Reverend Daniel H. Barnes, the Reverend Jonathan B. Kidder, of New York, and the Reverend John O. Choules, of Newport, Rhode Island, formerly principal of an academy at Red Hook, Dutchess county, New York; known, also, as the author of the "History of Missions," and other publications.

In 1832 Mr. Maclay entered the freshman class of the University of the city of New York, and, after remaining at that institution four years, he graduated with the highest honorsthe valedictory to the graduating classes having been awarded to him by the faculty. At this time the professor, John Proudfit, being compelled to visit Europe for his health, directed Mr. Maclay, with the approbation of the Faculty of Science and Letters, to act as Professor of the Latin Language and of Literature during his absence. Mr. Maclay was then but twenty-two years of age.

While a student at the University, he was chosen president of one of the two literary societies connected with it, and appears to have evinced a lively interest both in the exercises and welfare of these nurseries of youthful talent. In 1838 he was elected a member of the Council, or Board of Trustees of the University, and also its Secretary, in which honorable connection with this institution he still continues. In 1836 he was associated with J. N. M'Elligott and M. Weed in the publication of the New York Quarterly Magazine, as one of its edit

ors.

While a student, he appears to have cherished the hope of seeing a periodical established in the city of New York which should take higher rank, and be distinguished by a more elabo rate and scientific character, than is compatible with a daily, or even a monthly publication. He seems to have had in view a periodical, under the immediate auspices of the University, known by some name which should indicate a connection with it, but still more so by the contribution of articles on the part of its professors and friends. The project was, however, abandoned after a careful consideration of all the difficulties which attended its execution,

The article on the sun's rays, contributed by Professor Draper to one of the publications of the National Institute, exhibits, in a striking manner, the beneficial influence which such a

mode of communication with the reading public as that contemplated by Mr. Maclay, exercises.

No effort of the mind of the scholar or the devotee of science, however painfully made, is lost, for a mirror is at hand in which it is faithfully reflected. The standard of taste is elevated, and the public mind withdrawn from the fugitive literature of the day, to correct models and to the contemplation of mind in its noblest exercise, revealing to other minds new views of our intellectual and moral nature.

In the conduct of the magazine already mentioned, much of the labor devolved upon Mr. Maclay. We have been informed by one of his intimate friends, that, out of four hundred and eighty-six pages, the number comprised in the magazine for 1837, not less than two hundred and seventy-five were contributed either directly or indirectly by himself. The articles known to be from his pen are varied both in regard to their subject and merit. Among them are reviews of Jones's Excursion to Jerusalem, Cairo, Damascus, &c.-of Lockhart's Life of Sir Walter Scott-The Religious Opinions of Washington -The Duchess de la Valliere, by Bulwer-The Great Metropolis Characteristics of Woman, by Mrs. Emerson-Robert Hall, &c., &c.

The following introduction to the review of the memoirs of Sir Walter Scott, strikes us as very natural and appropriate :

"Biography yields to no other species of composition in interest and instruction. More especially is it true when the subjects of which it treats are the struggles and vicissitudes of a life devoted to the pursuits of literature.

"There is a pleasure of the purest kind in observing the gradual development of thought and refinement of expression in one who, smitten with a love of the good and the beautiful, desirous to leave something behind him less perishable than his tombstone, has 'scorned delights and lived laborious days.' No one can read these memoirs of Sir Walter Scott, so long and so anxiously expected, without feeling this pleasure, and without deriving from them that instruction which might not be received from the perusal of less interesting works. In our judg ment, not the least important lesson which these memoirs teach is the advantage, or, rather, the necessity, which there is of having some profession less precarious than that of literature, upon VOL. I.-N

which the child of genius can fall back for comfort or support in the hour when Adversity clouds the lights which Hope hung up in the uncertain future. Had this stay been possessed by Burns and Savage, the one would not have been Scotland's shame as well as glory, nor would the other have been driven into those practices to which he has alluded with such pathos in the solemn scenes of 'The Wanderer :'

"Oh, let none censure, if untried by grief;

Which then, e'en then, he scorned, and blushed to name.'

Neither the limits nor the design of our work will enable us to furnish as extensive extracts as we could desire, or as, indeed, are essential to present a faithful portraiture of the mind of Mr. Maclay. We must, therefore, content ourselves with a few extracts from his reviews of Mrs. Jameson's Characteristics of the Women of Shakspeare, and even these we must confine to the characters of Juliet and Lady Macbeth:

"There are few commentators on the text of Shakspeare," he says, "who have given more pleasure, and (we may add with equal truth) more instruction, than Mrs. Jameson. We had thought that the subject had been exhausted; but she has unfolded it in fuller aspects and in fairer lights.'. Many of her thoughts upon the female characters of Shakspeare are strikingly original; and even when we meet those which our own reflections, or the observations of preceding commentators have rendered familiar, we find them bodied forth in those bright images that make this whole volume

"A perpetual feast of nectared sweets,
Where no crude surfeit reigns.'

