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THE GUIDE TO NATURE 



happen with universal ownership? The 

 spoliation of everything, and in a short 

 time the disappearance of everything 

 worth having. 



Dr. Robert T. Morris has been an- 

 other victim of efforts to aid humanity. 

 He has tried to propagate new forms 

 of trees and has spent an immense 

 amount of money upon the cultivation 

 of better nuts or more profuse produc- 

 tion. He has been a lover and popu- 

 larizer of high grade evergreen trees. 

 and yet some of his apparentlv friend- 

 ly neighbors have cut down his most 

 magnificent evergreens for Christmas 

 trees to amuse their children and soon 

 to be thrown out and burned. The re- 

 sults of Dr. Morris's labors are for fu- 

 ture generations; he cannot hope to 

 profit by them himself. I can conceive 

 of nothing more altruistic than his 

 work. It takes nearly a generation to 

 grow one nut tree. We might suppose 

 that humanity would give him everv 

 possible protection and encouragement. 



but instead of that ! ! 



_ We are a long, long way from so- 

 cialism, from universal protection and 

 acknowledgement of the ownership of 

 property when one has to offer a re- 

 ward, as did Commodore Benedict, for 

 the arrest of those wdio destroy his 

 property. There never was any good 

 reason for the saying, "The public be 

 damned," but some members of the 

 general public are saying by their ras- 

 cally deeds, "The owner be damned." 

 Every decent person in possession of 

 great power of Avealth or ability is 

 glad to share it, to disseminate it from 

 the center outward. We never knew 

 of a singer who did not like to sing if 

 others like to hear him. The godly man 

 is always and naturally a missionary. 

 The learned man delights in teaching 

 others. The man of vast estate, of pic- 

 turesque premises, beautiful plants and 

 gardens, would gladly have everybody 

 enjoy these beauties without an anxious 

 thought or care, but he is not allowed 

 to do it. I believe in socialism, not of 

 the erroneous politicial species, but in 

 community good will and of the free 

 sharing of good things with others. 

 But before universal friendship arrives, 

 much work must be done to convert the 

 minority that by mean words and 

 meaner actions discourage the efforts 



of the good to help the bad, of the rich 

 to aid the poor, of those who know to 

 tell those who don't. The universal 

 dissemination of wealth in mental and 

 worldly things would follow rapidly if 

 it were not for these few discouraging 

 people, discouraging by words and ac- 

 tions. The poet was right. There is a 

 good time coming, but it is not rapid in 

 its movement. Every one who wants 

 to see that good time should help it on 

 l)y' trying to stop the mean insinuations 

 and the dastardly deeds of the powerful 

 few. 



War on Poison Ivy. 



The extermination of poison ivv is 

 an appropriate subject for the consid- 

 eration of the Board of Health of every 

 town. It is a queer fact that the little 

 annoyances that may come from mos- 

 quitoes, or big annoyances if you see 

 fit to call them that, receive a great 

 amount of attention and are much ex- 

 ploited in the newspapers ; but more 

 serious pain and discomfort have been 

 occasioned by poison ivy, yet wdiere is 

 the Health Board that gives any at- 

 tention to its extermination? It 

 should not be destroyed by individual 

 eft'ort ; that is too expensive and dan- 

 gerous a process, and most landowners 

 do not know how to rid themselves of 

 this troublesome plant. They hesi- 

 tate to approach it and they know noth- 

 ing that will eradicate it. 



]\Iost persons are easily affected by 

 it. some even becoming poisoned by 

 passing near it at certain times when 

 the wind is blowing strongly in their 

 direction, although some scientists as- 

 sert that the leaves must be touched 

 in order to poison. I am aware that 

 much is said about the poison being oil 

 and not volatile and that it cannot be 

 carried in the air but actual observa- 

 tion and experience influence us to 

 doubt that dictum. I have myself 

 known persons to be badly poisoned 

 but who had no knowledge of having 

 touched the plant, although there may 

 have been an unnoticed contact. Yet 

 Professor J. T. Burrill, late professor 

 of Botany in the University of Illinois, 

 has discovered and described, on the 

 leaves of the poison, a microbe that he 

 has named Mkrococctis toxkatus. 

 This he believes is the peculiar poison 



