The Montgomery advertiser., 1906-04-15
MILES OF SEA
N, N, FLAGLER TO BUILD A RAIL-
 ROAD TO ISLAND.
on Florida Coast. The Foundation Il to Be of Cement-William E. Curtis Tells of Won
 derful System.


 adise. Is now engaged Tn what is prop sbIy the most remarkable piece of rail way construction that was ever at tempted. writes William E. Curtis Tn The Chicago Record-Hera d. It IS also the most expensive. He proposes to extend the East Coast Railroad rom the mainland of Flor!6a to the Island If Kew West. a distance of HI miles, regardless of tides, currents, winds and all that sort of things. Within the last few weeks the Southern Railroad has carried more than 5000 laborers, Ital- fans and Hungarians from New York who will be used in construction work and enormous quantities or building material have been shipped by rail and by sea.
 Stretched along the Florida coast as far as Key West is a chain of hum dreds of small islands of coral for nation, the result of millions of years of labor by billions of industrious lit- tie insects which devote their lives to the cause. The coral formations of the coast of Florida are among the most remarkable of physical phenomena in the universe. and the water is full of other wonders, strange animal life that Is not found anywhere else except along the Bay of Naples and in certain parts of the Indian Ocean. Here grows that extraordinary plant, half vegetable. half animal, known as the sponge, and myriads of other strange forms of life
 The reefs formed by the little insects have caught particles that have float cd through the air, and during the ages the hollows and crevices have been gradually filled with earth and vegetable matter. Thus islands have been formed with a soil that has all been carried by invisible agencies through the atmosphere. The seeds Of trees and plants, usefui and otherwise have come on the wings of the wind in the same way, and under the tropic sun all kinds of vegetables and fruits grow to perfection--oranges. lines. bananas, coeoanuts. pfneapples, man. goes and other fruits that are found throughout the West Indies. There is a great deal of vacant land in the keys, which offers an opportunity for people who like a ho, climate to en- gage in fruit-raising and market gar dening as soon as the Flagler railroad is finished and transportation facilt- ties are offered.
 About fifty of the keys are inhabited by a spare, mongres population of Cubans, negroes. descendants of Carit Indians. sandhill "crackers" from Florida and Georgia, castaways from wrecked vessels. beach-combers of all FdC6S, anu HcIC anu etiCLO d cd descendant of the Seminole In dians that used to occupy Florida These mongrel people are called 'conks II suppose after the conch shells which they gather in Yarge quantities and ship to market. They are mostly fishermen. spongegatherers and wreck CTS. Their ancestors were pirates and used to lure passing vessels onto the rocks by showing false lights. ana loot them. The cabins of these fisher men often contain interesting articles which are a part of the plunder oi wrecks in generations past, and some of them are very valuable. friend who made a cruise among the key: some years ago. told me that he found a service of solid silver plate. exqui sitely embossed, and bearing the coat of-arms of some proud family of Spain in the cabin of a sponge fisherman wh' claimed that he had inherited 1t from several generations of ancestors ant boasted that it must nave been takef from the cavin of some Spanish gal leon that ran upon these treacherou! reefs Steamers and sailing ships giv' them a wide berth nowadays, although the keys are we'll lighted by the gov ernment. The only navigation Is don' by the small luggers of the natives who sail in and out without the slight est fear. because they know the wat CTS as the red man knows the forests Sand Key. a small island about thirty miles south of Key West, is the mos southerly land of the United States Dry Tortugas, the most westerly O. the keys, was used as prison by th' military authorities curing the civt war, and is now a quarantine station There are no roads on the key, no car riages or other vehicles, and no ami nals except dogs and cats. People gt about In boats. The children go te school and on Sundays the natives gt to church in boats, and the mailcarrteri serve the island in thar way.
 Key Largo, the largest of all the is'