I TO 



TII1>: (HIDE TO NATURE 



fORRESPONDENCE 

 :5B r^ and Inform l 



Information^ 



An Expressive Coincidence. 



Duluth, Minnesota. 

 To the Editor :— 



The July number of The Guide to 

 Mature at hand, and very interesting — 

 as usual. Did you notice the odd little 

 coincidence on page in? It reads: 



first prize — a pocket microscope. 



"Teaches You to be Glad with What 



You Have.'' 



That's perfectly clear, of course, but I 

 couldn't help thinking, what's the mat- 

 ter with reading it the other way, viz: 

 "A pocket microscope teaches you to be 

 glad with what you have." And so it 

 does, by showing you that you have 

 so many beautiful things you never 

 dreamed you possessed. If, by its aid, 

 you can transform a tiny sprig of insig- 

 nificant flowers into a stalk of stately 

 lilies — why then you truly "possess" 

 those lilies ; and its use reveals a never- 

 ending wealth of beauty available to all. 

 Yours truly, 



Nellie B. Pendergast. 



Another Angle of View. 



Duluth, Minn. 

 To the Editor : 



Here is Dr. Long getting his feet 

 wet because he will not have rubbers 

 to break communion with Mother 

 Earth ; while the writer likes to wear 

 them in the woods, even though the 

 ground be dry as ashes, because they 

 deaden the sound of my own footsteps 

 and enable me the better to hear the 

 faint rustle or the snapping of tiny 

 twigs that tell of the passing of the little 

 wood folks, and the sense of their 

 nearness is a pleasure, even though I 

 cannot see them. 



In regard to Mr. Roosevelt's hunt- 

 ing. As far as personal feeling is con- 

 cerned, the writer agrees heartily with 



Mrs. Darragh. Though fond of target 

 shooting, I never fire at a living mark, 

 nor accompany those who do. Neither 

 do I wear birds or wings (and prob- 

 ably Mrs. Darragh does not). On 

 the other hand, I am not a vegetarian, 

 and do wear furs. 



I believe one's prejudices are one's 

 own affair, and bound by no rule save 

 the leadings of that mysterious entity 

 we call ourself, so long as they remain 

 personal; but when we use them as a 

 measure to condemn others, we are 

 bound to be both logical and consist- 

 ent. And are we? 



For instance, is there any more real 

 cruelty, per se, in a good marksman 

 shooting an eland, a gazelle or a wart 

 hog, than in the butcher killing an ox, 

 a calf or a pig? The former would 

 suffer no more, and it is but fair to pre- 

 sume that the latter are not a whit 

 more willing to give up their peaceful, 

 contented lives than are their wild 

 cousins. 



If one takes the position that no life 

 should be taken for any reason, it is 

 easy to be consistent (in theory, but 

 exceedingly difficult in practice, since 

 we should soon have to move out and 

 leave the earth for the creatures who had 

 it first) ; but when one says that life 

 should not be taken except for good 

 reasons, the bars are let down, and it 

 becomes a question of personal judg- 

 ment and opinion. 



What constitutes a good reason for 

 killing an animal? We (as a people) 

 kill in self-defense, for food, for cloth- 

 ing (including such unnecessary lux- 

 uries as ornamental furs, etc.), because 

 the animals crowd us, or because we 

 wish to invade their territory. We 

 keep a cow and kill a calf, heedless 

 alike of the physical suffering of the 

 calf and the mental anguish of the 



