Delaware gazette and state journal. (Wilmington, Del.) 1883-1902, 1893-10-26
AMONG FLORIDA ORANGE GROVES.
Where the Golden Fruit Grows
Like Peaches in Delaware.

on the Delaware Peninsula Florida
Produces a Box OF Oranges--The Pretty
Country Town of Eastls--Fresh venison
for Breakfast. .-.-
neutrality-suspicious. Of Gazette ana journal
EusTIs, FLA, Oct. i6.-The hotel
Thermometer marked 62o when | arose
ut O'Clock this morning This is the
| lowest temperature | have yet found in
| Florida; the highest has been $50.
Since the storm of Thursday | have
been riding around among orange
groves which are to be found every
where in this part of Florida.-big
groves, little groves, young groves, old
groves, flourishing groves, neglected
! groves, clean groves, grassy groves-it
is a disputed question among growers
whether Bermuda should be grown
in the grove or vigorously excluded.
This Bermuda" the grass of the sands,
did not come from bermuda. but was
imported from Africa by Captain Der.
moothes, from whom 1t takes it name
1t is the lawn grass of Florida and is
regarded as almost ineradicable where
1t has obtained a foothold. Let it once
get a grip on the bare sand and you
cannot starve II ont, drouths will not
kill II, blowing under does not
discourage 1t; 1t Is there to stay. 1t is a
fine.leaved, short, soft grass, lacking the
velyety rank greenness of northern
grasses, but it will make presentable
lawn in five years out of a plot of sand
as bare and barren looking as the side
of brick house.
The storm of Wednesday and Thurs.
day, residents say was the most severe
they have experienced in 10 years. 1t
was like the August storms that knocked
off a million baskets of peaches in Della
ware. Consequently | expected to find
the orange crop seriously injured. But
1t is not; at least in this locality. do
not think that more than per cent of
the fruit, in the groves have seen, has
been blown oil, and about an equal
quantity has been "thorned' and will
drop off. The oranges hereabouts are
still green, not more than one out of q
hundred being ripe enough to eat. OF
course have been sampling these ripper
ones literally aud find them delicious
freshly plucked from the tree. have
also been trying to eat guavas, but one
OF them per day will more than satisfy
me thus far. The guaya looks like a
small lemon and tastes like mixture of
molasses and burnt India rubber. II is
taste thai stays by you, too; after mas
ticating full grown and ripened guava
you can still taste it the next day.
am told that very few like this fruit on
i1rst acquaintance but that usage soon
brings relish for it.
For every basket of peaches produced
on the Delaware Peninsula, Florida
sends to market box of oranges. Like
the Delaware peach grower, the Florida
Orange grower, too, Is mixed as to the
prospective yield. Ia some groves there
are fewer oranges than last year; in
others there are more. General Manager
Ives Of the Florida Fruit Exchange,
whom l talked with in Jacksonville,
ought to be standard authority ON the
general outlook. He said:
THE outlook now Is for the largest
crop ever had in Florida-between
100000 and 4,5o0,0O0 boxes. We are
already shipping TO Europe, by way of
New York. We have now about 5000
or 1000 boxes en- route TO Liverpool.
We have heard from our first shipment
over there anu il realized an average,
gross, of S3.l2 per box. Last year we
hanuleq about 20 per cent of tho crop
that was shipped out of the State. The
exchange is an organization of growers.
The fruit is shipped 10 as and we market
il for the growers. We have agencies in
the principal cities OF the United States.
and IN Liverpool and Montreal"
Eustis is pretty country town, with
an all-the-yehr.round population of
about 800, considerably augmented dur
| tnn fk.z Nxrt,,
been claimed to be the geographical
centre OF the State and the highest
ground in Florida, about 500 feet above
sea level is in this section-though ox-
actly where would require accurate sur
veying to determine. 1t is region Of
lakes and rolling land. The town fronts
on a lake of the same name, four OF Ave
miles in diameter, one of cluster of
four that may be termed, relatively, large
lakes, in contradistinction to the numer-
Gus smaller lakes which we should call
ponds in Delaware. One of the prettiest
Of these-perhaps tine very prettiest, since
1t has had its hair combed as one might
| say, is known as "Crooked Lake" or.
rather, the "Crooked Lakes" there
being two of them side by side, desig-
mated as the east and west lakes. Sub
urban Eustls, with its ornate cottages
set in small orange groves, oleanders,
| palmettos, century plants, olives, guayas,
live-oaks, umbrella trees, eucalyptus,
and others, and its board sidewalks,
stretches out well along the northern
shore OF "Croolfed Lake, whose waters
aow clear over a hard sandy bottom
that knows nothing OF mud or ooze or
rubbish of any kind. John A. Mac.
donald, who has mapped this locality,
says Of this beautiful suburban water !:
Crooked Lake is the most beautiful
lake IN Florida. There is not one
Objectionable feature on any part
| OF its shores. The beach is white sand.
In few rods from high water mark the
land rises from soto $50 feet, &c.
This statement l can corroborate so
far as the west lake, the nearer to town,
is concerned; the east lake | have not
| examined.
Not far from the east lake is Lake
Gertrude, which runs southwark to
the railroad line east of Tavares,
and upon the southern shore of
this lake is located the Chatauqua of
Central Florida; one of the two branches
OF that establishment In the State. In
Eusus the government has planted an
experiment station with special refer
ence to the culture of the orange.
We generally have fresh venison on
the hotel table and was surprised to
learn that deer are still to be found
| u,ithir faxt, Y,nilah rf L,,.4;,