300 NATURE STUDY REVIEW [9:9— Dec, 1913 



Scrihner's Magazine — The Life History of the African Rhinoceros 

 and Hippopotamus, Th. Roosevelt. The Ascent of DenaH, 

 Hudson Stuck. 



World's Work— First Up Mt. Blackburn, Dora Keen. 

 "Chinese" Wilson, Plant Hunter. 



Editorial 



My Sanctuary 



No architectural pile contains my shrine. My sanctuary has no 

 marble walls nor pillars, no gilded dome, no cunningly wrought 

 brazen doors to shut it in. There are no aisles, dim-lit through 

 stained glass of the masters. No frescoed nave is there, no surpliced 

 choir, no tonsured priest, no hand-made jeweled altar, no scared 

 relic with its miraculous power. 



My sanctuary lies secluded deep in the autumtn woods. The 

 spire of a mighty pine, sole survivor in the region of a glorious race, 

 marks the spot. It wears its plumed head high above scarlet 

 maples and yellow gold of fading birch. Gray, lichen-tinted trunks 

 uphold a canopy of glowing color. Here amid these massive pillars 

 is a rocky amphitheater girt about with granite walls. What 

 titanic blow hollowed out this rocky dell ? Now the uncouth force 

 is shielded by a wealth of delicate plants that hide the rocks and 

 cover up their scars. Parmelias and red topped Cladonias with 

 hosts of other lichens have smoothed the rough rock edges. Poly- 

 pody ferns and spleenwort are growing in the crevices and 

 the evergreen wood fern hangs out its great fronds from the deeper 

 earth-filled hollows. Here on the level floor cinnamon ferns rear 

 their clustered leaves and the thick moss raises a host of brave hairy 

 capped heads. 



Into the brooding quiet of this retreat I have stumbled on my 

 ramble. The exquisite beauty of the place channs me. Incense 

 from the sacrificial leaves of autumn trees fills the air. A flock of 

 clear toned white throats voice my yearnings. Scant intimation 

 here of the travail of the centuries. Peace prevails. The fern 

 fronds quiver with the shedding of cheir spores. The pine, yonder, 

 rears its stately crown in i)ride of achievement which I feel if it 

 may not. The chickadee, chasing up its trunk, is playful with the 



