Books: Florida Exile

A PRINCE IN THEIR MIDST (275 pp.)—A. J. Hanna—University of Oklahoma ($3).

One of the sights of Florida in 1824, in the days when Florida's sights were pretty well confined to flora & fauna, was the new owner of a 1,2OO-acre plantation known as Parthenope, near St. Augustine. The bachelor proprietor was 23, and had a nervous, knowing, extraordinary manner.

He spoke Italian, Spanish, German and French as well as English. When he was not reading Blackstone or walking in his orange grove, he was likely to be sitting, in a specially constructed chair, neck-deep in the waters of the Matanzas River, considering...