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valuable sites, in the settled districts of sovereign States. He is willing to 
stand alone upon the isolated merits of his claims, and on the national 
importance of his enterprise. 
Very respectfully, : 
Your obedient servant, 
H. PERRINE. 
To the honorable the members of the Committee on Agriculture of the 
louse of Representatives. 
Wasurtneron, D. C., é 
February 3, 1838, 9 o'clock a. m. 
In his written address to your committee, left on the table of your room, 
on the 31st ultimo, he adverted to the fact, that, for the cultivation of our 
actual staples, the whole public lands in south Florida are not worth the 
average price of one cent an acre. If any doubt of that fact still exists in 
the minds of any member of your committee, the subscriber begs the privi- 
lege of dissipating that doubt by the testimony of personal witnesses and 
authentic documents. The same favor he requests in relation to the facts 
of the best sites and soils being selected under Spanish grants, and being 
now private property. The twelve miles square at Cape Florida, embraces 
the only site valuable either for a harbor or for water power on the main 
land of south Florida. The original Spanish grantee, Arambide, had 
granted by the Spanish Government; yet it appears that his entetgiiie 
was a ruinous failure, and I doubt not that it will prove equally rninous 
- to all future speculators in the same line, both on account of the defective 
quality and quantity of timber, and 6n account of the equally deeeptive 
nature of the reputed water power. 
In reference to the great expense of clearing and enclosing even until- 
lable rocks in a tropical climate, the subscriber refers your committee to a 
letter from the collector at Key West, in which he calculates the cost of 
clearing and enclosing a single acre, at $200, on that island. Hence also, 
ee failure Se all persons who have hitherto emigrated to south Florida, 
and attempted to commence the culture of our common staples in our 
€ 
od 
