Six Visions of St. Augustine

I.

FROM MRS. MARGARET ETHERIDGE MAYNARD (OF NEW YORK CITY) TO MRS. RUFUS HILL, ANDOVER, MASS.

ST. AUGUSTINE, February 22.

YOUR letter, my dear friend, has just arrived, and I instantly sit down to give you my frankest opinions of St. Augustine. In the first place, the climate is most disagreeable. I know they tell you it is n’t, but it seems to be a principle of the Floridians not to tell the truth. The main industry of the State is deceiving strangers. You read in the newspapers of the weather we found last month. I thought we should perish. My room had a fireplace, and Rawdon’s had a stove — which smoked. My dear, I had to sit wrapped up in furs, with my feet on the hot-water bag, feeling, for all the world, just like the Greely party. There was not a sign of steam, or furnace, or any other kind of warmth, except stoves and fireplaces, in the house, and the halls were like Greenland: I always had to put on my bonnet and cloak to go down to the parlor.

Well, their oranges are all frozen, and I think most of the trees are gone, too, though they pretend they are not. And you need not think you will get lovely tropical fruit, for you won’t, — nothing but oranges, and they are either stale (picked before the frost) or half frozen. They are rank poison ; but what do these greedy Augustines care that we are losing our health, eating their pestilential fruit ? I expected to revel in delicious figs, dates, bananas, Japan plums, pineapples, alligator pears, guavas, and all the other things those romancers that write the Florida circulars pretend you are going to have in a “ semi-tropical climate.” I even had visions of eating bread-fruit. One man said it grew in Florida, and I thought it might as well grow in St. Augustine as anywhere else. Well, my dear, there is nothing, nothing in this wicked world but poor oranges. Sometimes, it is true, for a few days, you can get some mean, green little Nassau bananas, and once two pineapples strayed over from the same place. I saw some cocoa-nuts in the pod (I suppose they call it a pod ; if they don’t, they ought to), and I asked the man if they were fresh. He said, “ Well, yes ’m, pretty fresh. I got ’em ’bout two months ago. They ain’t for eating, ezactly; strangers like to take ’em home to show.” There’s the list, unless you call peanuts fruit. And I think it perfectly ridiculous !

But to return to the climate : all January was horrid. After the cold we had weeks of rain and fog. There is a great deal of fog here, and a great deal of rain; and when it is n’t rainy or foggy the wind blows a gale. I really never saw such a tempestuous place. It goes without saying that you can’t walk. My dear Helen, don’t delude yourself with any notion of walking here ! Figure to yourself streets without a vestige of sidewalk, unless you choose to call a little ragged, humpy ruin of concrete, about a foot wide, a vestige. It certainly is n’t anything else, and usually there is n’t even that. They say it is a remnant of the old Spanish pavement. Probably, — or the Mound Builders ! The whole town is built on sand mixed with sharp little shells, which cut into your shoes and nearly drive you frantic. This is ankle-deep everywhere. You don’t walk in St. Augustine; you wade! And the dust is something dreadful. But you would n’t want to walk, anyhow. The streets are so narrow that pedestrians have to retire into the shops when two carriages pass each other. You always have to walk single file, so as to be ready to save your life by dodging into a doorway. Of course they drive the horses, and especially ride the horses, at the top of their speed, — these negroes would rather run over you than not! I suppose it does n’t add much to the perils of the street to have no drainage, and to see orange skins, papers, and every other kind of rubbish flung into the streets for you to tread over ; but it certainly is unpleasant.

As to drives : I think the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals ought to forbid driving horses through these sandy roads. I should want to discharge my coachman if he treated my horses so. And there is n’t anything but sand and swamp. And, right here,

I may as well free my mind about the drivers. They are liars from the cradle to the grave. I paid a colored man four dollars, the other day, to take me to Magnolia Grove. One of the things I went South to see was magnolias. We drove, and we drove, and we drove. It was hot and sandy and dusty, and I made him go slowly on account of the horses. Finally, we stopped. My dear, there was just one magnolia. The driver flicked the tip of his whip at the lone magnolia. “ Dat ’s it,” said he.

