Another valuable fruit of this remote region is the guava, whose tree, about the size of a peach, has straggling branches clad in a light brown bark of satiny smoothness. One hundred and fifty trees may be set to the acre. They require but little care, and will produce fruit when five or six years old. A thrifty tree should yield at least one bushel of fruit, worth from one dollar to one dollar and a half, while two and three bushels to the tree are not unusual. The guava is yellow, smooth-skinned, and about the size of a nectarine or a very large plum. Its interior is pink, and is filled with small seeds. While most of us are familiar with the dark-colored guava paste that, packed in small wooden boxes, comes from Cuba, comparatively few have tasted the delicious, beautifully clear guava jelly or the darker and richer guava marmalades of Florida. The demand for these is rapidly increasing. Each year sees the establishment of new factories for making them, and many thousands of acres may still be set to guavas without overstocking the market. Most interesting of all South Florida fruits, because little cultivated, almost unknown outside of the tropics, and most highly appreciated when once introduced, is the alligator or aracado pear--the _aguacate_ of Cuba. A very few alligator-pear trees are grown in sheltered spots of southern California; but South Florida, below latitude 26°, is the only section of the United States where it can be cultivated on a large scale and as a profitable crop. Here it grows as luxuriantly and with as little care as the guava, though it requires a greater depth of soil. The tree is tall, slender, and covered with a dense foliage of dark glossy green, while the ripened fruit, also green in color, is smooth-skinned and as large as a man's two fists. Inside is a great round stone or seed surrounded by a soft yellowish-green pulp, which, sprinkled with salt and eaten with a spoon, or made into a salad, is delicious beyond description. No one ever eats an alligator pear without wanting another, and the taste once acquired demands to be gratified regardless of expense. I have known fifty and even seventy-five cents apiece to be paid for these pears, and when I once asked a Broadway dealer which was the most expensive fruit in his store, he promptly answered, "Alligator pears." I have said little concerning bananas, cocoanuts, or mangoes, all of which are raised in South Florida, because they grow better in the West Indies and Central America, where labor is much cheaper than in any part of the United States, and from which they will safely bear transportation by sea. It is often asked by young would-be fruit-growers, "How much land ought a grove to contain, and what will be the returns?"