1901 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



449 



NOTES or TRAVLt 



< BY A. I. ROOT . 



FLORIDA TRAVELS, CONTINUED. 



The town of Miami, at the terminus of the 

 East Coast Railway, is a very new one. It 

 has been almost all built up within two or 

 three years. It is very prettily laid out, has 

 fine streets, and, like all the rest of these 

 Florida railroad towns, is especially adapted 

 to wheeling — that is, if you do not get too far 

 away in the country. When people were talk- 

 ing about the danger of frost six years ago we 

 were told the only really safe place was Bis- 

 cay ne Bay, where even tomatoes could be 

 grown the year round without any fear of in- 

 jury, no matter what the state of affairs was 

 in the northern part of Florida. I had quite 

 a notion of making my way over to Lake 

 Okeechobee, and making an effort to see if I 

 could not get a passage through to Fort Myers, 

 on the Caloosahatchie River. But I was told 

 by the people that it was a difficult and haz- 

 ardous undertt^king for even a middle-aged 

 man in good health, when used to roughing 

 it. Besides, it would take more time than I 

 could possibly spare, so I reluctantly gave it 

 up. 



A little way out of Miami is a celebrated 

 golf ground. It is a beautiful meadow, as 

 fine as a lawn, covering, I should judge, to- 

 ward half a square mile. This is maintained 

 and kept in trim exclusively for golf players. 

 I do not know much about golf ; but it has 

 this in its favor — it takes open air and a lot of 

 it. I saw the golf-players with their kit of 

 tools — that is, if that is what they call them, 

 with their colored boys to carry said tools and 

 wait on the players. I suspect it is a rather 

 aristocratic game. But just beyond the golf 

 ground I caught a view of acres of garden- 

 stuff, and this interested me more. I was 

 about to obey the printed sign-board at the 

 entrance of the golf ground, and wheel around 

 it ; but the obliging watchman told me to go 

 straight through the ground. He said there 

 was nobody there at the time, and it would 

 not hurt the walks a particle ; in fact, it would 

 make them better to run the rubber tires over 

 them. I demurred a little at taking my 

 chances of being arrested, but he assured me 

 /le was " boss and all hands " when there were 

 no players around. 



I can hardly take space to tell you about all 

 the beautiful crops I saw in that garden on " 

 the Miami flats. The ground is a level piece 

 of prairie, I should call it. It probably had 

 been swampy before ditches had been put 

 through to carry off the water. There were 

 acres and acres of tomatoes, all the way from 

 little plants clear up to ripe fruit. The best 

 plantations are trained on stakes ; but as it 

 was quite an additional expense, there was a 

 difference of opinion as to whether it paid or 

 not. Almost every vegetable known was 

 grown here for the Northern markets, unless 

 it is some that, like asparagus, rhubarb, and 



others that absolutely require freezing weath- 

 er. 



When out in the fields away from any resi- 

 dence or workmen I saw beautiful strawberries 

 reddening under the tropical sunshine. It 

 was a variety I could not exactly make out, 

 and I longed to taste them ; but even though 

 nobody was in sight I concluded I would not 

 set a bad example — well, a bad example before 

 })iyself, if you choose. But a little further on 

 I stopped at the house and obtained permis- 

 sion to sample the bern'es, promising to take 

 not more than half a dozen. The proprietor 

 was away from home ; but one of the boys 

 smilingly took the responsibility of giving me 

 permission to pick so many, and the quality I 

 found fully equal to berries raised north. 



Now, in these Miami gardens there are good, 

 bad, and indifferent crops of almost every 

 kind. Some will tell you the ground is not 

 suited for this, that, and the other ; but before 

 I got around, somebody had proven that the 

 very thing in question could be grown to per- 

 fection. It was the old story over again — the 

 successful man had studied his crop and his 

 locality, and finally, by dint of repeated try- 

 ing, he had found out just how to manage to 

 grow beautiful strawberries, or this, that, and 

 the other, even on that low level ground. 



I was pleased with the ranch of Jordeau 

 Brothers. They had succeeded in growing 

 bananas, oranges, and cumquats, right side 

 by side with corn, beans, and potatoes. In 

 fact, they had got good crops of almost every 

 thing. Up in front of the pretty little home 

 was a bulletin -board, and on this board were 

 tacked market quotations from New York, and 

 also orders received for certain stuff Any 

 one of the employees could see by glancing at 

 this bulletin-board that so many crates of cu- 

 cumbers, tomatoes, and strawberries were to 

 be loaded up and sent to the station by just 

 such a time in the afternoon. 



Although there is no drawback in the way 

 of frost in this Miami region, they have blight, 

 fungus, and noxious insects to contend with. 

 I reached town just in time to hunt up anoth- 

 er nice pineapple for my noonday meal, and 

 then I started out to see where I could find 

 some bread and butter to go with it. Now, 

 there is one queer feature about these Florida 

 railway towns, especially in the vicinity of 

 the great hotels. There are very few restau- 

 rants or low priced eating houses. I do not 

 know whether the hotels have been instrumen- 

 tal in keeping them out or not. In two places 

 in Miami I saw bright new signs hung out. 

 saying " Restaurant " in large plain letters. 

 But one of the men had quit business. The 

 other man was running a tailor shop. I point- 

 ed to the signs, but they said they had not 

 had time to take them down. Finally, down 

 by the boat-landing, I found some beautiful 

 white bread and nice butter to match, and I 

 was happy and contented with a dinner that 

 cost less than 25 cents. In the outskirts of 

 Miami there is another palatial hotel. The 

 grounds and the surroundings make one think 

 of the oriental tales of the Arabian Nights. 

 I found a similar display of tropical and ex- 

 otic plants, one shade i house being devoted 



