the bleak and cold of the North
where there was ice and snow when they had come away. In Georgia they
had found soft winds and balmy skies, but now, as they were headed into
Florida, they were to find it even warmer.

Orange Beach, where Mr. Brown expected to meet Mr. Halliday and attend
to some business, was in the southern part of Florida, somewhat inland
from the ocean and on a river which Bunny, at least, hoped would be
filled with alligators.

As for Sue, all she hoped for was to gather oranges and orange blossoms.
Both children, in a way, were to have their wishes gratified.

As the train went farther south, the scenery grew more and more green,
for Bunny and Sue were getting into the land where there is never any
snow or ice, and only occasionally a little frost, which all orange
growers dread. Sometimes, to keep a frost from hurting the orange trees,
great bonfires are built in the groves and kept going all night.

"Oh, look what a funny tree!" cried Sue, as the train was passing
through a swampy bit of forest. "It looks as if it had whiskers!"

"Oh, isn't it funny!" echoed Bunny. "What is it, Daddy?"

Daddy Brown leaned toward the car window and looked out. Several trees
were now seen, each one festooned with what Sue had called "whiskers."

"That is Spanish moss, also called long moss," explained Mr. Brown. "It
is common in Florida and other parts of the South, especially in trees
that grow in the swamps, or everglades."

"What are the everglades?" Bunny wanted to know. "Are they like
alligators?"

"Oh, no!" laughed his mother. "About all you think of, Bunny, is
alligators."

"I don't; do I, Mother?" asked Sue. "I keep thinking of oranges!"

Mr. and Mrs. Brown laughed at this, and Mr. Brown, after explaining how
the Spanish moss grew on trees, sometimes hanging down like the gray
beard of a very old man, told the children about the everglades.

"The everglades are the great swamps in the southern part of Florida,"
Mr. Brown said. "The land there is very low in some places, and the sea
water covers it at times. The everglades are lonely places, part forest
and partly covered with tall grass."

"Alligators, too?" asked Bunny, with wide-open eyes.

"Yes, I think alligators are there," Mr. Brown said. "But no oranges,"
he added, before Sue could ask that question. "It is too swampy to raise
oranges, though now an effort is being made to drain the swampy
everglades and make them of some use. We aren