On Monday, March 13th, we left St. Marks River, and, as the north wind blew, were forced to keep from one to two miles off the land on the open Gulf to find even two feet of water.  In many places we found rough pieces of coral rocks upon the bottom, and in several instances grounded upon them.  As the wind went down, the tide, which on this coast frequently rises only from eighteen inches to two feet, favored us with more water, and by night we were able to get close to the marshes, and enter a little creek west of the Ocilla River, where, staking our boats along side the soft marsh, we supped on chocolate and dry bread, and slept comfortably in our little craft until morning.

We were now in an almost uninhabited region, where only an occasional fisherman or sponger is met; but as we pulled along the coast the day after our camp in the marshes, we were struck with the absence of any sign of the presence of man.  We had hoped to meet with the vessels of sponge-gatherers anchored in the vicinity of Rock Island, to which place they resort to clean their crop; but when we passed the island in the afternoon, so scantily clothed with herbage, and upon which a few palms grew out of the shallow soil, it was deserted, while not a single sail could be seen upon the horizon of the sea.

My companion had not been well for several days, and he informed me at this late date that he was subject to malarial fever, or, as he called it, “swamp fever.”  It had been contracted by him while living on one of the bayous of southern Louisiana during a warm season.  Swamp fever, when at its height, usually produces temporary insanity; and he alarmed me by stating that he had been deprived of his reason for days at a time during his attacks.  The use of daily stimulants had kept up his constitutional vigor for several months; but as ours was a temperance diet, he gradually, after we left Biloxi and the regions where stimulants could be obtained, became nervous, lost his appetite, and was now suffering from chills and fever.  He was much depressed after leaving St. Marks, and had long fits of sullenness, so that he would row for hours without speaking.  I tried to cheer him, and on one occasion penetrated the forest a long distance to obtain some panacea with which to brace his unsettled nerves.

Saddles had deceived me as to the necessity of taking daily drams, which habit is, to say the least, a most inconvenient one for persons engaged in explorations of isolated parts of the coast, and voyaging in small boats; so we had both suffered much in consequence of his bad habit.  To furnish one moderate drinker with the liquid stimulant necessary for a boat voyage from New Orleans to Cedar Keys, at least five gallons of whiskey, and a large and heavy demijohn in which to store it securely, must form a portion of the cargo.  This bulk occupies important space in the confined quarters of a boat, every inch of which is needed for necessary articles, while the momentary and artificial strength given to the system is never, except as a remediable agent, productive of any real or lasting benefit.  My unfortunate companion had become so accustomed to the daily use of liquor, and his shattered system had been so propped by it, that he had been like a man walking on stilts; and now that they were knocked away, his own feet failed to support him, and a reaction was the inevitable result.