of visitors, but they are still amazingly few in number compared with those who go to Europe every year, and obtain very much. less enjoyment at a very much larger price. The Yosemite will hereafter be open in the winter.

At the recent session, Congress passed an act authorizing an exchange for the Calaveras big tree forest, which was owned by a Minnesota lumber king, patriotic enough to wait patiently for years for Congress to accept a grove of the most majestic sequoia trees in the world for timber land of equal value elsewhere on the public domain.

The chain of parks in that section of California belonging to the government now embraces 882,000 acres, including the Mariposa, the Sequoia, General Grant and Calaveras groves of big trees, all of which should be connected by perfect roadways so that the public can enjoy their wonders without discomfort and fatigue. They are all within a forest reserve of nearly 4,000,000 acres, which will belong perpetually to the government.

The House Committee on Public Lands has reported favorably a bill which passed the Senate last May, creating Glacier National Park, west of the summit of the Rocky Mountains and south of the Canadian boundary line in Montana. It includes about 1,300 square miles of the finest mountain scenery upon the continent, averaging about 10,000 feet above the sea level, containing about two hundred and fifty lakes and sixty-eight glaciers.

Those who are interested in this enterprise are confident that the Canadian government will reserve a similar area on its side of the border; it has already made a beginning which will make this the greatest park for natural beauty and the greatest preserve for wild animals in the civilized world. It is proposed to put it under the jurisdiction of the Secretary of Agriculture, who already administers it as a National Forest, and who will permit shooting and fishing at such times and under such rules and regulations as he deems best. There is practically no agricultural land and no mineral-bearing formations of commercial value, but in the canyons are roaring streams fed by melting ice and snow, and there are more than two hundred and fifty lakes which abound in fish of many varieties. The region is inhabited by a greater variety of large wild animals than can be found in any other one district of the United States. Mountain goats and sheep, grizzly and black bears,

caribou, elk, moose and two kinds of deer are found as well as a great variety of other mammals and birds. The animals use it as a breeding ground, because they can find perfect protection. The waters flow in three directions, finding the Hudson Bay, the Gulf of Mexico and the Pacific Ocean. Some of the mountains are of unparalleled beauty, one of the highest peaks having been named in honor of the late Grover Cleveland.

"Cinder Cone" is a great lava field of extraordinary scientific interest within the national forest of California, and is, perhaps, the best illustration we have of volcanic phenomena.

The Gila Cliff dwellings in New Mexico are among the most perfect and extensive remains of the prehistoric race which once occupied, irrigated and cultivated the southwestern section of this country. They are situated in the canyon of the Gila river in the southwestern part of New Mexico.

The Grand Canyon of the Colorado is well known. It is in many respects the grandest natural spectacle in the world.

Jewel Cave is situated within the Black Hills national forest, in Custer county, South Dakota, thirteen miles southwest from the town of Custer, and was so named because metallic stones of brilliant colors are found there in large quantities. It was discovered in 1900 by two brothers named Mishaud, who were prospecting for gold in that vicinity, and has been explored for several miles. A strange phenomena is the action of the wind, which alternately and with great regularity, blows in and blows out of the cave.

Lassen Peak, or Mount Diabolo, marks the southern terminus of a long line of extinct volcanoes in the Cascade range of mountains in California, and is not only a landmark of great beauty, but is of special importance in tracing the history of the volcanic phenomena in that vicinity.

The Pinnacles, about nine miles due east from the Southern Pacific Railroad station Soldad, San Benito county, California, are a collection of jagged peaks of impressive grandeur and much scientific interest.

The Tonto national monument is a group of prehistoric ruins located in the region commonly known as the Tonto drainage basin, Gila county, Arizona, and is of great ethnological and educational interest as a relic of vanquished civilization.

The Wheeler national monument is near Wagon Wheel Gap

station on the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad in California, near the summit of the continental divide, at an elevation of 11,500 feet. The fantastic forms, resulting from the erosion of rock and soil, make the spot of exceptional beauty. The numerous winding canyons and pinnacles form striking picturesque effects such as are seldom found elsewhere. Historic interest attaches to the place because an expedition led by General John C. Fremont was overtaken by disaster in that immediate vicinity. Skeletons of mules, bits of harness and camp equipage have been discovered near the spot. The Devil's Tower is a conspicuous landmark in the form of a monster obelisk, composed of lava and granite, rising 1,100 feet on the banks of the Belle Fourche river, in the Black Hills, in southeastern Wyoming. The obelisk is 376 feet wide at the top and 796 feet wide at the base. It is associated with many Indian legends and more than one fierce battle has been fought around it by the savages.

The Petrified Forest near Flagstaff, Arizona, is well known. It is a few miles from the tracks of the Sante Fe railroad and covers a large area which is strewn with the trunks and limbs of trees that have been turned into stone by some mysterious process of nature. It is unique among the freaks of nature.