“ Where’s Magnolia Grove ?” I asked.

“ Dat’s it,” said he, — " yes’m.”

“ But where are the rest of them ? ”

“ Dey ain’t no res’,” he replied.

“ But why do they call it Magnolia Grove, then ?” I inquired.

“ Kase of de magnolia,” said he.

This same man told me that the old market in the plaza was the old slavemarket, and that his mother was sold there; and it never was anything more romantic than a fish-market. And he told me that a scrubby old cemetery, where he took me for a dollar, was the Huguenot cemetery, when there never were any Huguenots buried in St. Augustine ; there never were any Huguenots in St. Augustine, anyhow. What’shis-name killed them all before they got here, and they were n’t buried anywhere, poor things. I read all about it in the guide book, after I got home ; that man was lying the whole while.

I have to squander my money on them still, because I can’t walk in the sand; I ’m giddy, though I am not young, and I can’t walk on the sea-wall; there is nothing but sand and sea-wall in Augustine. You ask about features of interest : there ’s a feature for you, — an awful structure, hardly three feet wide, without an inch of railing between you and eternity, or, at least, ruining your clothes. One side is the bay, and the other side the sand of Augustine, five feet below. “ Oh, that’s not much of a fall,” your nephew says; but I have n’t the figure for falling, and I leave the sea-wall to young Salisbury and my niece. By the way, he is a delightful fellow, and, entre nous, I fancy Emmy thinks so, too.

You want to know about excursions. Well, the least objectionable is to North Beach. You can get over in a sail-boat, if you are n’t seasick, and don’t value your life ; or you can take a dreadful little steamer (by climbing a ladder and walking a plank), and then probably have to wait an hour on the sand in the sun for it when you go back. There isn’t anything to see but a beach. Then there is Matanzas, where you sail forever, and are likely to have the wind desert you, and be obliged to spend the night nowhere in particular.

And there is a simply fiendish excursion to Anastasia Island. You go over in the steamer, — at least I did, — and when you get over you see a tramway built on piles, with a ditch on either side, and no room to fall out of the car, just merely a few planks for the horse to go over. The rails are of wood and all worn out ; and there is a decrepit, ramshackle old platform on wheels, with a canopy, which they call a car; and one poor little white invalid horse to drag it. Of course they load that car until it creaks and sways in the most awful manner, and then a brutal boy whips the poor horse along that dreadfully unsafe road. All this sickening peril is to get to the light-house. Then, if you like, you can jump into the bayonet bush, and scramble over to the beach. When you get back to the shore you generally have to wait an hour ; but you will have plenty to do, fighting sandflies. Then, if the tide is out, you will have to escape to the steamer in small boats half filled with water. Ours had no oarlocks, and the man stood up and paddled with an oar, and did n’t know how. Actually, I wonder that excursion did n’t shatter my nerves entirely. After we were all in the steamer, towing the boats along, that boat swamped, — swamped before our eyes. Think if we had all been in it!

As to places of interest: there are some ridiculous little city gates (with no wall), an ugly old cathedral, and the fort. The fort is well enough in its way, but don’t you let them show you the dungeons ; you nearly break your back crawling into the horrid black holes, and you can’t sleep all night for thinking of the awful stories they tell you about cages and skeletons and the Spanish Inquisition, and no end of horrors ! All lies, too, my dear ; I read about them in the guide book.

In regard to hotels, — well, perhaps I am too particular. But I can tell you one thing, they charge enough to be good. Prices, generally, are extortionate. “ Well, you see, ma’am,” said an honest tradesman to me, “ we have three prices : one for ourselves, the people of the town, that’s very reasonable ; one for the winter residents, that’s not so very high ; and then we make a special price for the rank strangers !” You will think they do, if you come. Last of all, you ask my advice about coming. Do you remember Punch’s to the young man about to marry ? It is mine, too, — Don’t! Your loving friend,

MARGARET E. MAYNARD.

