We stopped off Savannah near the close of the first day of our voyage, to leave some of our passengers and take in others; and on the second, which was also the second of the month, we were running rapidly down the Florida coast, with the trade-wind fresh on our beam, sweeping before it a long swell from the east, in which our vessel rocked too much for the stomachs of most of the passengers.  The next day the sea was smoother; we had changed our direction somewhat and were going before the wind, the Florida reefs full in sight, with their long streak of white surf, beyond which, along the line of the shore, lay a belt of water, of bright translucent green, and in front the waves wore an amethystine tint.  We sat the greater part of the day under an awning.  A long line, with a baited hook at the end, was let down into the water from the stern of our vessel, and after being dragged there an hour or two, it was seized by a king-fish, which was immediately hauled on board.  It was an elegantly shaped fish, weighing nearly twenty pounds, with a long head, and scales shining with blue and purple.  It was served up for dinner, and its flavor much commended by the amateurs.

The waters around us were full of sails, gleaming in the sunshine.  “They belong,” said our Charleston pilot, “to the wreckers who live at Key West.  Every morning they come out and cruise among the reefs, to discover if there are any vessels wrecked or in distress—­the night brings them back to the harbor on their island.”

Your readers know, I presume, that at Key West is a town containing nearly three thousand inhabitants, who subsist solely by the occupation of relieving vessels in distress navigating this dangerous coast, and bringing in such as are wrecked.  The population, of course, increases with the commerce of the country, and every vessel that sails from our ports to the Gulf of Mexico, or comes from the Gulf to the North, every addition to the intercourse of the Atlantic ports with Mobile, New Orleans, the West Indies, or Central America, adds to their chances of gain.  These people neither plant nor sow; their isle is a low barren spot, surrounded by a beach of white sand, formed of disintegrated porous limestone, and a covering of the same sand, spread thinly over the rock, forms its soil.

“It is a scandal,” said the pilot, “that this coast is not better lighted.  A few light-houses would make its navigation much safer, and they would be built, if Florida had any man in Congress to represent the matter properly to the government.  I have long been familiar with this coast—­sixty times, at least, I have made the voyage from Charleston to Havana, and I am sure that there is no such dangerous navigation on the coast of the United States.  In going to Havana, or to New Orleans, or to other ports on the gulf, commanders of vessels try to avoid the current of the gulf-stream which would carry them to the north, and they, therefore, shave the Florida coast, and keep near the reefs which you see yonder.  They often strike the reefs inadvertently, or are driven against them by storms.  In returning northward the navigation is safer; we give a good offing to the reefs and strike out into the gulf-stream, the current of which carries us in the direction of our voyage.”