We were growing accustomed to this inquiry, “Have you had the fever?” Everybody asked it; at the same time everybody informed us there was no malaria there in their own immediate surroundings, it existed in the place we had left, and in the place we were going to; it was never present with us; it had been yesterday, or would be to-morrow, but it was never to-day. It reminded us of the jam in Through the Looking-glass: “Jam yesterday, and jam to-morrow, but never, never any jam to-day.”
People who ought to know have stated that malaria is unknown at any season in any part of Florida, and have written volumes in support of this assertion. Perhaps it may be called by another name; certainly no one can travel through the low-lying districts of the St. John’s River, or, indeed, through any portion of semi-tropical Florida, without realising the fact that, amid all the rich luxuriance, the brilliant sunshine, and soft sweet airs, the fever fiend lies concealed, like the serpent hidden beneath the joys of paradise, biding its time, waiting till the hot summer days are swooning among the flowers.
Of course there are some places which at all seasons are more free from malarial disturbances than others. Fernandina may especially be mentioned, and St. Augustine. Jacksonville, and the regions of the Tallahassee country, though certainly liable to invasion, yet usually present a clean bill of health all the year round. But we will indulge in a retrospective view of Florida hereafter; at present we are on the St. John’s River, enjoying the most perfect dolce far niente, with no thought beyond the hour, and don’t care to be interrupted even for the very necessary operation of eating. The sound of the dinner bell is a disturbing element, but we must perforce obey its summons; though the mind can be fed on fair sunshine and fine scenery, the body requires more substantial support. On board this boat, and I believe on all that line of river steamers, there is uncommonly good feeding; the meals are excellently well and abundantly served. We “get through” as quickly as possible, and station ourselves again on deck.
We stop at all the landing stages to take in freight; sometimes it is man, sometimes it is mutton, the fruits of the earth, or the fruits of human kind. From some unexplained reason we make quite a long stop at “Saratoga,” a pretty little settlement lying along the east shore of the river. It is a striking contrast to that fashionable Saratoga, far away in the eastern province, with its gigantic hotels, its luxuries, its trim promenades, its music, its whirl of gaiety, and rush and roar of animated life—a seething cauldron of perfumed humanity, highly decorated and ready for daily sacrifice on the altar of fashion. There it is art, or nature clipped and twisted and trained, so far from its original simplicity, that you cannot recognise a single feature—in fact, Nature in masquerade; in brilliant, gorgeous masquerade, it is true, but hiding the naked loveliness of Nature’s self. Who could recognise the chaste beauty of a “Venus di Medici” beneath Worth’s latest costume, with decorations of Tiffany’s brightest jewels? Here is Nature’s purest self in her own Arcadian simplicity, clothed with golden orange groves and blooming gardens, aglow with brilliant-hued flowers running all along the river side, nodding at their own shadows in the stream. No belles nor beaux stroll through these lovely solitudes; not a petticoat is in sight; only a few coloured folk are working in the gardens, as our father Adam worked in our lost inheritance, “the Garden of Eden.” The bees are gathering honey, and the invisible insect world seems all astir, filling the air with a dreamy drowsy hum, just stirring the waves of silence to a soft, low-uttered harmony. Some few of our fellow passengers go ashore and ramble among the groves for half an hour, when they return loaded with the luscious fruit, which they seem to enjoy all the more having been allowed to gather all they desired for themselves.
We steam on for a few miles, when we come to Welaka, one of the healthiest localities of the state. It stands on a high bluff, fringed with a magnificent growth of live oaks, clothed in their own beautiful robes of green, undecorated by the grey Spanish moss, which, while adding to the graceful appearance of the trees, tells plainly that the malarial fiend is lurking somewhere near. In this locality is grown some of the finest oranges in the state, as the soil is rich and dry, and all the conditions are favourable to their successful cultivation. Directly opposite the landing stage is the mouth of the wonderful Ocklawaha, whose weird depths we have so lately penetrated. Three miles farther on we reach Norwalk, a primitive landing place, where there seems nothing to land for, and nowhere to go to when you have landed. But the settlement, it seems, is laid more than a mile back from the river, and is rather an important little town, the neighbourhood producing a large amount of garden vegetables and fruits. Very few orange growers settle in that location; very few tourists visit it; it is a simple city of homes; it has the regulation number of schools (indeed the simplest hamlet is well off on that score, the means for education are freely scattered throughout the length and breadth of the land; the poorest tillers of the land or toilers of the sea have no excuse for ignorance), churches, banks, etc., and a thriving population of busy workers. It is at this point the lower St. John’s river ends, and we pass into a narrow crooked channel, varying from forty to several hundred feet wide. Here the water loses its clear opaline blue, and reflects the clouds in dark murky shadows. This dingy colour of the water, they say, is owing to the rich, rank vegetation of this tropical region of the St. John’s river. Everywhere the shores are covered with dense forests of oak, cypress, willow, etc., interlaced with gigantic vines, some barren, some bearing a rich fruitage of sweet wild grapes. The grey Spanish moss hangs from the green branches, and reeds, rushes, and all kinds of long tropical grasses form an impenetrable jungle down to the water’s edge—nay, encroach upon the water’s self and sway gently on its surface; and flowers of immense size and brilliant colours are abundant everywhere; they spread over the surface of the water, and flourish on the vines, on the trees, on everything or on nothing, for we catch an occasional glimpse of the mysterious golden-hued air plant among the luxuriant green foliage. Here, too, the alligators and other hideous river reptiles abound, but you must have sharp eyes to get a glimpse of them, for as the steamer approaches they hurry back, and dive under the water, or hide upon the land. This dense jungle scenery is apt to give one an idea that we are going through some of Nature’s primeval solitudes, her secret haunts, impenetrable and uninhabitable for the human race. But that is a wrong idea; this is the low-lying valley region; the ground slopes upwards from the water’s edge, and within a mile or two—nay, sometimes much nearer, only a few hundred yards away from the waterside—are wide clearings where some adventurous pioneer has squatted and made his home, and cultivates the land, his own not by right of purchase, but possession. Only a few hundred yards from the malarial region you may breathe pure, healthful air.