P. S. I have just asked Rawdon her opinion ; and she says that she can’t find it in her conscience to recommend a town where they allow “ wild beasts like them halligators ” to be kept in yards, and to swim around loose in barrels in the shop windows. She happened to notice a big one tied to a post in a yard once, and ran for her life, all the way from King Street to the San Marco. Another time she saw a paragraph in a paper about Northerners never leaving without an alligator. Now she regularly looks under the bed for them every night. “ Most like the ’otel’s swarming with them this werry moment, mum,” she says, “ in bandboxes and bath-tubs !” Then she gathers her skirts tightly about her with one hand, and pokes with the umbrella handle in the other, and gives a little scream at every poke. I asked her why she screamed, and she said, “ Oh, mum, hit’s for the hawfulness of it! I can’t ’old in !”

I fancy Rawdon will be as relieved as I to go, and we leave for Charleston next Monday. Come there instead.

M. E. M.

II.

FROM MISS EMILY ETHERIDGE LAWRENCE (OF CHICAGO, ILL.) TO MRS. RUFUS HILL, ANDOVER, MASS.

ST. AUGUSTINE, February 22.

DEAR MRS. HILL, — I know auntie is writing you, and I am sure that she is saying something horrid about this dear, sweet, quaint, lovely old town. So I have treacherously borrowed her paper, and as you were so good as to ask me to write, too, I am going to do it now, and send my opinions along by the very same mail ; I am hoping that you will open my letter first.

Truly, dear Mrs. Hill, Augustine is lovely! The climate is delicious, soft, yet bracing. There is a good deal of fog ; but the effects on the water are so exquisite that one does n’t regret it, but quite the contrary. Mr. Salisbury is very good with his yacht, and takes us sailing so often that mamma and I are both in love with the bay. Every day, almost, we have a splendid sea breeze, and can make all the excursions by sail. I think there is no place like St. Augustine. I feel as though I were in Spain and England and America at the same time. It is most fascinating and romantic ; and I feel as though I could never tire of these narrow, winding streets, with their funny little shops, where you can buy alligator-tooth jewelry, and shells, and photographs, and the dearest palmetto hats in the world. Mr. Salisbury accuses me of intending to open a shop, I am buying so many, and poor mamma sighs and wonders how I am ever going to carry them all home.

You speak of the walks and drives. There is no end of them. In the first place, there is the town itself. I send you some photographs. Are n’t they perfect horrors ? I took them myself. Mr. Salisbury “ supplied the human interest,” as he calls it, by putting himself in the foreground. It is quite his own fault that his hands look so gigantic, and that he seems to have three of them in one of the pictures. He would put them out and wave them while the picture was going on. He said that he was representing “ one of Mr. Cook’s personally conducted tours, — being conducted.” Is n’t he quite too absurd, sometimes ? I wish the photographs were good, though, for the houses are so picturesque ; built of this queer old coquina stone, all stained and blackened by lichens, with dormer windows and hanging balconies (why they hang, and don’t break down, is a puzzle to me) and roofs that do a hundred fantastic things no other American roofs dare to do, — twist themselves into gables, project over balconies, step down and then project, or hop up and make the roof for a side gallery. Now don’t you pine to walk past such houses ? Why, the very names of the streets are tempting. King, St. George, Hypolita, Kuna, Spanish, Treasury, Baya, St. Francis, Tolomato, — don’t they make you think of Menendez and the Huguenots, and the Moors, and the English red-coats marching in, and Spanish signoritas in black lace veils, and the Seminole Indians, and the Inquisition, and guitars, serenading, and everything else nice and romantic ? And is n’t it interesting to think that we are walking on the very pavement that the Spaniards made ? There are lovely drives all about; and as for excursions, they are countless, by land or sea. Now the wild flowers are coming, and I rave over them. Yesterday, mamma, Mr. Salisbury, and I went out on the Picolata road and picked bushels of jasmine. We left the carriage, and got so interested (finding thicker and thicker trees, —you know how that is) that mamma began to think we were devoured by an alligator, and was in an awful state of anxiety. Rawdon has managed to give mamma her notions about alligators as beasts of prey. Then, there are all the sails. North Beach has such a nice beach and the most fascinating shells. Matanzas is weirdly beautiful, with its ruined fort and its associations. And there is a delightful excursion to Anastasia Island. You will laugh when you see the droll little primitive horsecar and ridiculous shaggy white pony that will meet you and take you over wooden rails to the lighthouse. There was such a load of us, and of course aunt Margie lifted up her voice in behalf of the beast. " Boy,” I heard her saying, “ you must n’t whip him. How would you like to be whipped when you were pulling a load too heavy for you? ”

