INDIAN RIVER. 



BEGINNING some thirty or thirty-five miles to the 

 southward of St. Augustine, and extending along 

 the coast of Florida about one hundred and seventy-five 

 or eighty miles, are two salt water-lagoons, separated 

 from the ocean by a mere narrow fringe of sand. The 

 larger and more southward of these is known as Indian 

 river, and the other as Mosquito lagoon. They are sepa 

 rated by a low belt of sand, resting upon a bed of shell 

 conglomerate scarcely two miles broad. 



It is, however, with Indian river that I have present 

 concern, as it is possessed of peculiar, extraordinary, and 

 little known attractions and resources, which, if properly 

 developed, would make it an unequalled sanitarium for 

 pulmonary subjects. With its northern extremity near 

 Cape Canaveral, this sheet of water stretches southward 

 for about one hundred and fifty miles, with but one narrow 

 communication with the ocean Indian River Inlet, lati 

 tude 27 deg. 30 min. north. The long, narrow strip of 

 sand on either side of the inlet, which, as I have said, 

 separates the lagoon from the ocean, is nowhere broader 

 than one mile. Here and there the winds and waves 

 have heaped up the sand into clusters of low dunes, but 

 next to the waters of the lagoon there is a dense growth 

 of the mangrove (Ithizophomcea), wood of small diameter, 



