THE CA.NADIAN HORTICULTUKIST, 



27 



flavored, melting, without core and 

 having few seeds ; in short the best 

 flavored blackberry one ever ate. Thus 

 far it has proved to be sufiiciently hardy 

 to endure the winters of the Niagara 

 District, and the plants are excellent 

 bearers. i 



FLORIDA IX WINTER. 

 It was on the third day of March 

 last, when you were wading in snow 

 drifts, and wrapping your muffler close 

 about your ears in order to keep out 

 the biting, frosty winter winds, that in 

 company with your honored, then Vice- 

 President, Wm. Roy, Esq., of Royston 

 Park, I set foot on the gulf coast of 

 Florida at Cedar Key. We had enjoyed 

 a most pleasant sail down the Missis- 

 sippi from New Orleans and across the 

 Gulf of Mexico. The weather had been 

 most enjoyable. As we steamed down 

 the river, we saw large gangs of men 

 and women at work on the sugar plan- i 

 tatious. We were told that they were 

 planting sugar cane. Each of these ! 

 plantations .seems to contain a large ; 

 number of acres. About in the middle 

 of their breadth, but well to the front 

 and near the bank of the river, stands ' 

 the planter's house, of two stories in 

 height, usually painted white, with 

 veranda extending across the whole 

 front, and flanked on each side with a j 

 double row of small white cabins, in i 

 which, in other days, lived the slaves. 

 In the rear of all is the sugar mill. It 

 is a long, narrow building, with a tall 

 chimney stack rising high above every 

 surrounding oVtject. The river bank is S 

 much higher than the adjacent fields, ] 

 and the deck of our steamer seemed to 1 

 be about on a level with the second 

 story of the planter's houses. We learned 

 that there is thirty-five of these sugar 

 manufactories now on this part of the 



river, and that the gross product is 

 about fifteen tho\;sand hogsheads of 

 sugar, and twenty thousand barrels of 

 molasses. The average yield per acre 

 here is thought to be a little under two 

 thousand pounds of sugar, and one 

 hundred and twenty barrels of molasses. 

 Adjoining the sugar plantations are 

 those devoted to the cultivation of rice. 

 As we passed them they seemed like 

 vast tracts of waste low land, without 

 tree or shrub. Indeed all this river 

 front is a vast treeless stretch. In the 

 distance we saw occasional trees of live 

 oak, but mo.st of the timber seemed to 

 be nothing but cypress, telling of deep 

 swamps and fathomless marshes. The 

 saw mills and sugar house furnaces long 

 ago used up all the accessible timber 

 and fire wood, and save the little fuel 

 required for domestic purposes, the 

 sugar mills depend upon coal and the 

 refuse cane from w-hich the juice has 

 been expressed for their fuel. 



The cultivation of rice along the river 

 here has greatly increased since the 

 return of peace. Strange as it may 

 seem the labor is mostly done by white 

 men, notwithstanding the fact that the 

 most laborious part of this industry 

 comes in the months of June and 

 August. These rice farms vary from 

 twenty to two hundred acres. The 

 average yield is said to be about twelve 

 barrels of rough rice to the acre, worth 

 usually about five dollars per barrel. 



Below the sugar and rice plantations 

 we passed a tract devoted to orange 

 culture. This industry, we were told, 

 has been carried on here from very 

 early times, and it is claimed that there 

 are orange trees yet standing that are 

 over a hundred yeai's old. For some 

 thirty miles we passed through con- 

 tinuous groves of orange trees, looking 

 not unlike young and very upright 

 apple trees, of compact style of growth, 

 with very rich dark green foliage. 

 Some of these orange orchards are very 