Dear aunt Margie, she quite hates the place. She has tried three hotels, and is now at a fourth. We are at the first of the discarded ones, and find it luxurious ; but when I told her so, she only shook her head sadly, and said, “ My dear, you are young ; you don’t depend on your soup.” She has her locked bath-tub and her Vienna coffeepot and all her traps. Rawdon gets out the tea things every afternoon at four; auntie collects all the old tabbies she knows, and they drink tea and abuse the place. They snub me, and they are too old for me to snub them, and it is enraging. There is one horrid old frump who is always flinging my age at me. “ What does nineteen know of the merits of a place ?” she says, — meaning me. Well, I could n’t know much less than she does ! That is awfully ill-natured. I do beg your pardon, dear Mrs. Hill, and I will talk about something else, quick!

You ask about the places of interest. I am sure one can’t help liking the seawall (such good walking and such a magnificent view), and there are some sweet little city gates (you see them on all the preserve cans), and the cathedral is a joy ; but the best of all is the fort. Is n’t it wonderful to think of all that those towers have seen, — how much triumph and what misery ! They were built by poor Indians and captives, you know. I declare, when I reflect how cruel those wicked Spaniards were, I take solid comfort in thinking of De Gourgues, and of how Drake burned the fort and pillaged the town. I only wish he had burned up old Menendez in it. Just picture that cruel old thing wheedling the poor shipwrecked Frenchmen into surrending, and then going off and drawing that cross in the sand, with his lance! And think of those poor, unsuspicious men, with their hands tied behind their back, coming ten at a time ; and then just as soon as they reached this fatal mark, the Spaniards stabbing them dead ! You will remember that when you walk along the Matanzas beach. Matanzas, “Place of Slaughter,”'—is n’t it rightly named ? Did you know that Osceola was confined in the fort before they sent him to Charleston ? Poor Osceola, I liked his not letting them kill women and children. And that was fine, too, about the council, when he dashed his knife through the treaty, crying, “ The only treaty that I will make is with this !” But you will imagine that I am Tennyson’s brook, that goes on forever. I will stop — no, I won’t, until I tell you about prices. I think them very reasonable, when you consider how short the season is, and that there is nothing but the season to live on. Who can wonder that they make all they can out of us while they have a chance ! Now please pardon this long effusion, and don’t let it prevent your coming.

Always, dear Mrs. Hill, affectionately yours, EMILY E. LAWRENCE.

P. S. There are good riding horses here, and very good tennis grounds. It is amusing to watch the game, even if one does n’t play, so I mention it. Mr. Salisbury is the best player here.

E. E. L.

III.

FROM COL. SAMUEL TURNER, U. S. A., TO MRS. RUFUS HILL, ANDOVER MASS.

ST. AUGUSTINE, February 23, 1886.