What, for instance, can be finer than the paragraph in which, refuting the arguments of those who contend that no pulse of affection for the fair Ophelia beat in the breast of Hamlet, she shows that this affection existed, but in subservience to the stronger desire of avenging a 'most unnatural murder ;' so that Hamlet, in pushing aside his love in order not to be interrupted in his purposed vengeance, resembled that judge of the Areopagus who, being occupied with graver matters, flung from him the little bird which had sought refuge in his bosom, and with such angry violence that he killed it?

"Of the character of Juliet, the author speaks in language which must be true, or there is no reliance on the history and our own observations of the human affections. Many have condemned the sentiments to which the balcony scenes give rise, or, rather, the language in which those sentiments are clothed, as extravagant; yet, under what sky has not love protested that the sun, and moon, and stars 'grew pale and sick with envy at the object of its idolatry? One of the profoundest critics upon Shakspeare (Schlegel) says that this censure originates in a fanciless way of thinking, to which every thing appears unnatural that does not suit its tame insipidity. Hence an idea has been formed of simple and natural pathos, which consists of exclamations destitute of imagery, and in nowise elevated above everyday life; but energetic passions electrify the whole mental powers, and will consequently, in highly-favored natures, express themselves in an ingenuous and figurative manner.

"The authoress has spared us the trouble of answering those over-delicate persons who hang their head when they read the fond adjuration, 'Come, night! come, Romeo!

"While upon the play of Romeo and Juliet, we may notice an observation of Bulwer's, to which it would be unnecessary to allude had it not the sanction of his name. Speaking of this play, he says, 'The wit of Mercutio is of so perfect a cast, that Shakspeare, unable to continue it, was compelled to put him to death in the third act.'

"Now we will not pretend to say what Shakspeare was or was not compelled to do; but it does appear to us that the death of Mercutio was intended, not to stop a flow of wit, difficult of continuance, but to advance the action of the play; it is, indeed, the hinge upon which the play turns. If Tybalt had not slain Mercutio, Romeo had not slain Tybalt; if Romeo had not slain Tybalt, Romeo had not been banished, and Juliet had not lain in the tomb of the Capulets.

"Mrs. Jameson has dedicated this work to Mrs. Butler, and this brings to our mind that lady's masterly impersonation of the part of Juliet. It was the character in which she won her first laurels, and has never been represented with equal ability upon the American stage. The harmonious utterance which wafted the verse, varied, but unbroken, to the ear, and the delicate modulations of the voice, which brought out with such

nicety the different, and, to a careless observer, almost imperceptible shades in the meaning of the part, constituted no small portion of the charm of the representation. Passages which are ordinarily omitted or slurred over-passages, however, that are to a performance what the foliage is to the tree, which, if it does not add to its strength, constitutes much of its beautywere, by the felicity with which they were pronounced, rendered even more effective than those in which an attempt is usually made to split the cars of the groundling.' How beautifully was the inclination of the confiding Juliet to hold her lover in converse expressed, when, recovering from the surprise into which she had been thrown by his unexpected appearance beneath the balcony, she archly asks,

"By whose directions found you out this place?'

And again, when imploring Romeo not to swear by the moon, how well was the conception of the poet illustrated by the reproachful glance cast at the planet, as she added,

"The inconstant moon,

That nightly changes in her circled orb!'

Who that has heard can ever forget the manner in which the question,

Speakest thou from thy heart?'

was put to the nurse, when that worthy personage counseled her to wed Paris? No sooner had the affirmative answer been given, than we perceive the die is cast. The tone of the actress, or, rather, the look which accompanied that tone, evinced that the ties (light as shreds of silk, but strong as bars of iron) which had bound Juliet to the old playmate of her childhood were severed forever, and that the heart, whose only pulse was love, was in future to be a sealed book to her former confidant, although the words had not yet been uttered—

"Thou and my bosom henceforth shall be twain.'

"Alas! that the power which can thus shed a rich illumination over the page of genius, should die with its possessor. Pity it is that the spell which entrances the hearts of thousands should so soon be broken! that the noblest triumphs achieved in the field opened up by the youngest of the sister arts' can not be perpetuated from age to age, but that, though as brilliant, they should be as unsubstantial as the dew-drops from the womb of the morning!