Yet even here I had more than one reminder that the world is a small
place. I met a burly negro in a cart, and fell into talk with him about
the Florida climate, an endless topic, out of which a cynical traveler
may easily extract almost endless amusement. How abput the summers here?
I inquired. Were they really as paradisaical (I did not use that word)
as some reports would lead one to suppose? The man smiled, as if he had
heard something like that before. He did not think the Florida summer a
dream of delight, even on the east coast. "I'm tellin' you the truth,
sah; the mosquiters an' sandflies is awful." Was he born here? I asked.
No; he came from B----, Alabama. Everybody in eastern Florida came from
somewhere, as well as I could make out.
"Oh, from B----," said I. "Did you know Mr. W----, of the ---- Iron
Works?"
He smiled again. "Yes, sah; I used to work for him. He's a nice man." He
spoke the truth that time beyond a peradventure. He was healthier here
than in the other place, he thought, and wages were higher; but he liked
the other place better "for pleasure." It was an odd coincidence, was it
not, that I should meet in this solitude a man who knew the only citizen
of Alabama with whom I was ever acquainted.
At another time I fell in with an oldish colored man, who, like myself,
had taken to the woods for a quiet Sunday stroll. _He_ was from
Mississippi, he told me.
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