DEAR HELEN, — Mea culpa! mea culpa ! I deceived you, but I did n’t mean to. I am the man who advised you to go to St. Augustine. But it was n’t this Augustine that I was talking about. I was here nineteen years ago. Then it was the quaintest, dreamiest, most pathetic old Spanish town. The Minorcans spoke Spanish, everybody was ruined by the war, nobody thought of being enterprising, and the pretty Minorcan girls, slim and darkeyed and pensive-looking, were a pleasant sight for a young fellow. The old coquina houses stood all over the town, and each house had its garden and high wall around the orange-trees. The plaza market was a market then ; from four to six, every morning, you could buy the toughest Floridian beef and “ razor-backs (Floridian for pig, my ignorant friend ; so called because their backs are thin and sharp as a razor), and as good fish as any man wants to eat. Then we came over from Picolata by stage. We crawled along for six miles, but we always came into town with a grand flourish, the four horses on a gallop and the horn going. We drew up opposite the post-office. The post-office was worth seeing then, I assure you. Formerly, when there was a governor, it was the “ Governor’s Palace,” no less. There were arches in front, and a noble, high wall, with great pillars, all around the garden, and a row of pride of India trees before the wall.

Well, now, what have they done? Spoiled everything. My adorable Anglo-Spanish town is trampled under the inexorable march of improvement. They have built fine villas and pulled down the old houses. They have run up cheap wooden shops and houses plastered all over with shingles, like fish scales ; all alike, showy, ugly, and scampily built. They have kicked the old relics out of the way. The proprietor of a boarding-house had the old coquina battery pulled down because it obstructed the view. The “ oldest house,” where the date-palm (so old that no one remembers any tradition of its planting) grew through the wall, is smartened up out of knowledge. The sculptured wall of the house, which cost so much that it ruined the Spanish treasurer, is gone, and the picket fence of a hotel has taken its place. They have even tried to pull down the city gates for the stone, but they did have the grace to stop that. They have stuck a big hotel up to stare the fort out of countenance,— and there I am. It is comfortable enough ; I have no fault to find with the comfort, but I wish the vandals that built it were in Matanzas Bay. They have half a dozen more hotels, over the town, and are building another one by the river, which is to be in Spanish style, with tropical courts and fountains and hanging gardens and the Lord knows what not. I hear rumors that they are going to try to get an appropriation from Congress, and make Augustine a port of entry. Like enough. They have got two railroads, and they are fighting fora canal with the Halifax River, so as to bring up tropical fruits from South Florida. “ We are going to have right smart of a town,” says the New South. They are. But the charm of “ the ever faithful city ” has withered under their enterprising hands, and is gone forever.

Why, the Minorcans themselves have been scorched by this flaming zeal for “improvement.” They want to sell their places. Nineteen years ago, you could n’t get a Minorcan to sell the home his father gave him, at any price. But now they don’t even cling to the old tongue; the new generation can’t talk Spanish. They have n’t even spared the good old lies. They had to improve on them. I hardly recognized the venerable fiction of the cages found in the dungeon, when I read it in the guide books. I haven’t the heart to go to the fort and hear Sergeant McGuire’s successor hold forth.

Oh, well, perhaps it is because “ I have been young, and now I am old ; ” and more than the old ruins made Augustine beautiful to me then. To-day,

The prettiest sight to me, in Augustine, now, is the flock of young people, playing tennis in all the colors of the rainbow, or riding horseback. Young Salisbury is a fine fellow, and I see him nearly every day, riding, or walking, or sailing with a charmingly pretty young girl. I will wager he thinks St. Augustine delightful. But you and I, my dear friend, — ah, there is the difference ! Well, you might come and see for yourself; it is easy to get away again.

Always your devoted friend,

SAMUEL TURNER.

IV.

FROM MRS. CLARENCE ATTERBURY (WINTER RESIDENT OF ST. AUGUSTINE ) TO MRS. RUFUS HILL.

ST. AUGUSTINE, February 22.

