In his signature, Billy always uses the prefix, “Mr.”
At another time on Billy’s return to his Okeechobee home, a letter was received which read:
“My Good Friend:
“Littly white birds me send. Indians all well.”
The egrets, snowy white and beautiful as a poem, came in a crate made of green palm stems, with a door fastened by buck skin hinges and buck skin catch, the whole a marvel of neatness and ingenuity.
The birds were at once given the freedom of the lawn, where they have been a constant surprise, in showing how full of confidence, how charming the wild heron can be made under habits of domestication. They love companionship and at meal time they station themselves like two sentinels, at the dining room piazza. Here they stand, with their long necks craning into the door-way, alert and tense, waiting for their beef to be thrown to them.
These white plumed egrets, with their dark, piercing eyes, their spotless white figures adorned in their bridal veil of long silken plumes, make a picture that an artist may envy.
It is a pleasing and encouraging fact that on all occasions when the Seminoles visit white settlements they are warmly welcomed by the whites and treated with the utmost respect and many times entertained as one would celebrities.
The Florida Times-Union always breaks a lance in favor of the Seminole. During a carnival season in Jacksonville, Billy Bowlegs visited the city, and of his visit an editorial read: