M

ALEXANDER MACAULEY.

R. MACAULEY was born in the year 1844 in Rochester, N. Y. Most of his life has been devoted to business, not only in Rochester, but in Detroit, Mich., where he resided for twenty years. Aside from his business career Mr. Macauley has spent not a few leisure hours in writing for the press. He has written for Theodore Tilton's Golden Age, the New York Sunday Sun, Independent, Interior, Current and other publications. At school he was noted for his scholarly mathematical productions and also excelled in algebra. It was a delight in those early days, for him to labor untiringly over some difficult problem until its solution was successfully accomplished. Mr. Macauley has always been a great reader of both prose and poetry. He once said, "I consider my favorite authors much like Southey when he writes:

'My never-failing friends are they

With whom I converse day by day.'"

He has always been a devoted admirer of the opera and drama, and spends many enjoyable hours listening to some of the best talent in the country. He now resides in Rochester. H.A. K.

THE TELL-TALE WATER.

As he stooped to dip from the crystal spring (Which like a mirror shone beneath their gaze) Some water for the fair one lingering

So closely at his side, to his amaze, He saw a look reflected from her face Which he had thought would never find a place

Within its lineaments: a look of love

So deep, so earnest, so unmistakable In all its bearings, so ineffably above

All other looks that ever from her fell, He dropped the half-raised goblet in the stream, A moment standing as in blissful dream,

Then, turning, held her close till he had won
From her coy lips their own most sweet confession
How long the course of her true love did run
Ere tell-tale water caught her fond expression,
And gave her, half reluctant, to a lover
Who ne'er before her preference could discover.

THE TORNADO.

It came like the flash of a scimitar's blade
In the hand of stout Moslem just ready to slay,
And the wail of the victim ere low he is laid

Resembled the cry which arose on that day,

337

When right over their heads frightened people did

see

The most terrible cloud that e'er darkened the earth,

And the way they did shout, and the way they did flee,

One could not but think of the judgment-day's birth.

Who will picture the scene when the whirlwind is spent,

And tell of the woe and despiar that were there? How a mother in agony o'er her child bent,

Too stricken for tears and too palsied for prayer, How speak of the houseless and homeless who stand Bewailing their loss in such pitiful tones That sympathy's tears have a power to command An expression of sorrow even from stones.

RIZPAH.

WITH staff in hand, stern Rizpah dauntless stands
To guard the bodies of her sons, who, slain
For sacrifice, now hang upon the plain

In ghastly form, a terror to all lands.
Mute, prayerful, watchful, as if mighty bands
Of robbers girt her like a giant chain,

She backward drives the birds and beasts again, By wondrous power and might of eyes and hands. Rizpah! thy name comes blazoned through long

years

For showing all the strength and fearlessness
A mother can bestow upon her own,
To guard from foul disgrace. Yet not the less
Methinks e'en in this time and temperate zone
Would every mother shield her sons from stress
Of evil, 'till soul and body's strength were gone.

THE SONNET.

I LIKE the sonnet, for its length is right
To say exactly what one has to say;
And in such brief, sententious kind of way
As makes the meaning clear, even as light
It is a kingdom in itself; as bright

And glorious as a beauteous morn of May
Just on the verge of June, and its array
Is all complete as that of mailéd knight.

So do I love to list to Shakespeare's voice
When he unfolds the burden of his care,
Or Milton when he bids free souls rejoice
And bloody tyrants ever to beware,
Or Wordsworth, Coleridge, Shelley, Keats,
In whom high art with noble genius meets.

JUNE.

WHO does not love the golden month of June,
To bask within the sunshine of her smile,
Perchance reclining on a bank the while,
With ear attent to nature's various tune?
And is not this to o'er-wrought souls a boon
Beyond all price? Thus sorrow we beguile,
Forgotten, too, the pleasures that defile
And stain out noble manhood all too soon.

For now has nature donned her royal dress, And shines resplendent as divinest queen, Who beams on all around her loveliness,

Eager for glory, anxious to be seen. And I would on her face untiring gaze, While linger yet fair June's delicious days.

CLEOPATRA.

DEATH lurked within the velvet of her cheek,
And in the myriad tangles of her hair,
And in her eyes which drew men to despair,
And on her lips whose thrill made strong men weak;
Yea, all the honeyed accents she did speak
To men death-laden were; but unaware,
Enrapt they listened, heeding not the snare
Which caught their manhood in wild passion's freak.

Brave Antony! whene'er I pause to think

Of all thou wert and all thou might'st have been, Thy soul enmeshed and ever on the brink

Of cureless woe thus bound to Egypt's queen, From tears of pity I can scarce refrain, That in her arms did melt such soul and brain.

INTIMATIONS OF SPRING.

TO-DAY the ground is cold, and hard, and bare,
And scarce is seen a slender blade of grass;
The trees show leafless branches as you pass,
And flowers lie withered in the frosty air.
But, somehow, nature seems to be aware
'Tis time for spring, and dimly, as in glass,
The practised eye discerns a varied mass
That for glad springtime hastens to prepare.

