ren, though slaves, are often dressed with
great neatness. In the colored people whom I saw in the Catholic church, I
remarked a more agreeable, open, and gentle physiognomy than I have been
accustomed to see in that class. The Spanish race blends more kindly with
the African, than does the English, and produces handsomer men and women.

I have been to see the quarries of coquina, or shell-rock, on the island
of St. Anastasia, which lies between St. Augustine and the main ocean. We
landed on the island, and after a walk of some distance on a sandy road
through the thick shrubs, we arrived at some huts built of a frame-work of
poles thatched with the radiated leaves of the dwarf palmetto, which had a
very picturesque appearance. Here we found a circular hollow in the earth,
the place of an old excavation, now shaded with red-cedars, and the
palmetto-royal bristling with long pointed leaves, which bent over and
embowered it, and at the bottom was a spring within a square curb of
stone, where we refreshed ourselves with a draught of cold water. The
quarries were at a little distance from this. The rock lies in the ridges,
a little below the surface, forming a stratum of no great depth. The
blocks are cut out with crowbars thrust into the rock. It is of a delicate
cream color, and is composed of mere shells and fragments of shells,
apparently cemented by the fresh water percolating through them and
depositing calcareous matter brought from the shells above. Whenever
there is any mixture of sand with the shells, rock is not formed.

Of this material the old fort of St. Mark and the greater part of the city
are built. It is said to become harder when exposed to the air and the
rain, but to disintegrate when frequently moistened with sea-water. Large
blocks were lying on the shore ready to be conveyed to the fort, which is
undergoing repairs. It is some consolation to know that this fine old work
will undergo as little change in the original plan as is consistent with
the modern improvements in fortification. Lieutenant Benham, who has the
charge of the repairs, has strong antiquarian tastes, and will preserve as
much as possible of its original aspect. It must lose its battlements,
however, its fine mural crown. Battlements are now obsolete, except when
they are of no use, as on the roofs of churches and Gothic cottages.

In another part of the same island, which we visited afterward, is a
dwelling-house situated amid orange-