Montezuma's Castle is an enormous ruin situated about 600 feet above the bed of a creek forty-eight miles south of Flagstaff, Arizona, and 125 miles north of Phoenix, Arizona. It contains twenty large and eight small rooms, besides a number of closets and alcoves evidently used for storerooms. What the original dimensions of the building were is purely conjectural, but the structure remaining measures forty-eight feet from the base to the summit, being five stories in height, and about one hundred feet long. Other ruins of smaller dimensions are found in the same locality which were built and occupied by an extinct race that had considerable knowledge of mechanics and an advanced civilization. When and how it vanished from the earth is unknown, but it is conceded by archæologists that this is the oldest ruin in the southwest and that it was deserted long before 1540, when Coronado made his expedition from the City of Mexico in search of the fabulous cities of Cibola.

El Moro, or Inscription Rock, is another important landmark, fifty-five miles east of the Zuni pueblo, and fifty miles south of the

Sante Fe road, near Wingate station. It is a quadrangular mass of white sandstone, nearly a mile in length and more than two hundred feet in height. Upon its weather-beaten surface are numerous inscriptions in Spanish, some of them deeply and beautifully engraved, and dated as far back as 1506. These inscriptions contain brief records of the visits of explorers and Spanish soldiers on the march of conquest, or early Franciscan friars penetrating the wilderness to convert the heathen. A special agent of the Land Office says that the Inscription Rock "is one of nature's most unique obelisks, wrapt in the profound silence of the desert. It is hard to realize that 500 years ago these same walls echoed the clank of steel harness and coats of mail and that with the implements of Spanish conquest the pathfinders of the new world were carving historic records upon the eternal rocks."

Chaco Canyon is another collection of cliff dwellings of great interest. Muir Woods is a wonderful natural forest in California. The Tuma Cacori national monument is the ruins of a church and monastery built by the Jesuit missionaries during the time of Spanish domination, two miles south of Tubar station near the Southern Pacific Railway in Arizona. The walls are of burnt brick twelve feet thick and only partially preserved. Portions of mural paintings still remain on the walls of the chancel.

The natural bridges in eastern Utah and north of the Navajo Indian Reservation are not accessible to the public because there are no roads to reach them, but that country is developing quite rapidly and means of transportation will ultimately be provided. The bridges are more lofty and have greater spans than any other natural bridges known to exist. Besides them the Natural Bridge of Virginia, which is associated in every child's history with an incident in the youth of George Washington, is a mere miniature. The Utah natural bridges were created by the erosion of streams which worked their way through them years ago. They have been seen and described by members of the Geological Survey, agents of the Land Office and other scientists, who estimate them as among the greatest wonders of the world.

The Lewis and Clark Cavern is a limestone cave of enormous dimensions, containing a number of large vaulted chambers. It is situated one mile from Limespur station on the Northern Pacific Railroad in Montana. It has two entrances which are about one

hundred yards apart in the walls of a deep canyon of the Jefferson river about five hundred feet below the rim and overlooks for a distance of fifty miles the trail of Lewis and Clark on their expedition to Oregon. The vaults of the cavern have never been fully explored, but those that are known are magnificently decorated with stalactites and stalagmites of great variety in size, form and color, similar to those of the Luray Caves of Virginia.

The area covered by the park system of the District of Columbia covers 773 acres, divided into 317 separate reservations, varying in size from 250 square feet to 301 acres. Of this area 117 plots of 361 acres are highly improved; 125 of 324 acres are partially improved, and eighty-seven of about eighty-eight acres remain unimproved. What is known as Potomac Park, west of the railroad embankment, contains a little more than three hundred acres exclusive of water surface.

In treating of this subject it is impossible to overlook the recent gift of Mrs. E. H. Harriman to the State of New York, of a tract of ten thousand acres of land and one million dollars cash for its improvement; and the accompanying gift of $1,625,000 cash from seventeen patriotic men and women of New York City to be used in purchasing adjoining land. The intention is to make a park sixty miles long, varying from 1,200 feet to twelve miles wide, upon the rim of the Palisades and along the west bank of the Hudson River from the boundary line of New Jersey to the city of Newburg, above West Point. It is understood also that the family of the late Abram S. Hewitt intend to make a similar gift of eight or ten thousand acres south of the boundary to the State of New Jersey, provided the legislature of that state makes an appropriation for its care and improvement. When this scheme is completed it will be in several respects the most notable playground in the world, embracing a total area of 45,000 acres along the bank of a great thoroughfare and immediately accessible to three or four million people.

The United States is beginning to take care of its property. Our people are beginning to realize the value of their possessions, and are providing for their care and protection. If the present administration's policy had been applied to the national domain fifty years ago it would have made an enormous difference in our national wealth, but it is more important to look after future conservation than to waste tears over what we have lost.