
RAMBLES IN FLORIDA. 283 

About a mile from the town towards the ocean is the 
r lighthouse, built upon somewhat elevated ground, forming 
EL with the adjacent buildings and moss-festooned oaks, a bit 
[ of highly pieturesque and pleasing scenery. 
b. Between the lighthouse and the road to the beach, not far 
distant, is another mound in the centre of an ancient camp- 
ing ground, the latter covered with bleaching shells, the 
remnants of unrecorded clam-bakes and oyster-feasts. This 
mound is much smaller than the first, only about one hun- 
dred yards in circumference and about fifteen feet in height ; 
it was covered with trees and shrubs,* the largest of the 
former being perhaps nine inches in diameter; their roots 
penetrating the loose material of which the mound is com- 
posed, and in their ramifications wound and twisted among 
the skeletons of unknown men whose decayed bones crum- 
bled at a touch. Stone implements were found, and in the 
Surrounding field fragments of earthen-ware less perishable 
than the hands that made them. 
_ *rom here to the ocean the path lies through a low and, 
| in some places, dense growth of Saw-palmetto,f interspersed 
. With one or more species of Cactus. The leaf-stalks of the 
a former have sharp points along the edges, hence the name; 
and the prickly Oactaceœ may be considered the porcupines 
and hedgehogs of the vegetable kingdom. Though painful 
to the touch and dangerous to the apparel they should not be 
denounced ; many of the Cacti, as well as of the Palmacee, 
to which family the Saw-palmetto belongs, bear delicious 
fruit, and some species of Cacti are the feeding parks of the 
Insect, from which the celebrated scarlet dyestuff, known as 
cochineal, is derived. 











; is Xanthozylum Carolinianum Lam., or Prickly Ash, also called tenet wipe s 
here. It is said to possess valuable medicinal qualities; à piece of ose bar! 

: “log the mouth and chewed produces a stinging sensation, causing the tongue to 
t einas gg after grasping a nettle. 
2 i Coccus cacti 'T'ha cochin RS d E š . Pham bugs; 
alive. scalded, and then dried. 1t is esti- 

the c. Cactt of which if ic 3 
d that every pound of from half to 
, ers of a million of 
th 1 ji 
hineal contains 70000 of these insects, and 
* 


