Bartram, who traveled through Florida in the latter part of the last century, speaks of passing through a great extent of ancient Indian fields, now silent and deserted, overgrown with forests, orange groves, and rank vegetation, the site of the ancient Alachua, the capital of a famous and powerful tribe, who in days of old could assemble thousands at bull-play and other athletic exercises "over these then happy fields and green plains." "Almost every step we take," adds he, "over these fertile heights, discovers the remains and traces of ancient human habitations and cultivation." About the year 1763, when Florida was ceded by the Spaniards to the English, we are told that the Indians generally retired from the towns and the neighborhood of the whites, and burying themselves in the deep forests, intricate swamps and hommocks, and vast savannas of the interior, devoted themselves to a pastoral life, and the rearing of horses and cattle. These are the people that received the name of the Seminoles, or Wanderers, which they still retain. Bartram gives a pleasing picture of them at the time he visited them in their wilderness; where their distance from the abodes of the white man gave them a transient quiet and security. "This handful of people," says he, "possesses a vast territory, all East and the greatest part of West Florida, which being naturally cut and divided into thousands of islets, knolls, and eminences, by the innumerable rivers, lakes, swamps, vast savannas, and ponds, form so many secure retreats and temporary dwelling-places that effectually guard them from any sudden invasions or attacks from their enemies; and being such a swampy, hommocky country, furnishes such a plenty and variety of supplies for the nourishment of varieties of animals that I can venture to assert that no part of the globe so abounds with wild game, or creatures fit for the food of man.