So when the winter of our lives has sped,
And we are longing for eternal spring,
A thousand gentle influences are shed,

And wafted toward us as on angel's wing, To fit us for the land where dwell the dead After their days of early blossoming.

RETURN OF THE PRODIGAL.

AWAY in Eastern land, a day of peace,
Serene with beauty, hastens to its close;
And while the blessed light yet strongly lingers,
A father's watchful eyes have caught the likeness,
Yet vague and indistinct, of his lost son,
Coming in dire distress, in want and woe.
He runs to meet the prodigal, and falls
Upon his neck, nor heeding dirt nor filth,
And kisses him again, and yet again,
Until the wanderer's soul dissolves in tears.
No word of harsh complaint the father speaks,
But still renewedly exclaims in voice
Of most exquisite tenderness and love:
"Welcome, my son! a thousand welcomes back
To this thy home, which ever was and shall be
While I live. For know my house seemed ever
Bare and comfortless without thee; but now
Thou'rt come again, it is transformed to what
It was so many weary years ago,

When, in the hot impatience of thy youth,
Thou didst demand thy portion of our goods."
Such cheering words to him the father speaks,
And straightway leads him to his long-lost home,
Whose very doors obey the magic of

His presence, and of themselves wide open stand.
Such feasting and rejoicing as were there
I ween this world has scarcely seen eclipsed.
The elder brother, stung with hate at first,
At length joins in the revelry, and all
Is gay with choral song and merry dance.
The fatted calf is slain, and Envy gnaws
Its lips in mute despair to see such mirth
Unmixed with base alloy, but full and free
As is the mighty ocean, fathomless

As water whose depths only can be guessed!
And oh, what waves of bliss come o'er the soul,
To know that all the joy herein expressed
But faintly shadows forth the joy in heaven
Over one sinner who returns to God!

LIFE'S INTERCHANGE.

IN every joy there lurks a sorrow; In every pleasure bides a pain; Mirth to-day will fly to-morrow; The Proteus like appear again.

What if there were ceaseless pleasure
To intoxicate thy brain?

We should sink 'neath life's full measure,
And call the sweeter blessing pain.

O fool, in vain

May stretch and strain

Laocoon in sweat and pain!

Far better play

At liberty,

And dream we choose the escapeless way!

DAUGHTERS OF TOIL.

O, PALE with want and still despair, And faint with hastening others' gain, Whose finely fibred natures bear

The double curse of work and pain ; Whose days are long with toil unpaid,

And short to meet the crowding want; Whose nights are short for rest delayed, And long for stealthy fears to haunt

To whom my lady, hearing faint

The distance-muffled cry of need, Grants, through some alms-dispensing saint, The cup of water, cold indeed, The while my lord, pursuing gains Amid the market's sordid strife, With wageless labor from your veins Wrings out the warm, red wine of life,—

What hope for you that better days

Shall climb the yet unreddened east? When famine in the morning slays,

Why look for joy at midday feast? Far shines the good, and faintly throws A doubtful gleam through mist and rain ; But evil darkness presses close

His face against the window pane.

What hope for you that mansions free
Await in some diviner sphere,
Whose sapphire walls can never be
Devoured, like widows' houses here?
Too close these narrow walls incline,

This slender daylight beams too pale, For Heaven's all-loving warmth to shine, Or God's blue tenderness avail.

O brothers, sisters, who would fain
Some balm of healing help apply,
Cheer some one agony of pain,

One note of some despairing cry— Whose good designs uncertain wait,

By tangled social bands perplexed, Oh, read the sacred sentence straight; Do justly first-love mercy next!

No longer blooms in field or meadow sere,
Bright golden rod; nor in sweet rhythm swells
From full-leaved woods and hidden fairy dells,
The song of birds which lately filled the air.
But drest in all their heavenly hue, appear

The gentians blue, and, like sad funeral bells,
I hear the falling leaves, in awful knells,
Toll out the death of one more lovely year.
Break, break, sad heart, for with this year's decease
Is linked the death of my sweet love, and how
Can I in all this stillness, find the peace

Which Nature grants to those who humbly bow Before her throne? Sweet love, I ne'er shall cease To mourn the death of this fond year, I trow.

ROSALIND.

As often, on a quiet summer's day,

A silvery cloud floats multiform on high Across the wearying azure of the sky, Delaying but a bit, and then is gone away; So dost thou, lovely creature, play

In Arden's tiresome glades, and multiply
Thyself into a hundred forms that try
Thy lover's patience almost to dismay.

Though thou art playful, yet thou could'st be proud;
Though proud, yet tender still thou art;
Though prone to mischief, yet not over-loud
In all thy mirth. Thou art the counterpart
Of that light, fleecy cloud-but like the cloud,
Thou dost too soon from my fond gaze depart.

THEISM.

A VIOLET up-springing from its humble sod,
Cried to an atheist: "Behold! There is a God;
And He is powerful, or else I would not be;
Wise, or less wonderful would He have fashioned me;
Good, or I were not so beautifully made."

The atheist believed; and bowed his head, and prayed.