin-
folks" to baking, while he resolves himself into an invi-
tation committee, and sets out on his lean, lank, cracker
pony, and invites all the crackers for miles around to "cum
roundd" And they come. A fight generally .ends the
dance, and the best man wins the girl, for these dances are
usually prolific of "jinin" matches. It should be said,
however, per contra, that there is very little sexual immo-
rality at these half-civilized gatherings, for the mothers--
as in this case-are also on hand, and keep a sharp eye on
proceedings; while the men-the fathers-will shoot.
 We passed on, and at noon crossed the Withlacoochee
River, at Hays's Ferry, where there are two or three cabins.
The river is here a wide, deep, dark-colored, swift-running


S