Magnolia is about three-quarters of a mile from Green-Cove Springs, where are two or three large, well-kept boarding-houses. There is a very pleasant, shady walk through the woods from one place to the other; and the mail comes every day to Green Cove, and is sent for, from the Magnolia House, in a daily morning carriage. It is one of the amusements of the guests to ride over, on these occasions, for a little morning gossip and shopping, as Magnolia, being quite sequestered, does not present the opportunity to chaffer even for a stick of candy. Of course, fair ones that have been accustomed to the periodical excitement of a shopping-tour would sink into atrophy without an opportunity to spend something. What they can buy at Green Cove is a matter of indifference. It is the burning of money in idle purses that injures the nervous system.
There are no orange-groves on this side of the river. The orange-trees about the house are entirely of the wild kind; and, for merely ornamental purposes, no tree more beautiful could be devised. Its vivid green, the deep gold-color of its clusters of fruit, and the exuberance with which it blossoms, all go to recommend it. Formerly there were extensive orange-groves, with thousands of bearing trees, on this side of the river. The frost of 1835 killed the trees, and they have never been reset. Oranges are not, therefore, either cheap or plenty at Magnolia or Green Cove. Nothing shows more strikingly the want of enterprise that has characterized this country than this. Seedling oranges planted the very next day after the great frost would have been in bearing ten years after, and would, ere now, have yielded barrels and barrels of fruit; and the trees would have grown and taken care of themselves. One would have thought so very simple and easy a measure would have been adopted.
At eleven o'clock the next morning we took steamer for Mandarin, and went skimming along the shores, watching the white-blossoming plum-trees amid the green of the forest. We stopped at Hibernia, a pleasant boarding-house on an island called Fleming's, after a rich Col. Fleming who formerly had a handsome plantation there. There is a fine, attractive-looking country-house, embowered in trees and with shaded verandas, where about forty boarders are yearly accommodated. We have heard this resort very highly praised as a quiet spot, where the accommodations are homelike and comfortable. It is kept by the widow of the former proprietor; and we are told that guests who once go there return year after year. There is something certainly very peaceful and attractive about its surroundings.
But now our boat is once more drawing up to the wharf at Mandarin; and we must defer much that we have to say till next week. Phœbus, we are happy to say to our girl correspondents, is bright and happy, and in excellent voice. All day long, at intervals, we can hear him from the back veranda, shouting, "What cheer! what cheer!" or sometimes abbreviating it as "Cheer, cheer, cheer!"
Since we have been writing, one of those characteristic changes have come up to which this latitude is subject. The sun was shining, the river blue, the windows open, and the family reading, writing, and working on the veranda, when suddenly comes a frown of Nature,—a black scowl in the horizon. Up flies the wind; the waves are all white-caps; the blinds bang; the windows rattle; every one runs to shut every thing; and for a few moments it blows as if it would take house and all away. Down drop oranges in a golden shower; here, there, and everywhere the lightning flashes; thunder cracks and rattles and rolls; and the big torrents of rain come pouring down: but, in the back-porch, Phœbus between each clap persists in shouting, "What cheer! what cheer!" Like a woman in a passion, Nature ends all this with a burst of tears; and it is raining now, tenderly and plaintively as if bemoaning itself.
Well, we wouldn't have missed the sight if we had been asked; and we have picked up a bushel of oranges that otherwise somebody must have climbed the trees for.
Meanwhile the mail is closing. Good-by!
YELLOW JESSAMINES.
Mandarin, Fla., March 14, 1872.