PRELIMINARY REPORT ON PEAT. 
281 
any different climate for the time when the peat was formed ( a few 
hundred years ago, perhaps) from that which prevails today. 
Analyses of the Panasoffkee peat will be found in the table, 
under localities 31 and 32. 
HELENA RUN. 
(fig. 26) 
On May 21, 1909, in walking from Leesburg to Okahumpka 
and back, I crossed a sluggish stream flowing into the west end 
of Lake Harris (which is connected with the Ocklawaha River), 
and was surprised to see that its water, instead of being coffee- 
colored as is usual in the lake region, was clear Hike that of Lake 
Panasoffkee just described), which in peninsular Florida is a pretty 
Fig. 26.—Helena Run, looking west from railroad trestle about 4 miles 
from Leesburg and 2 from Okahumpka, Lake County. Shows Taxodium 
distichum (cypress), Fraxinus (ash), Tillandsia usneoides (moss), Nym- 
phaea macrcphyila (bonnets), Pontederia, etc. May 21, 1909. 
good sign of calcareous water. Later in the dav I was informed 
by an old resident of the neighborhood that this water comes from 
a limestone spring a few miles to the southwestward (Bug Spring, 
near Okahumpka), but that in wet seasons when the lake is high 
this stream (Helena Run) flows the ether way. and us waters 
find their way into the Gulf by way of the Withlacoochee River. 
The calcareous eastward-flowing stage of this run must be the 
usual one, for there are quite a number of lime-loving plants 
along it, and the general aspect of the vegetation is very similar 
