CHAPTER XIY.

FLORIDA   FOLKS   AND   FAMILIES.

Florida is rapidly becoming a Northern colony. The
tide of immigration to this State is large and steadily in¬
creasing, and is beyond doubt soon to assume immense pro¬
portions, and the immigrants as a class are unusually intel¬
ligent people. Nearly all of native American birth, the
foreign-born element is of insignificant dimensions at this
date.

Generally described, they are people who read—and con¬
tinue to read—and are well posted on the resources and ad¬
vantages of the various sections of the United States, and
know exactly what they desire. They come here with a
fixed purpose, that only requires a short period of local
observation and examination of the precise soil and climate
for their proposed special enterprise. It is no mining ex¬
citement attraction here, with visions of gold to be picked
up in lumps, but a healthy feeling of hope of a genial cli¬
mate, and a slow but steadily increasing wealth made
from the soil. There is a total absence of fhe wild, anx¬
ious, eager class of excited, young, single men arrayed in
flannel shirts, broad felt hats, top-boots, armed with knives
and immense navy revolvers, their brains filled with vision¬
ary ideas of suddenly acquired wealth, that are so plentiful
in Western countries and mining regions.

The immigrants to this section are the extreme oppo¬
site ; they are, as a class, middle-aged men, mostly with
families, evidently of good average education, well dressed,