IONE L. JONES.

JONE ELIZABETH LUSK was born at Cox

family of six girls. Her mother, dreaming over her first child, used to wish there might be a writer in the family, and, as if in response to the unspoken desire, Ione began scribbling verses at an early age. She is person of warm sympathies, ready tact, possessing much of that charity which in the Book of books is writ "Love." In 1872 her parents removed to Catskill village, N. Y., and shortly after, Ione was married to G. Howard Jones, a young lawyer of that place, where, with their two children, aged nine and eleven, they now reside.

Mrs. Jones is one of the best of companions, possessing a keen and ready wit and a quiet sense of humor, appreciating all that is interesting in human life. From childhood she has indicated the possession of many gifts, and now uses pen, brush, and piano or violin (and housewifely broom,) with readiness. Her first verses were published in 1884, and though she has written chiefly in a lighter vein, some of her unpublished poems show deeper channels of thought which speak of wider scope for her future work.

HOME.

A MAN can build a mansion

And furnish it throughout;

A man can build a palace, With lofty walls and stout;

A man can build a temple,

E. F. B.

With high and spacious dome; But no man in the world can build That precious thing called Home.

It is the happy faculty

Of woman far and wide,

To turn a cot or palace

Into something else beside—

Where brothers, sons and husbands, tired,
With willing footsteps come;

A place of rest, where love abounds,
A perfect kingdom-Home.

MARCH.

BOLD March! Wild March!

Oh! you saucy fellow!

Even though your voice is rough. We know your heart is mellow.

Hush! You'll wake the children up,

Listen to the clatter!

Pink Arbutus stirs in bed
And wonders what's the matter.
All the icy fleets set free,
Down the streams are rushing;
Toward the everlasting sea
Wildly, madly pushing.

Blow, then, blow! Let them go!
Winter's reign is o'er, we know.

Up hill, down dale,

Over moor and mountain;

Shout and sing "Awake! 'Tis spring!"
Burst forth, O laughing fountain!
Bend, tall elms, your graceful heads!
Swing low, O weeping willows!
Stretch, little blades of grass; for March
Has come to air your pillows.
Arouse, O, Pine! Awaken Larch!

And greet spring's trumpeter-brave March.

A SPRING IDYL.

FAIR young mother, with children three,
What may the names of your jewels be?
Whisper, I pray, the secret to me.

My first-born treasure is brave and bold,
Warlike and blustering. In him behold
March, my soldier! in pride be it told.

Fickle and wild, running over with fun,
Her tears born of rain-drops, her smiles of the sun,
Is dear little April-my sweet, wayward one.

Enshrouded in flowers from her head to her feet,
Comes my own dainty darling in contentment

sweet

May. Of all blessings, my own most complete.

And the fair young mother, on time's swift wing, With her jewels so rare, passed on; and the ring Of their footfalls was all that was left me of Spring.

A NOVEMBER DAY.

A DAMP gray blanket hides the mountain's blue, The day is sad and long;

The East Wind blows no hint of sunshine through, And hushed the wild bird's song.

Brown leaves are prest against the pavements wet,

O'er which, with cumbrous tread

The coal man, with his load on shoulder set,
Goes to and from the shed.

Ah, doleful noises, mist and falling leaves, I turn me from the pane:

Her passing scepter sobbing Fall bereaves, And Winter wails again.

Blaze thou! and warm my saddened heart, O fire, Light up this shadowy room;

With books, and friends, and logs piled high and higher,

Let old King Winter come.

SONNET-A KINDLY LOOK.

A KINDLY look, a word of commendation,
A sympathetic pressure of the hand;

A smile to those who journey o'er the land
Aweary of life's toil and degredation,

While struggling on 'gainst trials and temptation,
Give thou, O brother. For the Father planned
That we should love all men. Heed His com-
mand,

And pour into these sad hearts consolation.
Grim poverty thou sufferest not; ah! then
Have mercy on the poor, for deep their woe.
Let gentle pity plead for fallen men,

For reclaimed sinners shall be white as snow. And may God's blessings rest upon thee, when And where thy ministering footsteps go.

BE PREPARED.

No door so thick, no bolt so strong,
No tower so high, no wall so long,

But that Death enters in at last. Then watch with care; repent thy sin, Lest unaware he enters in

When time for penitence is past.

LIFE.

When I'am a man

Sings the sweet voice of boyhood-
When I'am a man. O, when! O, when!
From the grave future

Rings manhood's clear echo

If I were young again, then. O, Then!

-Life.

WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS.

WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS was born in

a suburb of Dublin, on the 13th of June, 1865. His birthplace, the residence of his father's uncle, was a quaint, castellated house, in a park full of beautiful forest trees, and containing within its limits a lake and an island. Here the future poet's childhood was spent in part, and it was an ideal home for a dreamy imaginative child. It was an intellectual centre in its day.

Mr. Yeats' father is an artist, who having been at the Bar for some years and with great distinction, gave up the profession, where he was safe to gain honor and wealth, for Art, in the following of which he has no doubt been happier, for he is a born artist. Springing from a very ancient and distinguished family he married the daughter of a race of English settlers in Ireland,-people who have brought with their English blood certain honorable qualities of seriousness, of determination, of mercantile probity and mercantile success, to add on to the Celtic qualities gained by intermarriage with the fascinating Irish. Of this marriage there are two daughters and a son, besides the poet, who is the eldest born.

Mr. Yeats was at school in London and Dublin. He did not enter a university, and curiously enough, his first bias was for scientific pursuits,-it must have been for those things which appeal to the faculty of wonder. However, he soon turned to poetry, pure and simple, and though his performance as an art student promised great things, he has rather neglected art for poetry. He dreamed away his later boyhood a good deal, which perhaps was wise, for he is of delicate physique. His first poetry published was in the Dublin University Review, and excited wide-spread interest. In the present year he has published a volume of poems, which has at once given him a position; it has been received as the work of a new poet promising great things by all the important London reviews. At present he is editing some of the Camelot Classics; his "Irish Fairy and Folk Lore" has appeared, and it is to my mind, the best edited of the whole series. He is engaged also on literary work for many magazines and newspapers. His is a subtle genius, rejoicing in the strange and the exotic, but withal, having such a virile quality behind it, such a faculty of delight in the deeds of heroes, that he will be saved from the pitfalls of those who seek the marvellous. In looks Mr. Yeats is as picturesque as one could desire,-hair, beard, and beautiful eyes of a southern darkness, with a face of a fine oval, and a clear, dusky color. Nature has written the poet upon his face. And his poetry is enhanced in beauty if read to you by his own voice, which has a thousand qualities of richness, of softness, and of flexibility. K. T.

KANVA, THE INDIAN, ON GOD.

I PASSED along the water's edge below the humid trees,

My spirit rocked in evening's hush, the rushes round my knees,

My spirit rocked in sleep and sighs; and saw the moorfowl pace

All dripping on a grassy slope, and saw them cease to chase

Each other round in circles; and I heard the eldest speak:

"Who holds the world between His bill and makes us strong or weak

Is an undying moorfowl, and He lives beyond the sky,

The rains are from His dripping wing, the moonbeams from His eye."

I passed a little further on and heard a lotus talk:

"Who made the world and ruleth it, He hangeth on a stalk,