By the by, we take this occasion to tell the lady who writes to beg of us to send her some seeds or roots of Florida plants or flowers, that we have put her letter on file, and perhaps, some day, may find something to send her. Any one who loves flowers touches a kindred spot in our heart. The difficulty with all these flowers and roots sent North is, that they need the heat of this climate to bring them to perfection. Still there is no saying what a real plant-lover may do in coaxing along exotics. The "run" we have been exploring has, we are told, in the season of them, beautiful blue wisteria climbing from branch to branch. It does not come till after the yellow jessamine is gone. The coral-honeysuckle and a species of trumpet-creeper also grow here, and, in a little time, will be in full flower. One of our party called us into the run, and bade us admire a beautiful shrub, some fifteen feet high, whose curious, sharply-cut, deep-green leaves were shining with that glossy polish which gives such brilliance. Its leaves were of waxen thickness, its habit of growth peculiarly graceful; and our colored handmaiden, who knows the habits of every plant in our vicinity, tells us that it bears a white, sweet blossom, some weeks later. We mentally resolve to appropriate this fair Daphne of the woods on the first opportunity when hands can be spared to take it up and transport it.
But now the sun falls west, and we plod homeward. If you want to see a new and peculiar beauty, watch a golden sunset through a grove draperied with gray moss. The swaying, filmy bands turn golden and rose-colored; and the long, swaying avenues are like a scene in fairyland. We come home, and disembark our treasures. Our house looks like a perfect flower-show. Every available vase and jar is full,—dogwood, azaleas, blue iris, wreaths of yellow jessamine, blue and white violets, and the golden unknown, which we christen primroses. The daily sorting of the vases is no small charge: but there is a hand to that department which never neglects; and so we breathe their air and refresh our eyes with their beauty daily.
Your cold Northern snow-storms hold back our spring. The orange-buds appear, but hang back. They are three weeks later than usual. Our letters tell us frightful stories of thermometers no end of the way below zero. When you have a snow-storm, we have a cold rain: so you must keep bright lookout on your ways up there, or we shall get no orange-blossoms.
We have received several letters containing questions about Florida. It is our intention to devote our next paper to answering these. We are perfectly ready to answer any number of inquiries, so long as we can lump them all together, and answer them through "The Christian Union."
One class of letters, however, we cannot too thankfully remember. Those who have read our papers with so much of sympathy as to send in contributions to our church here have done us great good. We have now a sum contributed with which we hope soon to replace our loss. And now, as the mail is closing, we must close.
P. S.—We wish you could see a gigantic bouquet that Mr. S—— has just brought in from the hummock. A little shrub-oak, about five feet high, whose spreading top is all a golden mass of bloom with yellow jessamine, he has cut down, and borne home in triumph.
What an adornment would this be for one of the gigantic Japanese vases that figure in New-York drawing-rooms! What would such a bouquet sell for?
"FLORIDA FOR INVALIDS."
