The Palatka daily news. (Palatka, Fla.) 1884-1888, 1885-05-19
'.CRACKER''
DETAILS A VISIT TO TWO Or
ANGE GROVES.

How Sour Fruit Is Made SWeet---Dis-
gusted Strangers--Packing
anges---Delusions OF
NorthernePs.
Special Cor. Of the Manitoba Sun.
NUMBER THREE LETTER.
Ocala is a thriving little town of sew
eral thousand inhabitans. The Florida
Southern and Peninsula railroads pass
through it. The hotel is very fine and
the business men seem somewhat ener-
getic and pushing. The town, like Pa
latka, was almost totally destroyed by
fire about year ago, but is now we'll
built, compact place. The soil is good,
dark, rich, sandy loan, with hammock
land, but the inevitable result Of rich
soil in this climate follows, namely, ma
laria; and as a New England Yankee
puts it: You'll shake yer teeth aout. !"
The sights Of the vicinity are the i'm
Iaense groves of Messrs. ]. A. Harris,
Hon. P p Bishop and Mr.. Eigleberger
all seif-made men, having commenced
with but little or nothing. The Harris
grove has an area of about $50 acres, and
contains something like 10000 trees.
We're this set off in regular grove style,
twenty-five feet apart each way, it would
contain ten thousand five hundred trees,
seventy to the acre, but nearly the whole
of it was originally wild, natural or
ango grove, the fruit being unfit for use
except to make delicious wine; and
the peel is made into a very fine marina
lade In the streets of Jacksonville, Pa
latka. and indeed in most OF the Florida
towns, these
SOUR TREES
are planted on the streets as shade trees,
and they have a very pretty appearance.
Many amusing stories are told of the
uninitiated sampling this fruit. There
is a fine of five dollars for plucking it, of
which the stranger is soon made aware.
Many Of them never think of enquiring
as to the quality of the fruit, hut watch
a favorable opportunity when the guar
diaus Of the peace are otherwise engaged,
and slyly pick some fine specimens, of
what they foudly think is the famous
Florida orange; the eyes greedily antici-
pate the luscious feast. Alas, for human
hopes, the teeth are buried in the golden
fruit and a change suddenly comes over
the face of the novice Disgust, sur
prise. disappointment and anger struggle
in tun for the mastery; blended with it
is a self-canscious feeling that it was
mean thing to take the fruit and such
mean fruit. Sour as vinegar, with con-
siderable of the persimmon astringency,
it sets ones teeth on edge, and draws the
mouth up as if with puckering string.
Diluted in water, the juice is really a
good tonic. 1 have wandered far from
the
HARRIS GROVE.
Let us again look it up. This grove, as
before stated, was a natural wild grove,
and was purchased by Mr.. J, A. Harris
some twelve years ago, when orange cul-
ture was practically in its infancy. The
forest trees were partially cut out and
the wild trees budded mot grafted) with
fruit The budding is done as follows:
An ineision is made in the bark of the
tree when the sap is flowing freely, in
tho shape of the letter Tan eye, or an
eye with thorn attached, or twig is
inserted, and pushed down between the
bark and the trunk, the bark Tapped over
it, waXed and tied in place with soft
twine or strips of old cotton. These are
known as the eye bud, the 'thorn"
bud and the spring bud am inclined
TO think the latter is the best, but it is a
matter of opinion. This having been
done in the Harris grove, many buds be-
ing placed on each tree, the natural
branches were gradually trimmed off as
rapidly as the buds could use the sap,
and finally nothing but the budded limbs
were left In three years the trees were
bearing crops, long wait but a glori-
Gus return, as there is shipped annually
from 95, COO to 80. 900 boxes of delicious
fruit, on which is made profit OF from
$1.25 to $2.25 per box nett. The soil is
dark. rich, low hammock appearing
much like our own beautiful soil, except
il muddiness), but ''everv rose has its
thorn, and in this case the thorn is
FEVER AND AGUE."
However, the owner of such place does
not need to remain all year on it, the i'm
portaut work being all done between
about January 1 and July of each year.
The. grove is perfectly level, and no sx-
tended view can be got OF it as q whole,
while IN attempt to explore it in detail
is simply wandering through a tangled
labyrinth of orange trees, till it pals on
the senses and one becomes wearied with
wandering about seeing but one thing
No attempt has been made IN beautify