It was an ideal socialistic order, and we truly “sat together in heavenly places.”  All gladly contributed to the needs of the poor or the sick; we chartered steamers and went on picnic excursions to attractive island resorts in our beautiful harbor; class distinctions were banished, envy and jealousy disappeared like snow before the sun, and good fellowship reigned supreme.  Our rich and poor met together as brothers and sisters.

Such an organization in churches would soon banish class hatreds, and do much to make this world a paradise like to that above.

The winter of 1892 was a red-letter season in the history of us all.  We rented our house in W——­, to a friend, and lived in Florida, our four girls attending Rollins College at Winter Park, where they enjoyed life immensely in the incomparable climate which, with their studies in this excellent school, was of great benefit to them, physically and mentally.  I was favored with free passes all over the state, and devoted my time to a careful examination of large tracts of land in various counties, but found none to my liking until on our return trip, we spent several weeks at Lawtey, in the county of Bradford.

Florida, within its vast area, contains a great variety of land and climates, and the person who has traversed only the beaten track of the tourist knows nothing of the fertile tracts and delightful temperatures of these green-grassed and Piny-woods Highlands.  Here, as nowhere else in the world, nature has provided all the essentials to agricultural success; there was but one mortgaged homestead in the entire township; it is the greatest strawberry mart in the world; the abundance of nutritious wild grasses render cattle and sheep raising throughout the year a source of great revenue, and the maximum of crop returns is secured with a minimum of labor.

At last, after years of search throughout the state, we found our ideal location for a colony, and I bonded over 6,000 acres of fertile, well-wooded lands, returned home, formed a syndicate, and paid for our tract, to which we gave the appropriate suggestive name of “Woodlawn.”  I successfully pursued my avocation of advertising and selling our lands, having an office in Boston and cooperating agents in several states.

On June 11th, 1894, my brother Joshua, the last of my father’s family except myself, was suddenly called to join our many loved ones in the spirit world.  All our lives we had been as David and Jonathan, and not a cloud had swept across the azure of our sky of mutual affection, until the advent of his second wife.  He was one of the best men that ever lived, and nearly everyone in his town had been benefited by his well-known generosity and self-sacrifice, and he found awaiting him, many treasures in the grand bank of heaven.

  “I cannot say, and I will not say
  That he is dead—­he is just away,
  With a cheery smile, and a wave of the hand,
  He has wandered into an unknown land,
  And left us dreaming how very fair
  It needs must be, since he lingers there;
  We think of him faring on, as dear
  In the love of there as the love of here,
  Think of him still as the same, I say,
  He is not dead—­he is just away.”