The aegis & intelligencer. [volume] (Bel Air, Md.) 1864-1923, 1882-05-12
Miscellallen11s.
For the Asgis and Mtelligmcer.
4 Plea for Florida.

Mr.. EDITOR: | noticed in your paper of
April 2lst an article, wherein you state that
two gentlemen from Baltimore county went
to Florida recently, and saw there nothing
but barren wastes of white sand. Now these
gentlemen do the State of Florida great in.
justice. In the first place, the sand there is
not white; that is, not all of it. The ham
mock soil is dark, somewhat the color of
phosphate. 1t is beyond my comprehension
how any person could go to Florida and re-
turn and make such n statement as these par
ties from Baltimore county have made. do
not know what portion of the State they
visited, but certain it is if they had gone to
Jacksonville and taken the steamer up St.
Johns river, they could not have failed to
see handsome residences, beautiful orange
groves, and every evidence of prosperous
and thriving State.
The traveller going South by the Atlantic
coast line travels through barren, desolate
country, but every one ought to know that
they cannot judge whole State BY what
they see from railroad car. A gentleman
from Ohio went South on the same train
with me last December. When he got to
Jacksonville, he took the first train North
and went home, remarking that this is one
h-ll of a country. Now how could he give
any just or accurate account of the State p
He, like the Baltimore county gentlemen,
had become disguised, and doubtless told his
friends in Ohio that he saw nothing but pine
trees. How would it do for strangers TO
judge our State and county by what they see
as they go from Baltimore to PHILADELPHIA
on the p, w. e b. Railroad? 1t would be
difficult to find II poorer section of the State
than some portions ofCecil county, and vet q
few miles of are the fertile hills of the Oc-
torara. Suppose we estimated the soil and
landscape of Maryland by what we see on
the Baltimore and Potomac Railroad from
Baltimore to Washington There is nothing
worse in Florida, assure you am inter-
ested, to small extent, in the future of Flor
ida, and such statements as these parties give
might prevent emigration there. Now, take
the statistics of the orange crop. That will
prove to any one not prejudiced that there is
not more prosperous State in the Union
than Florida. In 1870 the crop was estimat-
cd at 100000 oranges. In 1880, 100000
one orange for every inhabitant in the
United States.
Now, barren white sand will not grow
orange trees. This is patent to every reflect
ing mind. | think some one must have
thrown sand in the eyes of the gentlemen
from Baltimore county.
| can give the name and address of gen.
tleman in Florida, who, ten years ago, was
Clerk of the county in which he lived. at
81 200 per annum. He began to bud wild
grove, of which there are many throughout
the State, and last year he shipped $4,000
boxes OF oranges. Now calculate at "a per
box and what do we find ?-$50,0O0 per an
nun. This done in ten years, and where
there is nothing but barren wastes of white
sand.
AS to beauty of landscape, l will admit
that it will not compare with our State, or
with any rolling, billy country. Tojudge from
reports of interested people and newspapers,
Florida would seem to be a sort of fairy land,
an earthly paradise, where every one lives
life ofpastoral poetry in which golden fruits
and shmmering flowers, bubbing springs
and sweet-throated warblers play the princ-
pal parts; while on the other hand the story
of the gentleman from Baltimore county
conveys dreary impression of barren white
sand. 1t is very evident to any one who has
been there that disappointment had some
thing to do with the reports of these parties.
They went there expecting impossibilites.
In this weary world people cannot get rich,
even in an orange grove, without working
and waiting, and one would think that ey-
perience might have taught every body as
much as that. These gentlemen l have no
doubt, supposed they could purchase an or
ange grove for song and sit under their
vine and fig trees in luxury the balance of
their days.
There is all through the South good land
that can be bought for from S. to $40 per
acre. Suppose aman has $4,000. Ifhe buys
farm of 100 acres here it will take all his
capital. If he bought in the South at $40
per acre it would leave him $4,000 as work
ing capital, and he can get a living much
easier there than here. If these facts were
generally known it would not be long before
all that country would blossom as the rose.
Then take the climate into considerations
Here it takes all man can make, ESPECIALLY
if he is a poor farmer or mechanicD in the
summer to keep him during the winter. The
climate in winter in Florida is simply superb.
In December last the lowest saw the Their
mometer was AZ degrees and it generally
ranged from 60 to 20 degrees
There are hundreds of acres of land in
Florida that are worthless, totally unfit for
any thing, but the whole State is not a barren
waste of white sand, the report of the gen.
tlemen from Baltimore county notwithstahd-
ing
As said before, they expected an earthly
Paradise, or as you put It groves of spice and
oranges, enlivened by the songs of birds: and
TO breathe the perfume from nard and cassia
like that which is waited through the cedared
wales of the Hesperides. L. L. MILLER.
----4-t-
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