tinged, as we were told, with the roots of the red bay, a species of
magnolia. As the horses waded into the transparent crimson, we thought of
the butcheries committed by the Indians, on that road, and could almost
fancy that the water was still colored with the blood they had shed.

The driver of our wagon told us many narratives of these murders, and
pointed out the places where they were committed. He showed us where the
father of this young woman was shot dead in his wagon as he was going from
St. Augustine to his plantation, and the boy whom we had seen, was wounded
and scalped by them, and left for dead. In another place he showed us the
spot where a party of players, on their way to St. Augustine, were
surprised and killed. The Indians took possession of the stage dresses,
one of them arraying himself in the garb of Othello, another in that of
Richard the Third, and another taking the costume of Falstaff. I think it
was Wild Cat's gang who engaged in this affair, and I was told that after
the capture of this chief and some of his warriors, they recounted the
circumstances with great glee. At another place we passed a small thicket
in which several armed Indians, as they afterward related, lay concealed
while an officer of the United States army rode several times around it,
without any suspicion of their presence. The same men committed,
immediately afterward, several murders and robberies on the road.

At length we emerged upon a shrubby plain, and finally came in sight of
this oldest city of the United States, seated among its trees on a sandy
swell of land where it has stood for three hundred years. I was struck
with its ancient and homely aspect, even at a distance, and could not help
likening it to pictures which I had seen of Dutch towns, though it wanted
a windmill or two, to make the resemblance perfect. We drove into a green
square, in the midst of which was a monument erected to commemorate the
Spanish constitution of 1812, and thence through the narrow streets of the