38 
SEVENTH ANNUAL MEETING OF THE 
weighing ten pounds, and this fruit has been as profitable as 
anything I have ever raised on my place, I believe that 
in our section of the country (Lake county) every farmer and 
grower should have a patch of pineapples for his own use. 
When it is thoroughly ripe it is a delicious fruit, as much so 
■Sis any that can be had. These pineapples that we pick green 
and ship are not of a very fine flavor when they do ripen. 
People do not like the taste of them. People are going into 
pines extensively and there seems to be a great deal of trouble 
in getting slips. A gentleman told me to day that he had 150 
acres under cultivation, and he was thinking of putting out 
all of it in pineapples. The matter of transportation facilities 
is also a troublesome question. Mr. Plant has opened up a 
a st eamship line to the tropical regions, Jamaica and the south, 
and in view of the competition from the West Indies, I do not 
know where we will be after awhile. Unless transportation 
matters improve I am afraid we will be run out of the busi¬ 
ness. 
Mr. Phelps —It is not well to cross bridges before we 
get to them. I have great faith in what Mr. Flagler says and 
he says he is going to build further down into the state. Re¬ 
ferring again to the medicinal qualities of the pineapple: I 
think the time has come for us to realize that there is nothing 
so eloquent as the truth, and the simple truth should be told 
of the climate of Florida. I came to this state as an invalid. 
I respect the state. I have been sick in the last eighteen 
months, and I have been told again and again that I would 
not live long, but I am living and strong to-day. There are 
plants that grow in Florida that will cure almost any disease. 
You should all understand what your systems need. After 
going through a very trying year and not knowing what made 
me sick, I am up again and on my feet and ready to work, 
almost. I say to you that the pineapple and the fig are pre¬ 
eminently the food for this climate. Those two things are 
worth more as food than anything else, but they want to be 
ripe fruit, not green. Unripe fruit is not good for the stom¬ 
ach and the acid of such fruit is irritating. The acid of ripe 
fruits is all healthful. Yo food or fruit is equal to the pine¬ 
apple. I do not think we can raise pines where there is frost 
in the air to compete with the lower part of the state. I have 
kept a record for forty years and it is very interesting to me 
to studv the records of the barometer and the thermometer, 
and I have learned a great many things from this systematic 
study. The question of Orlando has been brought up. I have 
resided in Orange county twenty years. There are .places 
near that town where pineapples have been planted and grow 
so luxuriously that in going through the country in my buggy 
