154 ON THE ST. AUGUSTINE ROAD. 



tioned that I had lately been in southern 

 Florida, and found this region a strong 

 contrast. " Yes," he returned ; and, point- 

 ing to the grass, he remarked upon the 

 richness of the soil. " This yere land would 

 fertilize that," he said, speaking of southern 

 Florida. " I should n't wonder," said I. I 

 meant to be understood as concurring in his 

 opinion, but such a qualified, Yankeefied 

 assent seemed to him no assent at all. " Oh, 

 it will, it will ! " he responded, as if the 

 point were one about which I must on no 

 account be left unconvinced. He told me 

 that the fine house at which I had looked, a 

 little distance back, through a long vista of 

 trees, was the residence of Captain H., who 

 owned all the land along the road for a 

 good distance. I inquired how far the road 

 was pretty, like this. " For forty miles," he 

 said. That was farther than I was ready to 

 walk, and coming soon to the top of the hill, 

 or, more exactly, of the plateau, I stopped 

 in the shade of a china-tree, and looked at 

 the pleasing prospect. Behind me was a 

 plantation of young pear-trees, and before 

 me, among the hills northward, lay broad, 

 cultivated slopes, dotted here and there with 



