DELPORT FIELD TRIPS AT FALLEN LEAF LAKE 173 



deep in the bird kingdom as well as in some other higher orders of 

 creation. One day we cam.e, but the nest was empty. Upon 

 close observation, we discovered one little panting bird hidden 

 under an old. log. We watched him carefully and wanted so 

 much to take him in and care for him during these first 

 days; but we dared not, as he was imdoubtedly going through 

 one stage of his growth and must be left to start the battle oa 

 his own feet. The parents had gone off for a short vacation. 

 no doubt, which they justly deserved. We concluded too, that 

 if there is such a place as a bird-heaven, surely these parent 

 pewees had already earned a place therein. 



It was hard to leave Fallen Leaf and break away from the 

 association's we had gathered in the great out-of-doors; hard too, 

 to leave paths of peace and magic and come down to earth and 

 the "crowded roads that nm so straight to pain," but we came 

 back with new appreciations and deeper revelations of the beau- 

 ties of the wilderness and the life it sustains. 



Better than any personal gain was the realization of the in- 

 calculable benefits bestowed on the many individuals who had 

 partaken in this pioneer work of becoming acquainted with nature 

 through actual contact and first-hand education under a com- 

 petent instructor. The results accomplished have opened the way 

 toward bigger things in the same direction for future workers, and 

 the fact that there is a group of interested, enthusiastic followers 

 fairly clamoring at the gates for just this sort of education, is the 

 most encouraging indication that a definite program will be 

 outlined to meet this demand. As John Muir put it "Even the 

 scenery habit in its most artificial forms, mixed with spectacles, 

 silliness ^nd kodaks; its devotees arrayed more gorgeously than 

 scarlet tanagers, frightening the wild game with red umbrellas, — 

 even this is encouraging, and may well be regarded as a hopeful 

 sign of the times." 



Dr. E. Lawrence Palmer of Cornell is teaching at Berkeley, Cal. during 

 the Summer Session of the University of California. 



