AND AGRICULTURAL CAPABILITIES. 75 



If the establishment of sugar-mills at central and accessible points was desirable in 

 1823, it is more so in 1881. For years I have advocated the erection of a large sugar 

 mill and refinery in Jacksonville, where cane can be supplied by small growers and 

 converted into sugar and molasses. Laud and labor are cheap, taxes are low in the 

 country, firewood at the saw-mills is costless, and instead of consuming sugar grown 

 in Louisiana and Cuba we should produce enough for home consumption and a half 

 million hogsheads for exportation. With a suitable climate and soil, coupled with 

 cheap labor and an opportunity to obtain a supply of cane on reasonable terms, it 

 seems farcical that Floridians should consume sugar produced within one hundred 

 miles of the State ; pay the freight from Cuba to New York, an import duty at the 

 rate of on No. 13 to 16 sugar, 3 -fa cents, and on No. 16 to 20, 4 -fa cents per pound ; 

 the cost of refining in a Northern city, where labor is high, and where firewood and 

 coal are expensive, coupled with freights, commissions, profits, &c. There may not 

 be " millions in it," but there is a profitable investment for some person who will erect 

 a sugar mill and refinery in Jacksonville. If a market could be found for cane, its 

 production would be insured, and thousands of persons would engage in its cultiva- 

 tion ; the young orange grower, small farmer, and the owners of small patches and 

 town lots would plant it, and an ample supply for a mill and refinery could be secured. 

 This city is connected by river or railroad communication with every portion of the 

 State, and with low freights the cane could be shipped from distant points. Or, to 

 avoid the cost of transportation of cane, producers at a distance could press the cane, 

 barrel the juice, add the milk of lime, and ship it to its destination. The superan- 

 nuated third-class machinery at present used in the State consigns nearly one-half of 

 the juice of the cane to the bagasse heap ; hence an annual monetary loss. The cen- 

 tral factory system, with perfect machinery, would materially increase the yield of 

 sugar from the cane produced. From the best information before me I have reason 

 to believe that a central mill could afford to pay the producer $4 per ton for the cane, 

 and he would find it a more profitable crop than cotton. A central factory means a 

 divorce of the agricultural part of the sugar production from the manufacturing, mer- 

 cantile, and financial part, and that it would prove a profitable investment we are as- 

 sured. In 1858 the growers in Louisiana produced 1,124,592 hogsheads of sugar, worth 

 $120,000,000; and if this can be done in the unsuitable climate of Louisiana, the ques- 

 tion arises, what can be done in Florida with her soil and climatic advantages ? We 

 might furnish many facts and figures relating to this industry, but space says, hold, 

 enough. 



ORANGE CULTURE. 



This is one of the industries of Florida that has suddenly attained 

 very considerable proportions. From barely nothing, in a commercial 

 sense, at the close of the war, the business has grown to be worth 

 $1,000,000 in 1880. Measured by the progress of the past, it is destined 

 to become, in a very short time, one of the leading industries of the 

 State. Last year there were exported at least 45,000,000 of oranges. 

 The business so far has been very successful, and is daily inviting more 

 capital and enterprise. There is already $10,000,000 invested in orange 

 groves in the State, with a field open for the profitable employment of 

 $50,000,000 more. Lands suitable for growing oranges are in abun- 

 dance and at low prices. Orange groves can be found in almost every 

 part of the State, and on all varieties of soil well drained, the groves 

 numbering each from 10 to 10,000 trees. Hardly a family outside of 

 the cities but cultivates a greater or less number of orange trees, and 

 many residing in the cities do the same. Some of the largest groves in 



