d
unnumbered rolling hills covered with virgin forests, it is but natural
that the birds should congregate in great numbers, reveling in the
solitude which man invariably destroys.

HELEN BINGHAM,
in _In Tamal Land._

THE ABALONE.

I saw a rainbow, for an instant, gleam,
On the west edge of a receeding swell;
The next soft surge,
Which whispering sought the shore,
Swept to my feet an abalone shell;
It was the rainbow I had seen before.

JOHN E. RICHARDS,
in _Idylls of Monterey._

SEPTEMBER 29.

THE SEAGULL.

A ceaseless rover, waif of many climes,
He scorns the tempest, greets the lifting sun
With wings that fling the light and sinks at times
To ride in triumph where the tall waves run.

The rocks tide-worn, the high cliff brown and bare
And crags of bleak, strange shores he rests upon;
He floats above, a moment hangs in air
Clean-etched against the broad, gold breast of dawn.

Bold hunter of the deep! Of thy swift flights
What of them all brings keenest joy to thee--
To drive sharp pinions through storm-beaten nights,
Or shriek amid black hollows of the sea?

HERBERT BASHFORD,
in _At the Shrine of Song._

SEPTEMBER 30.

TO A SEA GULL AT SEA.

Thou winged Wonder!
Tell me I pray thy matchless craft,
Poised in air, then slipping wave-ward,
Mounting again like an arrow-shaft,
Circling, swaying, wheeling, dipping,
All with never a flap of wing,
Keeping pace with my flying ship here,
Give me a key to my wondering!
Gales but serve thee for swifter flying,
Foam crested waves with thy wings thou dost sweep,
Wonderful dun-colored, down-covered body,
Living thy life on the face of the deep!

ANNIE W. BRIGMAN.

OCTOBER 1.

THE PASSING OF SUMMER.

She smiled to the hearts that enshrined her,
Then the gold of her banner unfurled
And trailing her glories behind her
Passed over the rim of the world.

HARLEY R. WILEY,
in _New England Magazine, October_, 1906.

The California condor, the largest of all flying birds, is found only
on this coast and only in the southern half of that, although an
occasional specimen has been seen in the high Sierra Neveda. Of all the
sailing or soaring birds he is the most graceful and wonderful,
drifting to and fro, up and down, right or left, in straight lines or
curves, for hours at a time, darting like an arrow or hanging still in
air with equal ease on tha