[ 300 ] | 22 
absolute fertility to the most sandy, stony, and,swampy surface, or hitherto 
most sterile districts, and of positive wealth to the youngest, oldest, and | 
feeblest, or hitherto poorest population. Although the department may 
have agreed with the books, that the palms compose the most interesting 
and most valuable family of plants in the world, yet, without personal 
@ trees have not yet arrived. 
But as the colored natives of the tropics have neither machinery nor 
management, nor desire to abridge the stupid labor now wasted in the 
mere collection and preparation of the spontaneous and abundant products 
of these hardy plants, how much more profitably will they be cultivated 
by the hands and heads of our white citizens in tropical Florida? 
the governing principle of our popular Government, “the greatest good of 
the greatest number,”. the subscriber has also especially recommended the 
ris. ot 
arious other profitable plants of the same hardy family, espe- 
nong v 
cially recommended by him, those which yield Indian rubber or caoutchoe, - 
(Siphonia elastica, Castillea elastica, &c.,) are daily becoming more and 
more important to mankind ; and the artificial propagation of them has even 
been begun by the worst variety of the white species of mankind for vege- 
cultural improvement, the Spaniards in the island of Cuba. Among the 
Cacti, or hardy family of the prickly pear, he has long called public at-— 
tention towards the cnuitivation of the cochineal nourishing species, which, 
has probably prolonged the life of the subseriber. Other — cles Insure 
food to man in periods of the greatest scarcity, and fodder to domestic ani- 
mals at all times, on the most barren surfaces. Various species also affgrd 
impenetrable hedges for fields; formidable outworks around forts ; and ev 
boundary walls between nations. As we have various species of prickly 
*Cocos nucifera. +Carryota urens. +Borassus flabelliformis. § Mauritia flexuosa. 'Go- 
mutus saccharifera—Arenga saccharifera, vel Saguerus Ramphii, vel Borassus gomutus. 
> Y 