DEAREST HELEN, — Certainly, by all means come to Augustine. I am sure that you won’t regret it. And now I am going to answer all your questions in the most methodical manner, one by one. Climate ? Charming! But there is nothing perfect on earth, and our poor Florida climate is no exception, though I think it is expected to be. We do have rainy days in January, — not many, but we have them ; and last January it froze, but that was unprecedented. Generally, the weather is delightful, with just enough of a sea breeze to blow away every particle of malaria. Walks and drives ? They are endless. I will show you all the old houses. They are volumes of history, tragedy, and melodrama bound in brick and mortar. Our streets are n’t yet what we hope they will be, but the soil has one advantage ; you will seldom, if ever, need to wear rubbers, and if you get the right kind of boots you won’t mind the sand. There are delightful drives in every direction, and we have the gentlest horse, that will let us loiter along and almost see the flowers grow. How beautiful they are now, too! The woods are full of yellow jasmine, and hawthorn, and wild-plum blossoms; and on the pine barrens, the ground is beautiful with innumerable violets, blue and white, and dear little chaptalia, like daisies. The myrtles and oaks and magnolias keep their glossy green, and you won’t miss the orange-trees, though we do. It was pitiful, but we ought to be thankful that it was no worse. The trees are not harmed, and in a month’s time will shake their white blooms in the face of the croakers.

Excursions ? If you are fond of sailing, they are innumerable ; and I do so hope you are, for we have a new yacht, — really, it is only a sail-boat, but we call it a yacht because that sounds grander; since our friends are all setting up yachts, why not we ?

Hotels ? Good enough for any one ; but I sha’n’t say a word about them, because you are coming straight to us. The idea of your thinking of a hotel, Helen Hill ! It is evident that you don’t understand the Southern character.

Prices ? Very reasonable, indeed ; especially when you consider the long distance everything has to be transported. Tourists will have Northern beef and Northern butter and Northern groceries, and yet they grumble because they don’t get all these at the very lowest Northern prices. But tourists grumble, anyhow, I think. Apropros of grumblers, I paid a visit to Mrs. Maynard, as you asked. Now, she is typical. She is trying all the hotels, in rotation, with malice prepense, — just to pick flaws. She won’t sail, she won’t drive, she won’t walk ; she expects all the fruits of the tropic zone and all the flowers to be blooming at once, here in Augustine, in February. And, of course, she is disappointed with the poor ancient city. But I don’t think you will be. At least give us a trial. Clare is well and the children and all send love and join with me in begging you to come.

Yours with much love,

LAURA.

V.

FROM DANIEL CARVER LAWRENCE (OF CHICAGO, ILL.) TO MRS. RUFUS HILL, ANDOVER, MASS.

ST. AUGUSTINE, February 22, 1886.

MY DEAR MRS. HILL, — Your favor of the 19th is at hand, and in reply I would say that, speaking generally, St. Augustine seems an interesting old town for a week’s visit; after that, I should call it pretty slow, a town of no enterprise. Particularly, will answer your questions as they come.

I. The climate is fair to middling : better than Chicago in March, not so pleasant as Chicago in June. It rains considerable ; but they say that is splendid for the oranges. It blows most of the time ; but they say that is healthy. It is very changeable, hot and cold the same day; but they call that a pleasant variety. I take it, they are a set of champion braggers in Florida, and lie as easily as they eat. I met a poor Englishman, yesterday, one of a colony who had swallowed their big stories, and come over to South Florida to find perpetual sunshine and flowers, and nothing to do but wink at their orange-trees. When they got to their particular bit of swamp, they found there was n’t anything perpetual in Florida except alligators and swamp fever. The Englishman was pretty mad over the whole thing.

I did n’t much blame him, though he ought to have looked before he leaped. Fact of the matter is, the speculators have got hold of this State, and are booming it for all it is worth.

