-
 .
 '."'<."' .
 t" t. ; :
 '
 '-
 14, 1887 ] 'THE FLORIDA DISPATCH. -- 150ploridiana.

-

 It is a common saying in this county horses cows, chickens, hogs and'I l'I From Tropical Florida.
 that "the older the lands, the better folks. N t country is:: better Editor FLORIDA DISPATCH.
 they produce." For instance, right at dairying than this immediate place. The whippoorwill's note is heard
 ::' : :: ::: :: c :';;c :;::: ;:::: :::::;;;::;::;:::: ;::;; I ,
 SUNNY OITBA LAND. this place there are fields that have Cattle do well when taking care of and l the cold. has gone for 1887, and
 been cultivated thirty years, producingnow themselves-how much better when now we tail truthfully say as to damage 
 A Sojourner's View of it-The Climate almost like the bottom lands of the care of an intelligent ma ''er i is I to fruits and vegetables.
 ,,Soil and Productions-Oc- the Coo a. It is the decay of the rich bestowed upon them. Oa's: do finely Vegetables that were liable to be
 cupation of the People-Hard and heavy coats of grass and weeds Hundreds of acres sowed in Novem killed are dead. T e guavas are damaged -
 Times-Oranges and Other that improves their fertility.Let ber are now stooling. Mr.\ Dodson an i but not so much as to lose the
, Fruits-Sugar-Starch- me disabuse your mind in regardto : old farmer, a short distance from town crop, and though we had none last
 Stock-Grain, etc. one thing, that is, that the cultiva- made thirty bushels to the acre last year, we can enjoy them the present
 Mr John Patterson, Birmingham, Ala.: tion of the orange is the only industryof year. Lumbering is perhaps one of the year, and cordujlly invite the Rev. J.
 DEAR FRIEND-It is now near two the State. On the contrary, it is a remunerative occupali ns in the Stato FT. White front his Island Home and
 months since I wrote you. In that State of "many opportunities." A Bear with me a little longer. I Mr. P. W. Reasoner to come and enjoya
 ,time I have enjoyed Florida's "high ten-acre bearing orange is a good and i know a "Birmingham Real Estate guava pie with this scribe.
 priced"} climate in mid-winter. I con safe National Bank, nothing safer and Agent" can have but little patience We do not boast of bananas or pine-
 fees some disappointment. The "cold surer. But, in addition to this, of with a descriptive letter and especially l1ppl sas it is rather too cold for them
 snaps" have been frequent, but unat summer fruits alone there are when there are no "millions in it." in Ogden City; but I challenge Mr..
 tended with any serious damage to the peaches, pears, plums, strawberries The principal occupation of the White and Mr. P. W. Reasoner to.
 citrus plants. The oranges here have which yield abundantly, and come people just now in and around Ox- compete with us of the eastern portion!
 not been frozen on the trees, into bearing in a comparatively short ford is rolling log, burning brush, of Manaeeo with the orange.
 although the thermometer on the time. Mr. Murdock, late of Illinois, burning the woods, hunting cattle The writer has no nursery stock for-
 morning of the 19th showed a depression coming to Florida for his health, that have wandered off to other pas sale, hut "the truth of the pudding is;
 of the mercury as low as twentytwo purchased forty acres of laud near tures, making contracts with hands, in the eating" and I can to-day show
 degrees. It is not the "oldest in- the depot.- It was the virgin forest laying in fertilizer, buying. seed, planting a lemon tree loaded with lemons, orange 
 habitant" that has spread the idea fiuryears ago. He had it cle red gardens, setting out trees, planning trees with ripe and green oranges
 abroad"that Florida,or any part of it, and set to peach trees-the Peen-to a Jew railroad, talking railroad and covered with bloom, and you can
 is below the frost line." The nights, and Honey, reserving about an acre com mission,discussing the "inter-State find blooms enclosed ; and if you will
 especially from 3. a. m., are always for house, nursery, flowers and small commerce bill" and the consolidationof meet the writer at Orlando on the 15th
 cool, if not cold. The coldest days fruits. His idea was this, since the the "Fruit and Vegetable Growers' he will present you with ripe and
 this winter here have been charmingat peach tree is short-lived, the orange Association" with the "Fruit Growers' green oranges. Who can say that thisis
 ,mid-day-wraps mt required in trees set in the intermediate spaces, Association," and, all similar organizations not the home of the orange? Should
 open air exercise. will come on and be in full bearing in the State. Some mole liberal any one doubt the veracity of this
 You have had in Birmingham, this just ai the time the peach tree perishes terms and safer transit of fruits and scribe, they can be relieved of a small
 winter, palpable evidence that the from the earth. The prospect at produce are already an assured fact. surplus of the essential.I .
 orange tree is capable of en 'uriiig the this time is that the wisdom of his pro- The loss done to shippers in oranges am wishing the DISPATCH and
 severest, treatment of an ordinarily ject will be abundantly verified in the en route North this month is rm- that oJd-time editor D. H. Elliott,
 low thermometer. Frequently the fine > i ield just ahead. The cold snaps mense. Railroads and steamers will long life and success.F. .
 shippers here have been notified by have held the buds in check, inas- eventually provide against this risk. C.' M. BOGG ESS..
 commission agents at the various cities much that the full blooming is not yet It is a necessity. Ogden City, :Manatee Co., Fla., Feb. 1.1&1.
 ,North and West, that the "market is Eet in. This crop is more a certaintyhere Leesburg, by far the most important 4
 flooded, ship no more until further than with us in Alabama. These commercial centre in the interior, Panasoffkee Strawberries.Editor .
