their father were busy in the court-room nearly every
day, and Mrs. Elmer did not care to go ashore except for a walk in the
afternoon with her husband. So the children went off on long exploring
expeditions by themselves, and the following letter, written during
this time by Ruth to her dearest friend, Edna May, will give an idea of
some of the things they saw:

"KEY WEST, FLA., December 15, 188-.

"MY DEAREST EDNA,--It seems almost a year since I left you in dear old
Norton, so much has happened since then. This is the very first chance
I have had since I left to send you a letter, so I will make it a real
long one, and try to tell you everything.

"I was not sea-sick a bit, but Mark was.

"In the Penobscot River we rescued a man from a floating cake of ice,
and brought him with us. His name is Jan Jansen, but Mark calls him
Jack Jackson. A few days before we got here we found a wreck, and
helped get it off, and brought it here to Key West. Now we are waiting
for a court to say how much it was worth to do it. I shouldn't wonder
if they allowed as much as a thousand dollars, for the wreck was a big
ship, and it was real hard work.

"This is an awfully funny place, and I just wish you were here to walk
round with Mark and me and see it. It is on an island, and that is the
reason it is named 'Key,' because all the islands down here are called
keys. The Spaniards call it 'Cayo Hueso,' which means bone key, or bone
island; but I'm sure I don't know why, for I haven't seen any bones
here. The island is all made of coral, and the streets are just hard
white coral worn down. The island is almost flat, and 'Captain
Li'--he's our captain--says that the highest part is only sixteen feet
above the ocean.

"Oh, Edna! you ought to see the palm-trees. They grow everywhere, great
cocoa-nut and date palms, and we drink the milk out of the cocoa-nuts
when we go on picnics and get thirsty. And the roses are perfectly
lovely, and they have great oleanders and cactuses, and hundreds of
flowers that I don't know the names of, and they are all in full bloom
now, though it is nearly Christmas. I don't suppose I shall hang up my
stocking this Christmas; they don't seem to do it down here.

"The other day we went out to the soldiers' barracks, and saw a
banyan-tree that 'Captain Li' says is the only one in the United
States, but we didn't see any monkeys or elephants. Mark says he don't
think this is very tropical, because we haven't