170 FLORIDA.

which divide the waters of the ocean and the Gulf, are un-
doubtedly the best drained and as well adapted to the cult-
ure of the orange and all semi-tropical fruits as any in the
State, and to these advantages in this respect may be added
absolute exemption from damaging frost. Here, too, the
water is as pure and as sweet as in New England, and there
is entire exemption from fever and ague and other mala-
rious diseases found in lower sections of the State. From
September to April the climate is much like the finest
Indian-summer days of the North, while from April to
September the mercury rarely registers more than 96.
Situated on the narrow part of the peninsula, alternate
breezes from the Gulf and the ocean modify the heat and
render the nights cool and comfortable; and the universal
expression of people settled here from the North and West
is, that while the heat is more uniform and longer contin-
ued, it never reaches the extreme heat of the places from
which they came, and that their summers spent here have,
on the whole, been quite as comfortable as those of their
former homes. National official statistics show that the
death-rate of the State of Florida is two and three fourths
per cent., while that of New Hampshire is three per cent.,
and in other New England States and in the West the per-
centage is still larger. In Orange County, in a population
of upward of seven thousand, the late census returns show
only thirty-one deaths for the year ending June 1, 1880.
 How does the summer heat affect a Northern man ? is a
question frequently asked. The best reply is the fact that
sunstroke is unknown, and that with reasonable precautions
there is no more inconvenience from heat here than in the
North. The writer came from the North last May, just at
the unfavorable time of the year. For the first time in five
years he was able to follow his business through the entire
summer; and was free from that general letting down of
the nervous forces experienced for years while following
his profession in Iowa.
 The highest point recorded by the mercury last summer
was 97 ; the lowest reached the present winter-and this
has been the coldest since 1857, and with one exception
since 1835-is 34, showing a total annual range of 63.
In the boasted health-resorts of Colorado we have expe-
rienced a greater variation than this within twenty-four