The National tribune., 1909-03-11
Veterans, their wives and their child
20 any such afflicted place.
An Agreeable Disappointment.

veterans. their wives and their children
to any such afflicted place.
An Agreeable Disappointment.
A most agreeable disappointment
awaited me. When daylight came on
| Monday, March 1, and L looked out
midnight train had landed me, / founc
myself on one of those vast piney
plains such as those who have travelled
over the South Atlantic Coast are quite
familiar with. For miles the surface
of the country was as level as a floor,
with the tall, straight trunks of the
l1ong-leaved pine crowned at the sum-
nit with meager crest of limbs, stand
ing 40 or SO feet from each other. One
could see for miles thru these open
| woods in any direction, and what as
tonished my Northern companions was
| that we could drive in q buggy in any
direction. the only obstacles being
| fallen tree or saw palmetto.
There was nothing in the looks of
| the people to Indicate even a knowledge
of what malaria meant The children
and young folks were as bright and
rosy as could be found anywhere, and
the older people. tho generally gaunt
and sinewy. had absolutely nothing of
the ague tinge in their skins or eyes.
When they were questioned about ague
| they scarcely knew what it was and
only from hearsay. Many of the peo-
| pie I met were from northern Georgia
and Alabama, who had lived there for
number OF years, and found the cli-
| mate and soil quite as healthful as the
highlands which they had left. Here
and there Northern man was met who
told the same story, and said that he
had never enjoyed better health in his
life. They said that the days were
warm. but never SO warm as they had
experienced farther North, while the
nights were invariably cool. Summer
| and Winter. The Gulf of Mexico is
only distant some 40 miles, and there
was a constant interchange of air cur
rents, with the wind setting toward the
gulf in the daytime and returning from
the gulf at night. Everywhere were
the great festoons of Spanish moss
which are usually associated with ma
laria, but there were no fetid exhala-
tions to charge these with the fever
ish germs. The sky was like a May
morning in the North, and the people,
the commercial travellers and the tour
lists said that that had been the rule
during the whole Winter. There had
been only occasional showers, and after
these the sun came out quickly with
Springlike brilliance.
Hunting for the Swamps.
After breakfast the people were
shown the maps and interrogated about
the swamps. but they professed to have
no knowledge of them. They said that
in the earlier history of the country
there had been, 1t is true, many pools. |
ponds and lakes, but these had greatly |
diminished in number as the country |
was opened and the land cleared. Most |
of them held to the theory that the
pools did not receive as much water |
as formerly, since more of il sank into |
the plowed ground. There was hardly !
enough plowed ground found anywhere, |
however. to justify this conclusion
After breakfast, and 1t was an excel |
lent one considering the locality, we all |
got into buggies and drove about
searching for the swamps. The first
standing water we came to was some
miles distant and was n round, crystal
lake of several acres in size. Ihe wa
ter was clear, drinkable and abounded
in fish. What was strangest is that
the margin was cultivated up to within
foot of the waters edge. The lake
itself was bowl-like depression in the
general level, which collected the wa
ter from quite wide area. Naturally
the soil for several hundred feet from
the edge of the water was of the great
est richness, since it had received the
washings from the rest of the surface.
Richer soil could not be found any
where, and the owner with force of
men was working industriously in his
beds of cabbage, celery, lettuce and
cucumbers. All these were growing
iuxuriantly, and he was sanguine of
rich returns from his paintings. What
struck the attention of all of us was a
rather rudely constructed water wheel
with boxes made by some one who was
evidently not carpenter. To this was
attached a little gasoline engine, and a
ditch ran thru the sand to a still larger
pond at some distance. The owner ex-
planned that when the level of the
water in his pond rose so as to endan-
ger his bed he set his engine to work
to bail 1t OUT" that is, the wheel with |
Its crude buckets lifted the water up
to where 1t would flow away In the |
ditch and lower the level in the pond. |
His device had proved quite effective, |
and he wel well satisfied with 1t. With |
gallon Or so Of benzine he could keep |
the level of the little lake down to |
where it would furnish the requisite
moisture for his truck patch.
The experience was similar thruout |
the days search for the swamps. Wher-
ever these small bodies of water were |
still found the ground around them was |
considered very valuable on account Of |
Its richness and the crops Il would pro-
duce. The most Of what had once !