242 On the Acclimatioji of Tropial Exotics in Florida, 



tion, at the 'same time influencing our General Government 

 to aid in the establishment of an Experimental Garden for 

 the introduction of thousands of useful species from Trop- 

 ical Asia, Africa, and America. You will please publish the 

 enclosed in the Magazine of Horticulture and Botany, edited 

 by C. M. Hovey, Esq., of Boston. With great esteem, I am, 

 dear sir, very respectfully yours, Augustus Mitchell, M. D. 



St. Mary's, Georgia, April 29th, 1849. 



Hon. H. a. S. Dearborn. 



My dear Sir, — At your request, I herewith submit certain 

 facts, relating to the experiment of vegetable acclimation in 

 Tropical Florida, which have passed under my own obser- 

 vation, or have come within the range of my knowledge. 



In the year 1828, a gentleman of science and experience 

 strongly urged on government the project of a national accli- 

 mating nursery, to be located in Tropical Florida, supported 

 by a train of analogies, meteorological observations, and rea- 

 soning, which gave great plausibility to his positions. 



So far as experiment has tested his conclusions, they have 

 been fully verified. He recommended, with great confidence 

 in the success of the pine apple tribe, the acclimation of that 

 tropical exotic. 



And what has been the result 1 In Nov. 1847, and Jan. 

 1848, I made an exploration into Tropical Florida below 28 

 degrees, and down to 27 degrees 15 minutes. I there found 

 settlers, many of whom had come from the north, and an 

 account of whom I gave you in my last. Nearly all of them 

 had entered upon the culture of the tropical pine apple, and 

 had larger or smaller patches on plantations of the pine plant 

 under process of actual growth. 



Mr. Burnham, an original settler, and late representative 

 from St. Lucie county, and one of the most extensive plant- 

 ers of this fruit, furnished me the following statement relative 

 to the pine apple : — 



" The first slips of the pine I put out 20th August, 1843. 

 I then put out 46 slips. They bore fruit in 1845; the fruit 

 matured about the 10th of July. Since that time, from the 

 original 46 slips, I have increased to 3500 plants, one half of 

 which will bear next July. The apple does as well in Lucie, 

 if not better, than in Cuba. The fruit is larger and finer." 



