EDITORIAL 



249 



there for me." the reply is invariably, 

 "Do not be so sacrilegious as to take 

 children with yon. Do not. Become 

 converted yourself before yon try to 

 convert others. If the essence of na- 

 ture study is not good for you first of 

 all. then it is not good for the children." 

 Some of the compliments that come 

 to this magazine are painfully jarring 

 because they treat the magazine as so 

 much material to be bought and 

 handed over. This journal stands for 

 personality, for inspiration in the study 

 of nature, not for something merely in- 

 teresting to be read nor attractive pic- 

 tures to be admired. It stands for life 

 even more than for something that that 

 life may do. Nature study is not al- 

 together a matter of knowledge nor of 

 materials. It is chiefly a matter of per- 

 sonal inspiration. It is not a thing but 

 a point of view. It is not a daily talk 

 of fifteen minutes in the presence of 

 your pupils ; it is living for twenty- 

 four hours a day. 



War Co-operation with Railroads. 



Chairman Fairfax Harrison of the 

 railroads' war board, in a statement to 

 the public published today, makes an 

 appeal for co-operation of the people 

 with the railroads in the stupendous 

 task now confronting the carriers, and 

 for patience while the railroads grapple 

 with staggering difficulties yet to be 

 overcome. It should attract the atten- 

 tion and receive the sympathy of every 

 one. To say that upon the railroads 

 rest a great burden in the winning of 

 the war is but to state the elemental. 

 To say that the railroads have demon- 

 strated not only their willingness, but 

 ability to shoulder their load is but to 

 give simplest credit where it is most 

 obviously due. 



In his statement Chairman Harrison 

 calls attention, without boastfulness, to 

 some of the facts accomplished by the 

 railroads. They have in the five months 

 of the war hauled 116,000 carloads of 

 freight to national camps ; have handled 

 17,000 carloads of freight for the ship- 

 ping board ; have moved 750,000 car- 

 loads more of coal than in 1916, while 

 the general freight traffic was 50 per 

 cent, heavier than in 191 5. They have 

 transported 1,200,000 soldiers to train- 

 ing camps. They will move 75,000 car- 



loads of supplies a month to these 

 camps. 



All this in the face of difficulties of 

 their own, occasioned by serious short- 

 age of the highly skilled labor neces- 

 sary for railroad operation ; of a lack 

 of sufficient cars and locomotives ; of a 

 lamentable inability to get adequate 

 equipment while the government has 

 priority in its demands for steel and 

 other material. Even their officers have 

 diverted their attention to government 

 business to the detriment of executive 

 management of their own properties. 



The railroads' war board has sub- 

 mitted to the government director of 

 priority and the fuel administrator a 

 list of 450 commodities whose trans- 

 portation can be dispensed with with- 

 out inconvenience to the public, and 75 

 commodities which could be dispensed 

 with, although, admittedly, with incon- 

 venience. Denial of transportation of 

 these commodities will aid the rail- 

 roads to give greater service to the 

 war. Chairman Harrison asks the pub- 

 lic to co-operate. 



May he not reasonably expect us all 

 to pay heed to this request, not only to 

 submit without complaining to the cur- 

 tailment, but even to help it along? It 

 is all for the winning of the war. — The 

 Washington Evening Star. 



Where There's Plenty of Rain. 



The little island of Kauai ,in the 

 Hawaiian group may well claim the 

 record for range of climate. The island, 

 which is nearly circular, is only thirty 

 miles across, with an old volcano in 

 the center, some five thousand feet 

 high. On the leeward side of the peak 

 the country has the rainfall of a semi- 

 desert, only about twenty inches a year 

 on the average, and in some years less 

 than fifteen inches. But the windward 

 side of the mountain, only fourteen 

 miles away, is one of the wettest spots 

 on earth. The average rainfall is over 

 five hundred inches a year, while in 

 1914 it passed six hundred inches. This 

 is fifty feet of water each season over 

 the entire country, as against about 

 seven feet for New England, which is 

 one of the best watered portions of the 

 United States. Naturally, the whole 

 region is one dripping bog, on which 

 the rain falls virtuallv all the time. 



