14 FLORIDA FRUITS ORANGES. 



close, and the aneien regime was broken up, that a new 

 people began to press beyond the borders of Florida, bring- 

 ing in their midst the commencement of a new era in its 

 hitherto stagnant civilization. 



Even then it was some time before the attention of these 

 new-comers was drawn to the capabilities of the wild sour 

 orange groves scattered all around them in the rich ham- 

 mock lands, and the first bold pioneer who ventured to ex- 

 periment upon their true value, met, as is usual in such 

 cases, with no encouragement from his neighbors, but 

 rather determiner! opposition and ridicule. 



A case, in illustration, was related to the writer recently 

 by a neighbor, a lady who is now the proud owner of sev- 

 eral fine bearing groves : Fourteen years ago she removed 

 with her family from the northern part of the State down 

 into the "Great Lake Region," and "Orange Center," 

 building a home in the piny woods for the sake of health. 

 The want of shade was at once apparent ; to supply this 

 desideratum several large sour orange trees were trans- 

 planted from a wild grove near by. They flourished ex- 

 ceedingly well, but their fruit was allowed to rot upon the 

 ground uncared for. One day there came a stranger, who 

 argued so eloquently upon the great gain to be obtained by 

 cutting their tops oif, and inserting buds from a sweet 

 orange in their trunks, that, sorely against the will of our 

 informant, her husband proceeded to follow the stranger's 

 advice. " I scolded and cried, and cried and scolded," she 

 said, "but it was of no use; the tops of those splendid 

 trees were sawed off, and the little green sticks the stranger 

 gave us were put into the bark of the poor bare trunk. 

 In a few months, seeing how fast the buds were growing, 

 I began to think perhaps there was some truth in the 

 stranger's words, and in three years, when I saw a fine 

 crop of splendid oranges, the sweetest I had ever tasted, I 



