A great deal of thought has gone into making the building both inviting and enlightening for its diminutive clientele. There is a playground fenced off at the back, with a fairy fountain and several benches which, when the newly planted trees mature, will be pleasantly shady in the summer. On the lintel of each of the arched windows the letters of the alphabet are carved in the shape of fantastical animals. Inside, the floors are hard-wearing wood, the walls plastered and brightly painted with alphabets and numerals. The rooms are spacious and bright; the chairs and sofas strewn around are comfortable though upholstered in durable fabric with mounds of cushions; and enticing little corners, too, for those in search of solitude. The bookshelves are consciously pitched at child-friendly heights, with the simplest texts on the bottom shelves. There are practical amenities, too, where the children can bathe, eat heartily, and even take a nap.

The Sanctuary is open to every and any child. No questions are asked, no judgments made. The only rule is that kindness is to be both dispensed and received. The primary aim of the Sanctuary is not to educate or improve morals, but to provide first, much needed relief and second hope. Such aims, New Yorkers may think, sound laudable, yet Lady Margaret, the champion of this excellent cause, struggled to interest any of our great Metropolis’s philanthropists in it. A true Scotswoman, she stubbornly refused to give up the fight, and her grit and determination eventually won her the sympathetic ear of an anonymous donor.

Many hundreds of people amassed yesterday in the bright morning sunshine for the opening of the facility. They were mostly children and their mothers, but there were some fathers, too. While the Herald was given privileged access to the Sanctuary before opening day, reporters from other newspapers and journals were forced to jostle for position with their cameras on the sidewalk. Two notable exceptions were made in Mrs. Jane Croly, better known as the writer Jenny June, and Miss Mary Louise Booth, editor of Harper’s Bazar. Both ladies enjoy long-standing friendship with Lady Margaret, an author of some note herself. Having seen the completed Sanctuary, these ladies of the press have sworn to laud it lavishly in their journals in the hope of engaging their hitherto uninterested readers.

The ceremony itself was brief, with Lady Margaret doing little more than warmly thanking her benefactor and declaring the facility open. There was a great deal of cheering and applause when she cut the ribbon, and a spontaneous chorus of “Happy birthday, Lady Margaret,” it being, serendipitously, twenty-five years since the day of her birth. Then without any more ado, the double doors were thrown wide and the children stampeded through, some laughing and shouting, others glancing over their shoulders to their parents for permission, still others hanging back until Lady Margaret coaxed them in with her generous smile and the offer of cake.