1838] 



FARMERS' REGISTER. 



625 



a slisht effect, and vary the current accordingly, 

 modified, however, by strong winds. Still, the 

 waters have not any where a stagnant appear- 

 ance, and if unpalatable, they are so from causes 

 independent of their want of proper agitation. 

 They are uniformly of a dark color, like thai of 

 tolerably strong coftec, the bottom scarcely being 

 discoverable even in the shoal parts. The origin 

 of this tint may be various; decomposition of ve- 

 getable matter can contribute but little to aHect a 

 body of water so large, particularly when a consi- 

 derable portion of the banks are either savannas 

 or pine bluffs, neither likely to have much agency 

 in this way. Lake Monroe may furnish a chaly- 

 beate tincture, as its shores abound in chalybeate 

 earths. The lakes above may bear the same cha- 

 racter. The waters do not lose their color when 

 suffered to stand in a vessel and to make deposite 

 of such particles as may be afloat in them. 



The St. John's is a large river for some hundred 

 and fit\y miles from its mouth, being from three 

 miles to a mile wide nearly as high as Lake 

 George. Thus ffir it has the appearance of an 

 arm of the sea, and in fact feels the influence of 

 the tides. From Lake George upwards it is com- 

 paratively narrow, excepting where it dilates into 

 lakes, and very winding, running perhaps several 

 miles in one mile of a straight line. Lake George 

 has been long known, and Lake Monroe, about 

 sixty miles above, was occupied by our troops the 

 first campaign of the present war. Thence up- 

 wards the river was to be explored at the com- 

 mencement of the present campaign. It was soon 

 penetrated through Lake Jesup to Lake Harvey, 

 and afterwards to Lake Poinsett, about a hundred 

 miles above Lake Monroe. 



Charleston and Savannah steamboats ascended 

 with army supplies without difficulty, at the high 

 stage of the waters, to Lake Harvey, which sup- 

 plies were sent thence by row- barges to Lake 

 Poinsett, where the river ceased to be subservient 

 to the purposes of transportation. This high 

 stage was in the fall; as the winter months set in, 

 the larger boats could ascend no higher than Lake 

 Monroe, until spring rains again raised the level 

 of the waters. 



The banks of the river as high as Pilatka, or 

 more than one hundred miles from its mouth, are 

 generally elevated several feet above the water. 

 From that point to Lake George they are com- 

 paratively low, and are probably mostly sub- 

 merged at high stages of the water. Between 

 Lake George and Lake Monroe the banks are ge- 

 nerally high enough to be dry, excepting where 

 savannas prevail. Wherever the pine-barrens 

 strike upon the river, the banks are eiojht or ten 

 feet high, with a substratum of shelly soil or rock. 

 To Lake Monroe they are for the most part 

 clothed with a growth of wood — chiefly live oak, 

 pines, and cypress, as high as Lake George; the 

 palmetto or cabbage tree, being largely intermixed 

 thence upwards. 



The gray moss clothes nearly all the trees upon 

 the river, excepting the pine and palmetto. These 

 are respected or avoided by this general associate 

 of the trees, from some want of affinity which 

 may not be understood. This moss is a most sin- 

 gular production, having a rank luxuriance little 

 according with its kindred species. It hangs from 

 every bough many yards in length, and wears the 

 appearance at a distance of dingy muslin thrown 



with a careless grace over every part of the (ree> 

 waving to and fro in the breeze and forming a 

 most striking embellishment of the scene; and the 

 ellect is not dnninished by the presence of the tall 

 and symmetrical palmetto, which rises up some 

 Ibrty or fitly (eet perpendicular, like a perfectly 

 wrought column, surmounted by a capital of most 

 approjiriate beauty. The moss never throws its 

 foldings over this handsome tree; as we have be- 

 fore remarked, the pine is equally avoided by it. 

 This capricious forbearance with respect to these 

 two kinds of trees, introduces a beautiful variety 

 into the river scene. Where the banks are high 

 and sandy, the pine prevails; where they are low 

 and wet,'lhe cypress— "the melancholy cypress." 

 The live oak, and other miscellaneous trees, pre- 

 fer the banks of an intermediate character, as also 

 the palmetto. The cypress seems to exclude all 

 associations; no other trees minsle with it, or if 

 they happen to start up along side they are soon 

 overshadowed above by the spreading tops, or 

 crowded out by the cone-like bases below, which 

 last leave only room for the thousand "knees," or 

 sharp excrescences, from one to several feet high, 

 which shoot up like so many dwarf pinnacles. 



Ascendina: the river, which is constantly wind- 

 ing and shifling the point of view, wherever the 

 cy'press permits, there the moss is seen in all its 

 sweeping luxuriance. As these trees spring from 

 nearly a water level, and grow to about an equal 

 height, their fiat and spreadinir tops present near- 

 ly a horizontal line, where the green appears in 

 all its depth and freshness. Thence, however, to 

 within a few yards of the ground, the folds of 

 moss, like ample curtains, conceal nearly all from 

 view, leaving the trunks exposed below, which 

 are covered wiih a whitish bark. This aspect 

 may prevail for half a mile, when the banks may 

 rise and become covered with the live oak, whose 

 angular and scraggy arms give a new appearance 

 to the moss, which is still as luxuriant as on the cy- 

 press. But the outline above is far different here. 

 Palmettos perhaps raise their graceful heads above 

 the oaks in striking contrast with their associates; 

 or perhaps the pine may show in the barren be- 

 yond; while over all is the clear azure of the sky, 

 always in Florida 



" So purely dark, and darkly pure. " 



These chanceful beauties, combined with the oc- 

 casional sisrht of a wild orange-grove, with its 

 golden fi-uit bespanslinii the foliage, altogether 

 render a trip up the St. John's delightful in a high 

 decree. 



The ash, poplar, swamp oak, &c., which line 

 the banks of a part of the upper St. John's, drop 

 their leaves during the winter months, unlike all 

 the other trees to which we have been alluding. 

 But these trees would seem to be deciduous, to ex- 

 hibit more plainly the verdant parasite which at- 

 taches itself to most of their branches. In pass- 

 ing up the river for the first time, the uninstructed 

 gazer is surprised and puzzled to see on all these 

 trees a tuft of evergreen, while the branches in 

 general are stripped of their foliage, until informed 

 that it is the mistletoe, which, having attached it- 

 self thus to a foreign stock, continues to smile in 

 verdure, while its supporter is standing in gloomy 

 nakedness. The mistletoe bough is always of a 

 rounded form, varying in size from a few inches to 

 thirty or more in diameter. The seec's, which are 



