Nothing of particular interest occurs to break the monotony during our voyage to Manatee, one hundred miles distant from Cedar Keys. It is situated on a river of the same name, fifteen miles from the gulf. It was named from the sea-cow, which was found there, and used as an article of food. Visitors or immigrants may have the fondest dream of their imagination realized in finding here all the natural accompaniments for a pleasant home.
The view of Manatee, as we approach the town, is not particularly imposing—the houses being scattered in every direction, like the forces of a retreating army, while each settler appears to have taken possession of what land he could cultivate as he came. The dwellings are embowered in orange-trees, which in March freight the air with a perfume that permeates our very existence, producing a kind of luxurious rest, when time and all objects around us move as though in dreamland.
Perennial spring-time keeps vegetation growing all winter. The Palma Christi, in this locality, becomes a large tree, yielding its beans perfectly every year; while tomato-vines grow to an immense size, twining into shady bowers, fruiting, without cessation, until three years old, when the tomato has a strong flavor, resembling the vine. The guava, from which the jelly of commerce is manufactured, grows spontaneously, and it is said the mamma of all in South Florida still flourishes at this place. The lands in the vicinity are pine, hummock, and prairie. The pine-land requires fertilizing—the hummock, clearing and ditching—when two hogsheads of sugar and seventy five gallons of sirup are the average product of an acre, which, to those who never in their lives had as much sugar as they could eat, is a sweet item.
The prairie-lands furnish sustenance for the lowing herds, which are wild as deer. They are captured by a song the “cow-boys” sing, resembling nothing else in the world. Where it originated, none can tell; but the cattle gather from afar whenever it is sung, and are then driven at will by those long rawhide lashes that pop like pistols, many times cutting out pieces of quivering flesh, at which the sight of humanity would shrink.
The lusciousness of oranges produced here is incomparable, particularly when contrasted with those sour, stringy products of commerce. We have tasted this fruit from every clime, but never have the Manatee oranges been excelled. How ripe and delicious they grow on those tall trees, where they hang constantly exposed to the rays of a tropical sun until March! Messrs. Gates, Whittaker & Lee have old bearing groves, while hundreds of others are coming on.
When we reflect upon the superabundance of natural products that flourish in this locality, with which to supply the necessities of life, can we wonder why one of the wrecks of once powerful tribes so long resisted the encroachments of white settlers, contesting for territory until nearly extinct, many of them suffering with the calmness of Christian martyrs, or the bravery of Roman heroes—thus regarding death with a lofty disdain? The Indians, like the wild beasts in whose skins they were clad, have been driven, by the march of civilization, farther and farther into the grass-water country, where, like a lion deprived of his claws, resentment has died for want of strength to assert its prowess, while, by contact with an enlightened race, their original independence has been brought into a state of subjugation.
In this portion of Florida the cactus-pear grows to an immense size. History mentions a peculiar tribe of Indians who once lived here with as little solicitude for their support as the birds of passage, especially in the pear-season, which was hailed by them as a period of feasting—their only labor being to obtain the pears, which they afterward peeled and roasted for present use, or dried and packed like figs, to eat on their journeys, while the remaining portion of their time was passed in the observance of their various festivals and dancing—their houses being made of palm-matting, which they carried on their backs—thus moving their habitations, every three or four days, without the slightest inconvenience.
The inducements for immigration here are equal to any in the State. Adventurers do not flourish on this soil, the residents, taken as a mass, being the best that can be found. Many of them from the Southern States, uprooted from their old homes by the reverses of war, but not disheartened, have come down here to take root and thrive again. Church privileges are enjoyed, in a church where quiet Christian people assemble for worship. Also three well-taught schools in the town and vicinity. Two good resident physicians, but dependent on visitors for a support—one of them from a malarious country, who came here to escape death. Here, as in other localities, settlers have to sow before they can reap, but the natural growth in the hummocks evidences great fertility of soil.
The Manatee boarding-houses are sanitariums, where more trouble is taken to please visitors, at less expense, than at almost any other place in the State. The tables are supplied with food visitors can eat, that will nourish them—not what the host chooses to furnish. I well remember with what a troubled look Mrs. Gates took me into the larder one day after having dined on lemonade. There was a quantity of provisions to gladden the hungry: almost an entire roasted wild turkey, stuffed quarter of venison, fresh-baked fish, home-made light-bread and biscuits, pound-cake, rich lemon pies—any of which would tempt an epicurean taste. “You are eating nothing hardly,” said she; “now, whenever you wish, come and help yourself.”
The remoteness of this point from the principal resorts is the only objection. Every one who comes says the climate is perfect. The streams and gulf swarm with fish. Visitors sit on the wharf and recreate in catching twenty-pound snappers, while at low-tide the rheumatic old men wade about in the warm salt-water, happy as boys just entering their teens. Let all those who dream of sand-hills, and only starvation staring them in the face while in Florida, come to Manatee. A pure sea-breeze pervades the whole surrounding country, the evenness of temperature producing a very genial and happy influence in pulmonic diseases, more than all the drugs compounded by any pharmaceutist in the world. The moon here shines with a clear, luminous light of two common moons—an indescribable brilliancy that transforms the darkness of night almost into a continued day, which has a tendency to bewilder, and make us think we are in a land of fabled beauty, more than a troubled world, to be tossed again by the tempests incident to life. This appears to be the native home of the grape-vine, where all varieties flourish finely. Think of the money that is expended every year in sending to foreign countries for the one article of wine, and what a miserable, adulterated mixture is brought over, only dashed a little with pure grape-juice, while the drugs introduced would cause any one with delicate sensibilities to shrink from the thought of swallowing! If a reliable firm were to come here and undertake the culture of vineyards, manufacturing pure wines, it would be found more remunerative than orange-growing, the risk being not half so great, as the wine is improving with age, while fresh fruits decay very rapidly, when being transferred. Invalids, in coming to Florida, bring their wines; whereas, if they could be furnished with a better article at much less rates, they would soon find it more advantageous to patronize a home-product, the compounding of which they knew to be genuine as the far-famed vintage of the Rhine. Wine has always been in use from the days of Noah to the present time, although brigades of men and women-crusaders have screamed themselves hoarse in proclaiming its evils and wicked influences. If the manufacture of wines from pure grape-juice was encouraged, this beastly drunkenness from strychnine whisky would very soon be abandoned.