384 
GEOGRAPHY OF THE SOUTH ERS RES INSULA 
the middle belt. De Leon .spring, fabled as youth’s fountain, 
and the strange Blue spring, with its ultramarine waters, are the 
most notable of tlie.se whims of nature. 
The west coast region slopes gently awa}”^ from the middle 
ridge until it touches the Gulf It is traversed by rivers whose 
beauty it is imjiossible to describe. Rising in swamps and 
morasses, they make their way by countless windings to the 
Gulf. Overhead the trees twine their branches into one unbroken 
canopy, shutting out the sunlight. On the banks are lands of 
great fertility, devoted in some cases to grazing and in others to- 
gardens, whose early products reach the north while that region 
is still enveloped in ice and snow. The far-famed Suwanee 
river rises in the edge of the Okefenokee swamp in Georgia, and 
after a course of 240 miles empties into the Gulf The Withla- 
coochee takes its rise just west of Kissimmee, and after almost 
losing itself in the spread of its waters, eventually reaches the 
Gulf in Withlacoochee bay. The Caloosahatchee has its head- 
waters in the secret rece.sses of the Okaloocoochee slough, and 
as it approaches the coast it widens into a majestic stream. 
Through the drainage canal of the Di.sston Company it is con- 
nected with lake Flirt, lake Hicpochee, and lake Okeechobee. 
A voyage, uni<pie in every circumstance, may be made by steamer 
from Punta Kassa, following the river, the lakes, or the canal as 
far inland as Ki.ssimmee, where one sees the spreading cane 
fields redeemed by drainage at St. Cloud. 
Along the brinks and in the beds of these streams are found 
one of Florida’s chief sources of wealth, the great phosphate de- 
j)Osits. These dejiosits furnish the purest form of phosphate of 
lime found in nature, a fact especially significant of the manner 
in which the minerals of the west coast have in general been de- 
posited. Hundreds of thousands of tons are taken annually te 
Tampa, Punta Gorda, and Fernandina to be forwarded to foreign 
j)orts or American manufactories for conversion into commercial 
fertilizers. There are also here enormous bodies of sedimentary 
limestone, fuller’.s-earth, and kaolin, all of unusual j)urity, due te 
the peculiar conditions of their deposition. 
The Gulf coast is indented by many bays. These ba}"s, from 
Suwanee to Sanibel, are dotted with tropical islands, and are 
bounded on the one side by coasts of unfailing verdure and on 
the other by the blue waters of the Gulf. Chief of these are 
Tampa bay and Charlotte harbor, the terminals of two great 
railway systems. Here one may take steamer for the West 
