312 ISLES OF SUMMER. 



of perpetual and unfading verdure. It was reiDorted and believed 

 by Juan Ponce de Leon and otlier bold navigators, that upon one 

 of them existed water medicated and endowed by nature with 

 most wonderful potency. In tangled wood or rocky cavern, bub- 

 bled in the shadows or sparkled in the sunlight, that old dream 

 of the ages — the fountain of jjerpetual youth; and men toiled, 

 suffered, sickened and died in the vain search for the wonderful 

 waters of immortality. It is indeed fortunate for the world, con- 

 sidering the infamous character of many of those Spanish adven- 

 turers, that this pleasing dream had no basis of faot upon which 

 to rest. 



It has not been considered very strange, in an age which teemed 

 with marvels of fact which tax transcended in interest, novelty 

 and importance, the wildest conceptions of the imagination, that 

 men of intelligence implicitly believed in the existence of 



"A bright floral isle, 

 The jewel of a smooth and silver sea, 



"With springs iu which perennial summers smile, 

 A power of causing immortality;" 



and that some were willing to risk their money and their lives in 

 efforts to discover it. But the thread of life upon which these 

 dreamers were suspended, continued to weaken as it shortened, 

 and they soon found, as a practical fact, that the rejuvenating 

 spring is situated upon the other side of the dark tuibrd waters 

 of the river of death. 