II. “ Walks and drives and excursions.” Walking is bad in St. Augustine ; no sidewalks, streets dusty, sandy, and to my mind in a disgraceful condition. If the inhabitants weren’t so busy trying to cheat strangers out of their last red cent, they might be more enterprising. The only decent walking place is the sea-wall, and that Uncle Sam looks after; if he did n’t, it would be just as out of gear as everything else. So far as I can see, the Augustines are laying back on their oars, waiting to sell their marshes and sand lots at fabulous prices, and thinking all improvements worse than wasted, meanwhile. All the Floridians prefer to spend their money advertising in the Northern papers and on circulars, what a grand, glorious semi-tropical country they have, to putting any of it into the land. They have been dawdling over a canal for the longest while, and will dawdle, I guess, until some confiding Northern capitalists come down and fix it. Drives are about as had as the walking. Can’t say anything about any excursions except the one to Anastasia Island. I am glad I went, for it was worth the trouble to see the shiftless horse-car railway they have there, — wooden rails, and the worstlooking old Noah’s ark of a car you ever saw, drawn by a little white pony that looked so feeble you wanted to put him on the car and push him. The road is laid on piles, over the swamp, which is chock full of bayonet plants. And there is a notice stuck up, warning you that walking over that road is charged at the same price as riding. So when, for any reason, the car does n’t run, they get their little fifteen cents just the same. There’s Florida thrift for you ; they are bound to get your money, whether they give you anything for it, or not.

III.“ Places of interest.” Best of them is the fort. They say that cost so much that the Spanish king observed they must have built it of solid silver dollars. Shiftless about it, I guess. They say they had Indians and slaves and such fellows build it, and that sort of labor costs more than it comes to. I notice one thing about Florida, reading the history. All these colonies sent over here got their supplies from home. They never rolled up their sleeves and got their living out of the soil. Not they; if the ships with supplies did n’t come, they waltzed back home, or else they starved. And they have kept on doing that way, ever since. They get the bulk of their provisions from the North, now, — meat, groceries, canned vegetables, feed for their stock. Even most of the milk comes from the North, condensed, in cans, and about all the butter. Florida has always been a sort of colony. First Spanish, then English, now she is Yankee. About all the hotelkeepers and half the store-keepers are Yankees.

IV. “Hotels.” Should n’t like to express an opinion ; only what is called a first-class hotel here, with exalted prices, would cut a very small figure up North.

V. “ Prices.” They are high. The natives make the Yankees pay well for the property they buy or rent, and they pass the prices on to strangers.

Lastly, you ask about my opinion of the advisability of your coming. I should n’t presume to advise a lady. I don’t like St. Augustine, but Mrs. Lawrence and Emmie will talk to you by the hour about what a charming place it is. I imagine Emmie likes the sailing and the riding horseback, but what the Madam finds to admire beats me; I suppose, however, she knows her own mind. Remember me to Hill. There is firstclass fishing here. Tell him to bring his rod, if he comes. Hoping this long letter won’t be quite useless to you, I am Very truly yours,

D. C. LAWRENCE.

VI.

FROM BASIL SALISBURY (OF BOSTON, MASS.) TO MRS. RUFUS HILL, ANDOVER, MASS.

ST. AUGUSTINE, February 25, 188G.

DEAR AUNT HELEN, — I know it, you told me so ; but it makes no difference. We are engaged. Please come and give us your blessing. St. Augustine is charming, now. The climate is perfect; bright, sunny, hardly any wind, and we have n’t had a real rainy day for an age. You will like the walks ; and I want to show you my new boat. Then you are interested in antiquities, and you can gloat over them here in the Ancient City. The hotels do very well, all of them. Prices are moderate. Don’t you want me to go up to Jacksonville to meet you, if uncle Rufus does n’t come? You know Emily, so I sha’n’t need to expatiate on that subject. Come and bless us, do.

Your affectionate nephew,

BASIL.

FROM MRS. RUFUS HILL TO JUDGE RUFUS HILL, PORTLAND, MAINE.

ANDOVER, MASS., February 28.

DEAR RUFUS, — You know it was you who wanted me to write to all our friends in St. Augustine, and get a categorical opinion from each. Now will you please look over these letters, and see if you cam make anything definite about St. Augustine out of them, for I can’t! But is n’t it nice about Basil and Emily Lawrence ?

Your loving wife,

HELEN.

Octave Thanet.