8 FLORIDA: ITS CLIMATE, SOIL, PRODUCTIONS, 



over all other lauds. There are, besides the lauds already noticed, ex- 

 tensive tracks of savanna lauds, which approximate in character, text- 

 ure of the soil, and period and mode of formation, to the swamp lands, 

 differing only in being destitute of timber. These savannas yield an 

 immense crop of grass, which if cut and properly cured would afford a 

 quality of hay equal to the marsh hay of the Northwest. 



In Middle Florida, the counties of Leon, Gadsdeu, Jefferson, and 

 Madison have large quautites of high, rolling hammock lands, also the 

 county of Jackson in West Florida. They are more undulating than 

 those in East Florida, and are underlaid with a stiff red clay. They are 

 by vfar the best lands in the State for short-staple cotton, to which they 

 have been almost exclusively appropriated, and to wheat, rye, oats, corn, 

 tobacco, &c. In Volusia County there is a range of low hammock a 

 little back from the coast, from a half to two miles wide, and extending 

 from the head of the Halifax to the head of the Indian Elver, some 50 

 miles, as well adapted to sugar culture as any land in the State. The 

 Gulf Hammock, in Levy County, comprises perhaps the largest body 

 of rich land in Florida. It was bought up years ago at from $5 to $10 

 per acre, by private parties, by whom it. is mostly held at the present 

 time. The Atlantic, Gulf and West India Transit Railroad runs through 

 it, and it will no doubt become at an early day one of the garden spots 

 of the State. The clearing of the hammocks, however, is expensive, and, 

 as in every new country, we may expect to see the lands more lightly 

 timbered first brought into cultivation. 



CLIMATE. 



The climate of Florida, from parallel 31, its northern boundary, to 

 29, corresponds with that of Portugal, south of Oporto; the southern sec- 

 tion of Spain ; Oran, Algiers, and Tunis, on the northern coast of Africa; 

 the southernmost part of Italy ; the islands of Sicily, Greece, Morea ; the 

 isles of the Archipelago, and those of Candia, Rhodes, Cyprus, c.; 

 Asia Minor, Syria, Mesopotamia, and Armenia. From latitude 29 to 

 25, bordering almost on the tropics, and including the remainder of 

 East Florida, containing about 33,000,000 acres of land, there is no par- 

 allel climate in Europe or Asia Minor. 



As climate, in its effects upon the health and vigor of mankind, is of 

 fundamental importance, and enters more largely into the considera- 

 tions connected with the industrial occupation and development. of the 

 country, and as Florida is receiving more special attention from the 

 migratory world than common, I shall be pardoned if I occupy some 

 space in giving the results of scientific investigations in regard to the 

 constituent elements of the climate of this semi-tropical region. 



Dr. C. J. Kenworthy, of Jacksonville, a gentleman of extensive expe- 

 rience, as well as practical research, in an address before the Medical 

 Association of Florida, in 1880, presents a more thorough analysis of 

 the constituent elements of the atmosphere and climate of Florida than 





