thanks to Mr. William Kent in testimony of its appreciation of his noble gift to the Federal Government of the Redwood Cañon on Mount Tamalpais, with its magnificent primeval groves of Sequoia sempervirens, to be devoted as a public park and pleasure-ground to the people forever."" Los Angeles, Cal., Jan. 16, 1911: "Thanks for your kind letter and the book which you forwarded. "I am now at work on the Kings River yosemites, and I would like to have the part of the Kings River region which ought to be added to the General Grant and Sequoia National parks definitely described, because I wish to recommend the preservation of the region in the Yosemite Guide-book. . . . New York City, May 26, 1911: "I have just received a copy of 'My First Summer in the Sierra.' It is dedicated 'To The Sierra Club, Faithful Defender of the People's Playgrounds.' Am stopping with the Harrimans. The above will be my address until the first of July. "The American Alpine Club is arranging to give me a dinner, at which you may be sure there will be a lot of Hetch Hetchy work. . . . . "We may lose this particular fight, but truth and right must prevail at last. Anyhow we must be true to ourselves and the Lord." Castle Rock, Garrisons on Hudson, N. Y., June 27, 1911: "I've just written to Mr. McFarland assuring him of my help in the Niagara fight and my eagerness to meet him. I had not in the least forgotten him or his magnificent work, but since coming here I've had so much Hetch Hetchy and book work to do, besides planning for S. America, and have also been tousled and tumbled hither thither, dinnered, honored, etc., almost out of my wits, I could never set a day to see him. The society weather is now growing calm as the thermometer rises, and I hope to get a quiet week or two to see friends and finish my Yosemite book. . "The American Alpine Club gave me a fine dinner, so did the Appalachian, and a great time at the Yale Commencement, getting honor for helping to save Hetch Hetchy. Glad you like the Sierra Club summer book. I'll get the publishers to send some. Remember me to Mrs. Colby and Parsons and your brave pair of young mountaineers. Good luck for your outing. Greet them all at your camp-fire with my warmest good wishes." Para, Brazil, Sept. 19, 1911: "I hope you all had a good time this summer, the usual Sierra Club luck. When I left New York August 12th, the Hetch Hetchy looked comparatively safe as far as I could see, but the wicked, whether down or up, are never to be trusted, so we must keep on watching, praying, fighting, overcoming evil with good as we are able. "I've had a glorious time up the Amazon. In about a week from above date, I hope to be on my way to Rio de Janeiro. Thence I intend going to Buenos Aires, sail up the Uruguay and La Plata, cross the Andes to Valparaiso and southward along the araucarian forests, etc. Then perhaps to South Africa to see its wonderful flora, etc.; may be home in the spring. "My kindest regards to Mrs. Colby and the great pair of boys and to the Parsons, and all the Club you see.” On the Steamer "Windkirk," near Zanzibar, Feb. 4, 1912: "I've had a great time in South America and South Africa. Indeed it now seems that on this pair of wild, hot continents I've enjoyed the most fruitful year of my life. Some happy California day I'll try to tell you about it. I'm now on my way from Beira to Mombasa after a grand trip to the Zambesi Baobab forests, Victoria Falls, and the magnificent glacial rock scenery of Southern Rhodesia. From Mombasa I intend to make a short trip into the Nyanza lake region, then home via Suez, Naples and New York, hoping to find you and all the Sierra Club and its friends and affairs hale and happy and prosperous." Martinez, May 1, 1912: "I'll be down Friday and stop over for the Saturday meeting. If a few of the Club members wish very much to give me an informal dinner I'll not object, but my dress suit is in Los Angeles; have nothing but old clothes here, therefore the thing must be an informal sort of camp affair." Hollywood, Cal., June 24, 1912: "I thank you very much for your kind wishes to give me a pleasant Kern River trip, and am very sorry that work has been so unmercifully piled upon me that I find it impossible to escape from it, so I must just stay and work. "I heartily congratulate you and all your merry mountaineers in the magnificent trip that lies before you. As you know, I have seen something of nearly all the mountain chains in the world, and have experienced their varied climates and attractions of forests and rivers, lakes and meadows, etc. In fact, I have seen a little of all the high places and low places of the continents, but no mountain range seems to me so kind, so beautiful, or so fine in its sculpture as the Sierra Nevada. If you were as free as the winds are, and the light, to choose a camp ground in any part of the globe, I could not direct you to a single place for your outing that, all things considered, is so attractive, so exhilarating and uplifting in every way as just the trip that you are now making. You are far happier than you know. Good luck to you all, and I shall hope to see you all on your return, boys and girls, with the sparkle and exhilaration. of the mountains still in your eyes. With love and countless fondly cherished memories, Ever faithfully yours, JOHN MUIR," "Of course in all your camp-fire preaching and praying you will never forget Hetch Hetchy." SERRATISQVE MONTIBVS CONGLACIATORVM CAMBRIDGE MASSACHUSETTS JUNE 24 A D 1896 CHARLES WILLIAM ELIOT PRESIDENT JOHN MUIR BY DAVID STARR JORDAN It is not easy to write of my good friend, John Muir. The impression of his personality was so strong on those who knew him that all words seem cheap beside it. Those who never knew him can never, through any word of ours, be brought to realize what they have missed. John Muir first came to my notice in Indianapolis, forty years ago, but he was gone before I came there. He was a printer, I believe, in those days, and he made friends, for he was rich in wisdom and in love of nature. Five years later, in San Francisco, I met him frequently. He was lately back from the Yosemite, where, in rollicking enthusiasm, he had written the finest bird biography in existence, the story of the Water Ouzel in the "Ouzel Basin" of the Brewer range. In those days every meeting with him was a fresh joy. He was possessed with love and the enthusiasm for a fresh great mountain range, almost new to literature in those days, but fit to dominate it when the Alps and the Apennines have vanished, swallowed up in the sea of blood. He had, moreover, a quaint, crisp way of talking, his literary style in fact, and none of the nature lovers, the men who know how to feel in the presence of great things and beautiful, have expressed their craft better than he. There is another Scotsman of the cosmopolitan order to whom, in many ways, John Muir bore a strong resemblance. John Muir cared little for world-politics, and James Bryce knew little of the songs of birds, but these two great men looked on life and the universe in much the same way, both frankspoken and absolutely democratic; both open-eyed to all phenomena of the world, whatever and wheresoever they be; both wandering wide from their homes; both large-brained, cosmopolitan citizens of the world, the world God made and which lies open to us all the time. |