86 



THE GUIDE TO NATURE 



San Antonio, Texas. 



To the Editor: 



I send to your fine magazine, The 

 Guide to Nature, an interesting view 

 of two of our Texas cactus leaves, a 



tissue. I prepared the photograph at 

 the farm pasture of a good friend and 

 great nature enthusiast, Mr. Lee Hoyt, 

 of the Leona valley. 



Sincerely yours, 



Dr. R. Menger. 



TWO CACTUS LFAVES FROM TEXAS— ONE F 



OTHER TO SHOW^ 



large fresh one from a growing plant, 

 and another showing the framework or 

 skeleton with its beautiful network and 

 ramifications intact. They were gathered 

 by me during a late outing at our lovely 

 Leona hills, close to San Antonio, where 

 miles of wild cactus jungles exist in un- 

 cultivated pastures and open prairies. 



During late and remote floods near 

 the Leona creek numbers of these leaves 

 were carried away and lodged in the 

 trees and shrubbery — some as high as 

 thirty and more feet above the ground. 

 In one place, where earth, all sorts of 

 debris, cactus remnants and sand had ac- 

 cumulated, there were several leaves, 

 whole side branches showing such leaves 

 and root stems denuded of their succu- 

 lent parenchyma, leaving only the fi- 

 brous network, similar to that shown in 

 the photograph. This specimen, from 

 years of exposure to the elements, and 

 its incomplete covering of sand and soft 

 earth, lost all its integumental covering 

 except at a few spots near the base that 

 show outlines of the original external 



RF.SH FROM A (SROWING PLANT AM) THE 

 THE FRAMEWORK. 



Look Up! 



Look up, at the stately trees, 

 Look up, at the winsome flowers 



Which nature's lavish hand 



Has woven through the bowers. 



Look up at the hills around, 



All verdure-clad, serene ; 

 Look up at the mountains bold 



O'er nearer hilltops seen. 



Look up at the clear blue sky, 



Look up at the stars at night, 

 At clouds that are sailing by. 



The moon with its silvery light. 



Look up as you go along, 



'Twill broaden all your way; 

 Look up till the habit grows, 



And adds a zest to vour dav. 



-Emma Peirce. 



Clarence King, the first head of the 

 United States Geological Survey, writ- 

 ing in 1880, opined that the mineral 

 otitput of the country might sometime 

 in the distant future reach a value of 

 a billion dollars a year. Already it is 

 two and a half billions. 



