The times. (Owosso, Mich.) 1882-1897, 1895-12-27
THE SOUTH LAND.
GREAT CROPS AND FABULOUS
PRICES FOR THEM.
How the Farmer has to Treat the SOFIA
Sketch OF the Seminoles and Their
Everglade Homes-They Obey no Laws.
Except Tribal.
Atlanta, Ga. sS<vSss- a.


Two or three days a, Gle Cotton
States and International Exposition
has failed to find for us features of any
Importance that were not observed at
the Worlds Fair. The exposition is
simply a worlds fair in miniature.
We find many of the same exhibits.
We find also the Plaisance in full oper-
ation-jokes of all kinds and some
creditable exhibitions. In short. if one
did not attend the Worlds Fair, the
Atlanta Exposition is worthy of atten-
ton. 1t will not interest one who at
tended the fair for more than two
days.
one Is convinced at once upon get
ting upon q street car that Hazen s.
Plngree is not mayor of Atlanta. He
is further fully impressed that the
street car companies must own the city
government. With wife and child of
III, we boarded street car at the
Union depot and asked to be set down
at the Boulevard House, about mile
distant. We rendered ten cents as car
fare. More was demanded by the con-
ductor. Thinking that he wished fare
for our 10-year-old, we passed up an
other nickle. That was not enough.
Ten cents apiece all around was the
price. And ten cents was the price for
car fare all the time and has been
In Atlanta, and a most unsatisfactory
service it is at that. The common
council OF Atlanta and the city govern
ment in general is stated to us by the
citizens to be woefully corrupt. Our
experience in street cars would seem
to bear out this theory. Atlanta is a
beautiful city, surrounded by a mag
nificent scope of miserable, poor coun-
try, as Georgia country goes. The
surface is very broken and the land
worn out. We can see no use in such
a section for so large and beautiful a
city.
While upon our trip down in South
eastern Florida we once brought up IN
a camp of the Seminole Indians. This
was in the edge of the Everglades, up
on the New River, some six miles
above Fort Louderdale. The Seminole
is an Indian peculiar to himself. There
are some 500 of the bucks left in the
tribe, few more squaws than bucks,
and probably afew more "picannines,
as they call their children, than bucks
and squaws together. They inhabit the
Everglades where they retreated dur
ing the early Indian wars, and where
they have always and do still defy the
government to capture and remove
them to reservations. The Seminoles
are the only Indians in the United
States who still maintain their tribal
relations are not amenable to the laws
Of the United States and over whom the
government has no control. The party
which we come up with at New
River were out on trading expedition.
They had come down the New River in
their dug outs. One of the bucks
spoke some English. We left him at
night expecting to gain considerable
information from him in the morning
before our mule team was ready to
leave. But, 10! in the morning at $40,
poor 10 was too full for utterance.
Some Of the railroad men at work up
on the grade near by had supplied him
with bottle The fellows name was
Tommy Tiger. He could read and
write little, having been at school at
Tampa for a time. The night before
we had promised to get Congressman
Linton to secure his entrance to the
Indian school near washington, and
he was to have given us our answer the
next morning. But the next morning
he was too full for utterance" on the
question Of education. He challenged
us to "clog" on the river bank, which
was accepted, and as we assisted the
poor fellow to wind of an Indian clog,
our companion Johnson, Of Springfield,
ILL.,, snapped his "kodac" and immortal
lied the scene.
These Indians obey only their own
laws. The penalty of death is admin
istered upon slight occasion. They are
a moral people, entirely devoid of any
knowledge of religion, and for that
matter of education. It was stated to
us that Tommy Tiger, DR.. Big Cypress,
Billy Bow Legs and Tommy Okeecho-
bee are the only Indians in the tribe
who can read and write. For over
sixty years the Seminoles have defied
the government. 1t would now be
impossible for the government troops
to capture them. They are familiar
with every water way and island in the
Everglades. A company Of soldiers
could not transport supplies for over
q weeks maintenance through this Sec
ton. The Indian could subsist in
definitely. He could change his base
Of operations in a night and leave no
trail. A month would be required to
again locate him. His light dug-out
cypress boat, executed with great skill
mechanically, would transport COM
pany of twelve or fifteen with supplies
and not draw over three inches of wa
ter. We saw one of these boats. 1t
was about sixty feet in length, some
four feet in breadth and some three
feet above the water. Four men could
portage 1t considerable distance. 1t
carried two sails. 1t was "dug-out,"
a cypress tree having been used. The
mechanical work was exceedingly fine.
Tommy Tiger had paintel Seminole"
upon the. bows in quite fairly formed
letters.
The bucks are magnificently built
specimens Of the human family. Tall.
quare-shouldered, deep-chested and
strong. of limb. They, as well as the
squaws, who are very inferior physical
ly, were dressed principally in buck
skin. The squaws wore immense
necklaces of Deeds, bears claws, bears
teeth and periwinkle shells. The Sem
inoles subsist principally upon fish and
game. They kill large numbers of