The Florida agriculturist. [volume] (DeLand, Fla.) 1878-1911, 1881-03-02

nelaqo Consolidated aud united to
the contAent by half a thousand
miles of rasinland. When by grand
system ofsrtifcial canals for drain.
age and Sr commerce, costing ten
times less than the reclamation of
Holland oil the proposed Mississippi
embankmerts. All these rich low
lands shall be made cultivable, all
these lakes, ri rs and bogs be COLI
nected and make navigable; and
when that great ship canal shall pass
the imensE products of the great
Mississippi valley right through the
heart of our State, and when in the
near future that other great canal
shall lead the oommerce OF the world
into the gulf 70 cross our peninsula
also and this great world encircling
thoroughfare shaiI find in Florida its
only practicable continental contact
and when ar Ilne railroads, torking
from this poiAt of contact shall reach
more of the great cities of the whole
country by asess aggregate distance
Ahan is possible from any other sea-
port-then will the whole State be-
come a Yenice and New York
combined. IstlAis impossible? Have
we not come. to it naturally and
legitimateIy rom the consideration
OF the intrinsic formative elements Of
character touching only incidentally
upon environment Let US look
more definitely at the last environ
ment. Take our position ON the
great transit canal that is to be in the
present decade. Here at this great
commercial afte, say at Jacksonville,
take the distance by air line to the
great cities ~ Savannah rs miles,
Augusta % niles, Atlanta 265 miles,
Charleston 2l0 miles, Columbia 250
miles, Monta emery 800 miles, " Il
mington 330lmiles; Raleigh 400 miles,
| Nashville 37b miles; Memphis, Louis.
vile. Cincitnati aud Washington
! ! sAse - s0 fiffes each { IN Chffcsaa'
go $50 miles, only $50 more than the
distance from New York to that
city, while we are that much nearer
to st. Louis, aud only fifty miles
further from Cincinnati But sup.
pose Florida does not,become great
commercial State, it is at least subur-
ban to all the great cities east OF the
Rocky Mountains; here is an asylum
and retreat for the multitudes OF
sick, weary, and retiring in every
part of the country and can supply
the tables of those who prefer to
dine at home with all the choicest
fruits and earliest vegetables their
best markets demand. While we
ourselves, at home, can produce more
of the necessaries and Injuries OF life
than the people of any other State.
But we do not prefer to DE independ
ent,a and live apon home products
exclusively for we can do much bet.
ter to produce those very remunera.
tive articles peculiarly adapted TO
our climate aud soil and which are in
great demand where they cannot be
produced. For example We can often
exchange the products of single or.
ang tree Tor ten barrels of -four, and
100 OF these trees may be grown upon
single acre. thus by exchanging
we get at the rate of ten hundred
barrels of -four to the acre. And the
orange crop Of Florida is as certain
SIS the wheat crop of the West.
What we want is exchange and inter.
change-we want migration to make
Us home market. We want immi.
grafton to develop our varied re.
sources, TO take up and improve our
valuable lands to produce for home
market and for commercial exchange,
to help build roads and canals and
school houses. Nature has over
crowded everything here to such an
extent that our great want is the
means to utilize her bounties. Our
interest and our relations over reach
the bound1as OF our own State, nor
do they stop az Mason and Dixon's
line; they go east west and North,
to the extreme limits of our country.
Though we are the most southern In
latitude and climate. Our political
interests aud sympathies take in the
whole country and we belong to tie
great American Nation. Our pecul.
lar character and destiny finds its
highest development and realization |