BY
Gertrude Atherton, Mary Austin
Geraldine Bonner, Mary Halleck Foote
Eleanor Gates, James Hopper, Jack London
Bailey Millard, Miriam Michelson, W. C. Morrow
Frank Norris, Henry Milner Rideout
Charles Warren Stoddard, Isobel Strong
Richard Walton Tully and
Herman Whitaker
With a dedicatory poem by
George Sterling
COLLECTED BY THE
BOOK COMMITTEE OF THE
SPINNERS' CLUB
Illustrated by
Lillie V. O'Ryan, Maynard Dixon
Albertine Randall Wheelan, Merle Johnson
E. Almond Withrow and Gordon Ross
Initials and decorations by
Spencer Wright
PAUL ELDER AND COMPANY
SAN FRANCISCO AND NEW YORK
Published in behalf
of The Spinners' Benefit Fund
Ina D. Coolbrith
First Beneficiary
———
Copyright, 1907
by Paul Elder and Company
TO INA D. COOLBRITH
With wilder sighing in the pine
The wind went by, and so I dreamed;
And in that dusk of sleep it seemed
A city by the sea was mine.
To statelier sprang the walls of Tyre
From seaward cliff or stable hill;
And light and music met to fill
The splendid courts of her desire—
(Extolling chords that cried her praise,
And golden reeds whose mellow moan
Was like an ocean's undertone
Dying and lost on forest ways).
But sweeter far than any sound
That rang or rippled in her halls,
Was one beyond her eastern walls,
By summer gardens girdled round.
Twas from a nightingale, and oh!
The song it sang hath never word!
Sweeter it seemed than Love's, first-heard,
Or lutes in Aidenn murmuring low.
Faint, as when drowsy winds awake
A sisterhood of faery bells,
It won reply from hidden dells,
Loyal to Echo for its sake....
I dreamt I slept, but cannot say
How many dreamland seasons fled,
Nor what horizon of the dead
Gave back my dream's uncertain day.
But still beside the toiling sea
I lay, and saw—for walls o'ergrown—
The city that was mine had known
Time's sure and ancient treachery.
Above her ramparts, broad as Tyre's,
The grasses' mounting army broke;
The shadow of the sprawling oak
Usurpt the splendor of her fires.
But o'er the fallen marbles pale
I heard, like elfin melodies
Blown over from enchanted seas,
The music of the nightingale.
George Sterling.
