Democratic Sentinel, Volume 18, Number 5, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 16 February 1894 — St. Augustine. [ARTICLE]

St. Augustine.

The city of St. Augustine, on the easiern coast of Florida, stands in one respect pre-eminent among all the cities of the United States —it is truly an old city. It has many other claims to consideration, but these are 6hared with other cities. But in regard to age it is the one member of its class. Compare! with the cities of the Old World, St. Augustine would be called young; but in the United States a city whose buildings and monuments connect the Middle Ages with the present time may be considered to have a good claim to be called ancient. After visiting some of our great towns, where the noise and bustle ot traffic, the fire and din of manufactures, the long lines of buildings stretching out in every direction, with all the other evidences of active enterprise, proclaim these cities creatures of the present day and hour, it is refreshing and restfuf to go down to quiet St. Augustine, where one may gate into the dry moat of a fort of medieval architecture, walk over its drawbridges, pass under its portcullis, and go down into its dungeons: and where in soft semi-tropical air the visitor may wander through narrow streets resembling those of Spain and Italy, where the houses on each side lean over toward one another so that neighbors might almost shake bands from their upper windows, and are surrounded by orange groves and rosegardens which blossom all the year.— St. Nicholas.