58 bulletin: museum of comparative zoology. 



to get into the interior ; we had been previously on the South Fork. 

 The same broad low divide supporting numerous keys (Plate XXIV. 

 Fi<*. 2) was crossed by shallow channels of water running over a 

 siliceous sand which covered the rock about a foot, so we had little 

 difficulty here. We found, however, that we could go only in a general 

 northwest direction. Even then we should have been very probably 

 obliged to give up our route had we not discovered a fresh Indian trail. 

 We followed this for nearly two days, tracing it with ease through the 

 grass, but having many sharp hunts where open water was crossed 

 (Plate XXV. Fig. 2). Finally, the trail was completely lost, and mud 

 ways in the saw-grass were all that were left to us. We were thirty 

 miles or more from the coast ; an unbroken expanse of grass with small 

 bushes extended to the west (Plate XXV. Fig. 1), and to the east only 

 one or two keys were faintly visible. The rock foundation had been 

 traced by soundings with a pole through the mud. Its distance below 

 the water surface varied between three and six feet ; at our most distant 

 point it was five feet. 



During high water one might frequently sail in the Everglades, and 

 exploration would be much more rapid. 



One more possibility of reaching Long Key presented itself, — to go 

 across the pine belt south of Cocoanut Grove to the edge of the Ever- 

 glades, and then see what might be done. 1 went along the shore in a 

 canoe, with the same man as guide : the limestone was within easy reach 

 under water for most of the time. A little south of Cutler, at the 

 locality called the Hunting Ground, an examination of natural wells and 

 sinks made by the falling in of the roofs of underground channels 

 showed only stratified limestone to water level. The deepest sections 

 were perhaps twelve feet. About twenty miles south of Cocoanut Grove 

 we entered a small creek, and worked up its tortuous course some miles 

 to the edge of the pines. A rough walk of perhaps eighteen miles 

 brought us to the edge of the Everglades. By burning the grass, I was 

 enabled to go some three miles farther west (Plate XXVI.). This point 

 was about twenty-three miles from the coast; to the west could be seen 

 numerous keys, the nearest small one being half a mile away, while at 

 a distance of four or five miles there appeared to be a key continuous 

 from northeast to southwest, perhaps the reputed Long Key, but the 

 occurrence of numerous intermediate keys rendered belief in its con- 

 tinuity uncertain. The aspect of the Everglades here was similar to 

 that farther north, — the rock foundation was dipping gradually west- 

 ward below the water level, and the keys were low islands of vegetation 



