14 THE AUDUBON BU UL Eee 
When the first Audubon Society was organized, Mrs. Ridg- 
way was asked to act as local secretary. A little later the Audu- 
bon Society of the District of Columbia was organized. Of this 
she was a charter member, and was not only very active in in- 
creasing the membership, but was appointed one of a committee 
delegated to canvas the millinery establishments and department 
stores in Washington for the purpose of trying to induce the 
proprietors to discard birds and feathers as ornaments on 
women’s hats. In this effort Mrs. Ridgway was successful to 
the extent of persuading one milliner, a Miss Henderson (who 
has since married), who faithfully kept her promise, and, I am 
glad to say, to her financial advantage; for at an exhibition of 
featherless hats, held under the auspices of the Audubon Society 
at the Arlington Hotel, Miss Henderson’s hats were highly 
praised and gained her many new patrons. 
Ill health, immediately following the death of her only son 
in his twenty-fourth year, has since prevented Mrs. Ridgway 
from taking an active part in Audubon Society work, but has 
not in the least diminished her interest in bird protection. Here 
at our home she has spared no effort to encourage the birds to 
stay with us, with results that are extremely gratifying. For 
more than a year past, however, this labor of love has been too 
much for her, and she has had to turn her charges over to me. 
Mrs. Ridgway is a lover of her home, family, and friends and 
eares nothing for what is called “‘Society.’’ Her life has been 
marked by such complete devotion to her husband and his inter- 
ests that even Ruth of olden times did not say more truly than 
has she in practice: “Whither thou goest I will go; and where 
thou lodgest I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy 
God my God.” It has not always been easy for her, especially 
when she left old friends and familiar scenes: for others untried; 
but she has become completely adjusted and reconciled to the 
change and does not regret it. Old friends are sadly missed, but 
new ones, some of them very precious, have been found; many 
things far more than compensate for what has been lost, and 
neither she nor I would return to city life except from the direst 
necessity. 
In a letter just received from a very dear but distant friend ~ 
to whom I had written of Mrs. Ridgway’s illness, he says: 
“Greetings, with love and sympathy: with my hope and prayer 
also for the restoration to health of Mrs. Ridgway, whose gra- 
cious influence I have been sensible of even at a great distance. 
“One phrase she used in a letter crowns her with immortality: 
“Where love is, there is no such word as sacrifice.’ 
“Learned first in time’s dawn, the ages have taught nothing 
finer, nothing truer. Mrs. Ridgway compressed in a sentence 
all that Colonel Robert G. Ingersoll said in a long lecture, some of 
whose glittering phrases I recall even yet... . But all of it is ex- 