 notice." .In the history of our coun- trees will bear at the lowest estimate, is in this county, fourteen miles from
 try, the supply and reduced price, this year, one bushel of peaches each. I Oxford. It is at the crossing of the FLORIDA DISPATCH:
 have never been so abundant and Now, counting forty to the acre at two F. S. R. and F. R. & N. Railroad, and In your issue of the DISPATCH,Jau1-
 marked, and.these following in the dollars per bushel will make a return has water transportation by Lakes nary 31st, I notice that "Z" says they
 wake. of. the disastrous "freeze" of last almost intoxicating. The sugar cane Harris and Griffin into the Ok lawaha find it "profitable" to mulch strawberries -
 winter grows with luxuriance in all the pen river, and thence to the St. Johns and where he Jives. Where doe. he-
 insular of Florida and it live? We, here in Panasoffee, do not:
 You must know, John, that thereare portion can the Atlantic.
 no groves, in the strict meaning of be left in the field to ripen fully with- Fruitland Park, n thriving little mulch, any of us, yet we are sendingin
 the word, in and around Oxford. The out danger of frost, which in Louisiana town on the Florida Southern Rail twenty to fifty quarts of berries
 .. bearing trees, except those just beginning causes it to be gathered in an un- road is ab"ut nine miles from Oxford. every two days and getting $2.50 to
 to bear, in no instance, I believeI matured state. With a bare effort Maj O. P. Rooks, the gentleman who $3 per quart t for) them in Philadelphia.To .
 am safe in saying, and these on the this State would take its place along took more premiums than anyone repeat my remark made in a
 whole not exceeding twelve years of with Louisiana in its contest for, a else at the 'V orld's Exposition at former letter, comment is unnecessary.
 extend of continued tariff before So has beautiful If "Z" and his friends live in Middle
 New Orleans
 age, over an area one acre Congress. a place
 at any one place. One of these groves, long as this State affords such oppor- her('. About eight years ago he came Florida and want to mulch as protec-
 if deserves. the name, has shipped tunities i iri sugar and syrup making, it to this place from Philadelphia and tion against clay, and their fruit comes
 about five hundred boxes of good is marvelous that so much time and without experience, and but little in somewhere about April, we haveno
 objection whatever, but if he has.
 oranges-"brights. money are thrown away on the sorg- more than an unconquerable energy,
 In a former letter I stated to you hum and beet experiment. To keep he has achieved eminent success. any doubt as to whether berries can be.
 that Oxford is a new town-now four money at home and to build up our Over one hundred varieties of fruits handled properly without mulching, _
 old industries inducement shouldbe cultivated hisp let him ask Mr. Pillow, at Jacksonville 
 years -a new community composedof own an are now successfully on
 good people from many parts of offered to develop this resource. ace. He has with little means con- whether he ever received any
 our country. Through the enterpriseand The Le Conte pear does well here. verted the barren pine forest into almost sanded berries from me or my neigh-.
 push of these new comers, to Professor Borden, while pruning his a a paradise of fruits and flowers.I bor, Mr. Stannard, last year, or from:
 gether with the renewed energies of week or two ago, cut a sprout from do not suppose fifty thousand dollarsw me the year before, or it he is stint
 the.native Floridians, much land has one, twelve feet long-the growth of />uld be an inducement to him to unsatisfied, Messrs. Pancoast &:
 been cleared and set to orange trees, last year. Many\ of the Japan and sell his possessiorsIt Griffiths, of Philadelphia, can tell
 so in a few years this little town will Chinese fruits flourish here, as if in is generally conceded that the him something about the condition of
 have become an important shipping their own native soil. The apple, as high pine lands in this county are the Panasoffee fruit that is now bringing '
 point. It is no secret, that just at this many parts of Alabama, does not lo equal to any in the State. I am sure $3 right alnn Cash talks, my
 time, the people are suffering from the well. The Grape fruit is classed with they are preferable to the hammocksas friend, in this mundane" sphere of ours."WhoiVZ'anyway .
 double calamity of last year-the the orange though a little more tender homes. The malaria abounding ) ?
 freeze and the late spring, The ferti- in its growth. This fruit, so soon as along the marshy lakes and 'ow lands W. D.. LEWIS.
 Panasofrkee, Fla., Feb.) 1887.Teosinte. .
 lizer bill and seed bill, just as in Ala. known, will be more valuable than the -not worse than in similar localities 4
 bama, make a'bad'' matter much worse. orange. in other Statei-exists to a greater .
 It is this that is now oppressing the The Cassava is a nutritious root, extent than in the rolling pine lands.
 people more than natural causes. I which, independent of its edible part Since I wrote you I have been to This has ripened seed in this settlement 
 will whisper to you that in October, yields a starch equal in value, poundfor Tampa, Orlando, Sanford, back to but it must not be cut down, the
 when I reached here, I saw grass and pound to the best corn starch, and Jacksonvil'e' and back to Oxford very first stalks must be allowed 1 t to-

 beggar-weed rotting on the ground, also yields as many pounds as corn again. Without disparaging any grow up and go C to seed._ _
 which, if it had been converted, into per bushel. Under ordinary circum- place, I must say that I shall invest --- --e.
 hay in the proper stage, would have stances two hundred bushels jean be here. S SMITH. Strawberries are being shipped,
 made these farmers indeoeudent. produced per acre. It is fine for Orlando, Sumter county, Fla.,Jan. $<.\i. daily from Plant City.FEBRUARY ,