142 MASSACHUSETTS HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



ground from fifty to a hundred feet wide. Silver Spring affords 

 steamboat transportation for ten miles before it flows into a rirer 

 which empties into the St. John's, but he took a small boat 

 because he could see the river bottom better. The water is so 

 clear that where it is eight}' feet deep the sand at the bottom 

 looks as if it were within a foot of the surface. He could see 

 little fishes near the bottom and their shadows on the bottom. 

 The formation is coral, and in one place the water pours out from 

 under a coral shelf; in another spring there is a hole six feet in 

 diameter in the bottom, through which the water pours up. The 

 central part of the State is made up of a chain of lakes, forming 

 the St. John's River, which in some places is very wide and in 

 some very narrow. At Blue Spring a portion of the surface had 

 a beautiful blue color, and another was of a most brilliant green, 

 like the colors of a peacock. The bank was fifty feet high, and 

 the view from it was magnificent. A hunter, engaged in killing 

 birds to decorate ladies' bonnets, told the speaker that he had 

 also killed two hundred alligators this season ; the skins bring 

 from sixty to ninety cents each. While the alligators may be 

 exterminated in some places, there are thousands of acres that 

 will remain in swamps and be the home of alligators for all time. 



There are no statistics in regard to the acreage of the orange 

 crop in Florida and no way of foretelling the future product. 

 The crop this j'ear is estimated at three million boxes — about 

 half the consumption of this country. There are not less than 

 four hundred thousand acres devoted to oranges today, but many 

 thousands of acres will never produce oranges, for they are not 

 successful unless cared for. But the increase must be immense, 

 for not more than one acre in thirty is in full development. The 

 growers are endeavoring to get a tariff on foreign fruit of one 

 dollar per box. The great want is cheap transportation to the 

 consumer. 



The speaker thought it would have been better if some of the 

 capital which has built a surplus of railroads in the West had 

 been devoted to building them in Florida. The roads will proba- 

 bly hereafter centre in some port where steamships can take the 

 oranges to Northern cities. The growers are learning to load 

 them in cars in bulk so as to be transported safely. The price 

 will probably diminish until they are sold here for half what they 

 cost today, which will bring about additional consumption as we 

 learn to eat more. Oranges are enormously productive ; Mr. 



