330 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Mar. 15. 



is just across the way; stores and places of 

 business, I liave mentioned; boats are conaing 

 and going constantly at the wharf, right at the 

 door of the hotel; we have beautiful, spacious, 

 airy rooms. The parlor and even the office is 

 carpeted and furnished in excellent style. 

 Every thing is clean, beautiful, and new. The 

 most courteous and civil people are always 

 ready to help and advise. I was obliged to 

 change the tire of my wheel in consequence of 

 running over a catfish on the beach. At least 

 half a doz(!n different persons offered to help 

 me, or bring me any thing I wanted. Last, but 

 not least, a beautiful, cushioned naptha-launch 

 is in use every day, solely for the benetit of the 

 guests of the hotel, and entirely without 

 charge. I wanted to go over to Georgiana, six 

 or eight miles distant, and they carried me over 

 and waited an hour for me to make my visit. 



My good friend O. N. Page, at this place, and 

 his family, were delighted to see me, but scold- 

 ed pretty severely because I came all the way 

 down to Florida and then stayed only an hour. 

 One of friend Page's grandchildren, a curly- 

 headed, bashful little chap who has commenc- 

 ed going to school, couldn't learn to recite the 

 vowels — a, e, i, o, u, y, because, whenever he 

 got started, he would always run off into A. I. 

 Root. You see, A 1. Root is such a household 

 word at Georgiana. Here we first saw a pine- 

 apple-garden, and cocoanut palms large enough 

 to bear; and when we saw some strawberries 

 large enough to be red, friend Page climbed 

 over the fence and picked a berry. Then we 

 told the owner afterward. It seems too bad to 

 hurry by friends who are so glad to see you in 

 this way; but how else shall I ever get around '? 



Friday, Feb. 1, we found ourselves at Palm 

 Beach. I enjoyed a ride on my wheel for sev- 

 eral miles before breakfast. It is daylight here 

 at half-past five, and the earliest breakfast is 

 at half-past seven. Iran down the west coast 

 of Palm Beacli through beautiful grounds 

 interspersed with cocoanut palms and various 

 other tropical products. Patches of tomatoes 

 more than a foot high greeted me at every turn. 

 At one point I saw a beautiful garden of cacti. 

 Of course, the frost has marred the beauty of 

 all the grounds more or less, but not nearly so 

 much here as farther north. Orange-trees here 

 have all their foliage, and the fruit is said to 

 be uninjured; but veiy few oranges are grown 

 in the vicinity of Palm Beach, it seems. The 

 grounds around the great hotel. The Royal 

 Poinciana, are not only beautiful, but are kept 

 constantly neat and tidy. The hotel at Palm 

 Beach I should call the handsomest structure 

 of its kind I have ever seen anywhere. The 

 Ponce de Leon, at St. Augustine, is admired by 

 many, and is called the finest in the world. 

 But what prejudiced me at first glance was to 

 see the breaks in the paint, and unsightly 

 stains running down on what I supposed to be 

 stone work. All over the edifice were glimpses 

 indicating that the building was cement and 

 veneer, and not what it purported to be. The 

 Moorish architecture, I admit, is beautiful. 

 The hotel here is built to represent wood, and 

 nothing else. The wood is neatly painted. 

 There are no rusty spots or unsightly cracks 

 caused by the wear and tear of the sun and 

 storms. It is perfectly bright, clean, and hand- 

 some. I tried my wheel on the ocean-beach; 

 but the sand seems to be too soft down here. 

 The walks along the shores of Lake Worth at 

 Palm Beach are very fine for wheeling. Along 

 here, as at Rockledge, the shores are mostly 

 lined with a queer rocky formation called 

 coquina. This seems to be all made up of 

 fragments of shells. In many places it is made 

 up entirely of polished fragments, or of shells 

 almost pure white, these fragments being ce- 



mented together by what seems to be a trans- 

 parent cement.* It has been suggested it was 

 first made solid by the salt of the ocean, and, 

 after the lapse of time, by some change caused 

 by the sun and air, this salt formed an insolu- 

 ble compound. The stonework of the Ponce de 

 Leon is mainly of this material. It would 

 seem asif there were fragments of ^5hells enough 

 in Florida to furnish lime for the world. A 

 word in regard to the multiplication of shellfish. 

 Friend Hart showed us something that look- 

 ed like kernels of sweetcorn strung on a thread. 

 He said that these eggs were produced by the 

 fish that inhabits the great conch-shells- Each 

 grain of corn, as it appears to be, in due lime 

 bursts open, and is then found to be full of lit- 

 tle shells not larger than a cabbage seed. These 

 shells grow. I don't know how rapidly, until 

 they make the great heavy handsome shells we 

 find and use so often as ornaments. The ani- 

 mal, when it is alive in salt water, has a neatly 

 shutting lid that it can pull down and be al- 

 most absolutely beyond the reach of its en- 

 emies. The old mound-builders used these 

 shell-fish for food, for we find the remains of 

 many conch-shells in the oyster-shell mounds, 

 with a hole broken in a particular point to 

 enable them to extract the fish for food. 



SHALL, I RECOMMEND FLORIDA AS A PLACE 

 FOR A POOR MAN TO GET A LIVING? 



In some respects, no. Florida seems to be a 

 camping-ground for rich people — millionaires 

 if you choose. Almost every man who has 

 made a fortune in soap, chewing-gum, or any 

 such commodity, has a winter residence in 

 Florida. There are almost no manufactures or 

 other similar industries, except factories espe- 

 cially for these rich people. For instance, 

 there are ice-factories in every considerable 

 town. Then fishing is constantly going on to 

 supply the great hotels and fine residences. 

 Orange-growing seems to be the one great in- 

 dustry — that is, for a crop to ship long distances. 

 There is no doubt a gooa opening, and always 

 will be, for gardeners who will furnish extra 

 fine products for the great hotels. Every one 

 who raises a crop, however, must look out that 

 he has a market for all he raises; and he must 

 see to it that he can get a product into the mar- 

 ket before it goes to waste on his hands. I 

 should say there is plenty of opportunity to get 

 good wages in most places where one has the 

 energy and strength to work during the hot 

 weather. I warn you, however, that it is the 

 grandest place on the face of the earth to sit on 

 a cool piazza and rest instead of working out in 

 the sun; and if you don't look out you will find 

 yourself giving way to this prevailing fashion. 

 A great deal of the work done is to accommo- 

 date tourists and pleasure-seekers. The yachts 

 and launches that are flitting about on Lake 

 Worth right before our eyes, while we take 

 down these notes, are far more for pleasure- 

 parties,than they are for business. 



This' morning at six o'clock the weather was 

 oppressively hot; but by eight o'clock we had 

 a brisk breeze on the water that has several 

 times made me think of putting on my coat. 

 Here for the first time we find cocoanut palms 

 scattered about almost everywhere. Young 

 trees are starting up all through the brush, 

 especially along the bank of the lake. In the 

 little flower-beds in the neat cottage where we 

 are staying are cocoanuts lying on top of the 

 ground, with sprouts from a few inches to a 

 foot or more in length. The smaller ones have 

 as yet no root at all, but those with the larger 

 tops have roots starting out from the other end 

 of the nut, reaching down into the ground. It 

 would seem that they are the easiest things to 

 grow in the world. We are much indebted to 