We soon emerge from these luxuriant picturesque regions, and are on the wide river again. Rarely has one river so many phases as this world-famous St. John’s; the scenery is always changing—a series of panoramic views, land and water, combining to make one whole of picturesque loveliness. We stop at two or three more unimportant landing-places, pass some neat, solitary homes and thriving orange groves, and then reach Georgetown, the entrance to Lake St. George. Here a party of gentlemen with dogs and guns come on board. They are going on a sporting expedition up the Indian river into wilder regions than we dare to penetrate; for although the Indian river region is well known and thoroughly appreciated, it is visited by very few tourists or strangers, it being difficult of access, necessitating several days’ water travelling, and the accommodation for travellers being of the roughest description, and even then only to be obtained at rare intervals. To make amends, however, for the scarcity of places of public entertainment, the inhabitants are most hospitable, and a guest chamber is generally reserved in even the humblest farmhouse, where the stranger is always made welcome to the best the house affords. This kind of primitive casual entertainment is often far preferable to the gilded glories of the stereotyped hotel. These Indian river regions are more sparsely populated than those of St. John’s; this too is owing to its general inaccessibility, for nowhere in all the state is there a richer or more fertile soil calculated for the growth of cereals of all kinds, fruits, vegetables, and sugar-cane attaining sometimes to sixteen feet high—a single stalk yielding more than a gallon of juice; and cacao, date, cocoanut, ginger, cassava, and yams may be cultivated with equal profit. The river affords rare sport for the fishermen, for it abounds with a great variety of fish, and is remarkable for its superb mullet, weighing from three to nine pounds, and measuring from fifteen to twenty inches in length. Turtling is also largely carried on, and is a most lucrative business. The splendid hammock lands all along the Indian river have a magnificent growth of hickory, mulberry, red elm, iron wood, and crab wood; both the latter are finely grained, and capable of receiving a fine polish. The surrounding woods abound with small game and deer, and occasionally a small black bear shows himself, while wild cats and such-like creatures may be found without much difficulty by those who seek them, and sometimes they make themselves more free than welcome to those who do not. Not infrequently a panther appears upon the scene, and is seldom allowed to retire unmolested to his den. It is hardly necessary to state that the whole of this fertile Indian river region is far below the frost line—the general temperature all the year round being about 75°, though it has been known on rare occasions to rise to 90° or fall to 55°. But we must draw our thoughts from the Indian river and continue on our way; we are now upon Lake St. George. Slowly we steam across this magnificent sheet of water, one of the loveliest and most interesting of all the lakes in Florida; it is six miles wide by fourteen miles long. These lovely lakes, of all shapes and sizes, are scattered throughout the central region of Florida; they vary from smooth, pleasant-looking pools of about an acre, hidden away in the heart of the pine woods, to the spacious lakes of fifty miles. They all lie far away from the large rivers and the sea-shore, and have always pleasant if not especially attractive surroundings; their shores are generally slightly rolling, and covered with palmetto or pine, or sometimes the grassy slopes are outlined by a thick tangle of jungle in the distance. Orange Lake County is one of the famous inland lake districts. In the neighbourhood of Interlaken and Oceola the lakes are most numerous; looking in any direction a dozen or more pretty lakelets may be seen, and from one special spot in Maitland no less than nine large lakes are visible. Farther South, still in the centre of the peninsula, and surrounded by fine hammock lands (which always indicate the richest soil), are several other beautiful lakes—Conway, Cypress, Kissimmee, and Tohopekalaga and many more, large and small. The country is prairie-like, and the vegetation throughout this extensive region purely tropical, though as yet it is very sparsely populated. Civilisation has not had time to develop the means of transport, and the lands are lying waste, only waiting till the spirit of cultivation sweeps that way.
In this brief allusion to the lake regions, which constitute so special a feature in the peninsula of Florida, I have made no mention of the numerous springs of sparkling waters which dot the whole surface of the land; in some cases they are like little lakelets, in some cases they are springs of pure water, in others the water is medicated.
Most of the lake shores in Orange County are dotted with pretty homes embowered in green trees, their smooth lawns and flower gardens running down to the water’s edge. Lake Okechobee covers an area of nearly seven hundred square miles, and is the largest in the state; it is at the very farthest point South, and penetrates into the region of the Everglades.
Here, on Lake St. George, wild ducks and all kinds of water fowl seem as numerous as butterflies on a warm summer’s day. Some of our fellow travellers amuse themselves by shooting the wild ducks, and a hybrid young darkie, who seems as much at home in the water as out of it, dives down head foremost, and fishes them out, and seems to enjoy the fun of it.
There was one couple on board who attracted general attention by their frank and unreserved appreciation of each others’ charms. They were not young, they were not beautiful; they were a kind of attenuated edition of the renowned Mr. Pickwick and Mrs. Wardle. He wore glasses, and the tender passion filtered through a pair of green spectacles loses somewhat of its romance. They were evidently veterans in the art of amorous warfare; he sat with his arm round her waist, and carried on his wooing through the medium of a bottle of champagne; they drank out of one glass, and worked slowly to the bottom of it, and then called for more. Some kinds of clay will bear a great deal of soaking.