The Florida agriculturist. [volume] (DeLand, Fla.) 1878-1911, 1893-10-18
DeLand, Fla, Wednesday, October is, 1898.

and an explanation as to your actions. don't
care to ent ihtO any discussion as TO the cor
1ectne stf your actions or as to the right OF the
same, but simply desire to notify you that II
you have dared to estion my integrity or
your language is such as t. in any way lnlure
me or my standing in Florida, that l shall take
such steps to punish on a d protect myself as
the laws of libel in this country will permit me
to.
desire to say to you that | will p'y the ex-
penses of Il conn ittee Of the EthelW Old shippers
that may be Il 'cted by maj rity vote OF the
anne to New York and return, and also the TX
enses of any expert accountant that the' may
desire to employ, and viii urni them will Tree
access to my books, and every facility possible
to thoroughly inspect the who'll proceed ngs
from beginning to tnd. If after their invest ga
ton it is found as only can be the case, that my
VIII le action and everyth ng that WAS done in
connection with the Ethe wo was as 1t. aight
honj at honorable and outright as it was o. sible
to make il, then you have raised this question:
and shall agree to shoulder these expt nses your
self. II, however, it is found that l have Gone
ANYTHING wrong or that any fraud has been com
mitted, then will agree to stand all the expen
ses and cOnsequeD ces.
Pending the receipt of your circular by ega
advice have nothing further to saj but if you
lefuse to send the same, shall commence pI Oceed
ings against you at oLce, for attempting to III
jIre me. had advice some weeks ago that you
were intending to take this STEP bnt for what
cause l know not. Meanwhile it will save us
both trouble if you will first find out that YOU
are right in making the charge of fraud before go
ing ahead.
shall be glad to hear from you by return
mail, and failing TO do so, shall give you an op-
portunity of proving that there has been fraud
as far as the Ethelwo,d shippers IRE concerned.
Very truly yours.
(Signed) e. l. GoODsELL.
This letter was evidently intended to
frighten us from our purpose but the
following letter shows how we felt:
DELAND, FLA. Sept. A, 1898.
Mr.. E. L. GoodSeH, 1O3 Park Place, N. y.
Dear Sir:-Your letter of the lst. at hand.
In the first place your Information as to our
sending out printed circulars to shippers of the
Ethel old is not correct. We have written them
q personal letter copy of which we enclose.
We have letters in possession that lay sew
eral charges at your door. Our object in sending
out these letters was to see if such charges were
true. If they are not the investigation will do
you no harm. If We do find that there is any.
thing out of the way the growers will know just
what it is.
AS to your threats they do not change ouI
purpose at all. W6 have withheld all publication
of letters until the investigation is closed If as
you say the whole proceedings are straight from
beginning to end it will show itself without any
threats to help it.
Yours in the interest OF Florida Orange Grow
ers (Sgned) e. O. PAINTER.
In reply to the above letter we received
the following.
NEW YORK. September II, 1893.
Mr.. Z. o. Painter. DeLand, Fla
DEAR SIR:-I have yours of September 4th, in
closing copy of your circular letter to Ethewold
shippers that requ ysted be sent me. dated Aug
ust 23rd. l received inform alton soon after this,
that at the instance of certain Florida organi-
zation, in conjunction with other untriendly com
petitOrs. you were planning to create such feel-
ing against me. by publishing false charges
rejecting ON my honesty, as to prevent my get