Page:Frances Wood Shimer 1826-1901.djvu/24

 grief which tears could not assuage, in increased toil and a closer application to business. Outsiders may have thought that this diligence arose from a desire to accumulate, or from force of habit, but their vision did not pierce the veil which masked great sorrows.

It was at this time that Miss Ophelia Mason, a teacher of unusual graces of character, was seriously ill, requiring constant care. Mrs. Shimer's own suffering made her heart very tender for another in affliction. She assumed the duties of nurse, installing the invalid in her own room, and bestowing on her the sympathy and companionship for which her own heart was yearning. Their mutual love, like that between mother and daughter, was a great comfort to Mrs. Shimer, but she was deprived of this solace by the death of Miss Mason in January, 1870.

In the winter of 1883, Mrs. Shimer went to Florida to recuperate after an attack of pneumonia. The results were most satisfactory, but the ensuing winter pulmonary symptoms again compelled her to seek the milder climate. It was evident that she could never again endure the rigor of northern winters. This led to the establishment of a permanent winter home in De Land, the college town of the south. It was the time of awakening to the resources and advantages of the state for orange culture. Always a lover of trees and “things growing,” she saw both pleasure and possibilities of great financial returns in investments. She began more as an antidote for homesickness and loneliness than for financial results, for with her activity she could not be idle during the enforced absence of six months in each year. Investment followed investment, until Mrs. Shimer was considered one of the leading orange growers of the state, and her groves were unsurpassed in promise of large and permanent annuities.

Quantities of tropical fruits from her groves were consumed by the Seminary family. In January, 1895, when her orange crop was estimated by the thousands of boxes, came a frost&mdash;“a killing frost”&mdash;reaching a latitude affirmed by tradition to be frost-proof, and golden prospects were blighted with fruit which covered the ground like a carpet of gold. She did not know or realize the full extent of her loss until the next year, when, after arranging for the transfer of the Seminary, she went South, and learned that the trees