8 PREFATORY. 



visited St. Augustine last winter., and will be multiplied 

 in the next, The hotel accommodations there have been 

 trebled within live years, and are still increasing. Not 

 only at Jacksonville, Green Cove Springs, and other 

 favorite resorts on the St. Johns river, but also on the 

 eastern seaboard and the south-west coast, hotels are 

 being erected for use in the approaching season. New 

 steamers have been added to the St. Johns river lines, 

 and increased facilities opened for communication with 

 the North. Agricultural resources have been developed 

 beyond expectation. Lands have been opened that arc 

 richly adapted to the cultivation of the orange, banana, 

 guava, and pineapple, while the early northern markets 

 for green peas, cucumbers, strawberries, tomatoes, and 

 melons, offer pecuniary temptations to gardeners that 

 cannot be overlooked. Agricultural and emigration 

 societies have been established, and newspapers devoted 

 to the economic interests of the State. Land for well- 

 located farms has appreciated five times its value in three 

 years, and real estate has advanced to fancy prices at the 

 principal watering-places. Northern merchants have 

 built princely residences there ; considerable settlements 

 have been made at numerous points on the coast and in 

 the interior ; and old familiar places arc no longer recog 

 nized, such changes have a few years wrought. Even 

 that old travesty on railroads, the wooden line from 

 Tocoi to St. Augustine, has given place to iron rails, 

 quick transit, and comfortable passenger coaches. In 

 valids throng its health-giving atmosphere and healing 

 springs. Sportsmen find rich returns in sections that 

 are alive with game, and which, only two years ago, were 

 unknown and inaccessible. There is no place on this 

 continent like Florida, for both game and fish. 



