236 THE OKEECHOBEE EXPEDITION&quot;. 



serene,, and its waters as untroubled as in January ; but 

 Indian river in April is not the river it was in January, 

 for all that. Its visitors from the North,, the Yankees, 

 have departed and its visitors from the South, the 

 insects, have arrived. The temperature in April does 

 not vary much from that of March ; the mornings are 

 deliciously cool, and the afternoons well, they are 

 warm. Sixty-five in the morning at sunrise ; ninety at 

 noon ; a breeze from the south all day, and a gale from 

 the west all night. 



When I had returned to St. Lucie from Okeechobee, 

 my friend at head-quarters wanted to leave ; and it was 

 only to allow me a flying trip to the Seminole town that 

 he would remain. The reasons he urged for departing 

 were &quot;insects.&quot; Fleas and mosquitoes might have their 

 uses, might be a blesssing to mankind, but too many 

 fleas and a superabundance of mosquitoes were worse 

 than none at all ; and so long as that grind-stone was 

 left out of doors for them to sharpen their bills on, so 

 long was life a burden to him. And so we sailed away 

 from St. Lucie. A few miles from St. Lucie is Indian 

 River Inlet, where the fishing is superb and the mos 

 quitoes abundant. We went over to the inlet one day, 

 with my old guide Jim to assist us. The memory of 

 that day s sport will not soon fade away bass, sheeps- 

 head, crevalle all bit well, and fully sustained the repu 

 tation accorded this inlet as the best fishing ground on 

 the coast. Jim had been hunting in the scrub along the 

 sand ridge, and returned to the boat as I hauled in my 

 last fish, bloody and torn. There was blood on his face, 

 blood on his hands, hair and rifle. His shirt and pants 

 were torn and likewise bloody. In reply to my questions 

 he remarked in a careless way that he had run a-foul of 



