{
 "id": "ambrose-bierce/the-mackaiad",
 "title": "The Mackaiad",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "Ambrose Bierce",
 "poet_slug": "ambrose-bierce",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Black Beetles in Amber",
 "book_slug": "black-beetles-in-amber",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 18,
 "container": "Black Beetles in Amber",
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1892,
  "venue": "Black Beetles in Amber (1892)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/blackbeetlesinam00bier"
  ]
 },
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  "repo": "standardebooks/ambrose-bierce_poetry",
  "file": "black-beetles-in-amber.xhtml",
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   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/12658",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/12977",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/15599",
   "https://archive.org/details/collectedworksof04bierrich",
   "https://archive.org/details/collectedworksof05bierrich",
   "https://archive.org/details/collectedworksof08bierrich",
   "https://archive.org/details/shapesofclay00bier",
   "https://archive.org/details/blackbeetlesinam00bier",
   "https://archive.org/details/literarycalifor05mighgoog",
   "https://archive.org/details/cali07webb"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20",
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    "date": "2026-08-20"
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 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 91,
  "n_stanzas": 6,
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  "longest_line_chars": 51,
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 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Mackay’s hot wrath to Bonynge, direful spring",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of blows unnumbered, heavenly goddess, sing⁠—",
    "indent": 3
   },
   {
    "text": "That wrath which hurled to Hellman’s office floor",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Two heroes, mutually smeared with gore,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Whose hair in handfuls marked the dire debate,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And riven coat-tails testified their hate.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Sing, muse, what first their indignation fired,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "What words augmented it, by whom inspired.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "First, the great Bonynge comes upon the scene",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And asks the favor of the British Queen.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Suppliant he stands and urges all his claim:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His wealth, his portly person and his name,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His habitation in the setting sun,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As child of nature; and his suit he won.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "No more the Sovereign, wearied with his plea,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From slumber’s chain her faculties can free.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Low and more low the royal eyelids creep,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "She gives the assenting nod and falls asleep.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Straightway the Bonynges all invade the Court",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And telegraph the news to every port.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Beneath the seas, red-hot, the tidings fly,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The cables crinkle and the fishes fry!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The world, awaking like a startled bat,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Exclaims: “A Bonynge? What the devil’s that?”",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Mackay, meanwhile, to envy all attent,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Untaught to spare, unable to relent,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Walks in our town on needles and on pins,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And in a mean, revengeful spirit⁠—grins!",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Sing, muse, what next to break the peace occurred⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "What act uncivil, what unfriendly word?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The god of Bosh ascending from his pool,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Where since creation he has played the fool,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Clove the blue slush, as other gods the sky,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And, waiting but a moment’s space to dry,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Touched Bonynge with his finger-tip. “O son,”",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "He said, “alike of nature and a gun,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Knowest not Mackay’s insufferable sin?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Hast thou not heard that he doth stand and grin?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Arise! assert thy manhood, and attest",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The uncommercial spirit in thy breast.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Avenge thine honor, for by Jove I swear",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thou shalt not else be my peculiar care!”",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "He spake, and ere his worshiper could kneel",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Had dived into his slush pool, head and heel.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Full of the god and to revenges nerved,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And conscious of a will that never swerved,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Bonynge set sail: our world beyond the wave",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As gladly took him as the other gave.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "New York received him, but a shudder ran",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Through all the western coast, which knew the man;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And science said that the seismic agitation",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Was due to mutable equilibration.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "O goddess, sing what Bonynge next essayed.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Did he unscabbard the avenging blade,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The long spear brandish and porrect the shield,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Havoc the town and devastate the field?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His sacred thirst for blood did he allay",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "By halving the unfortunate Mackay?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Small were the profit and the joy to him",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To hew a base-born person, limb from limb.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Let vulgar souls to low revenge incline,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That of diviner spirits is divine.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Bonynge at noonday stood in public places",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And (with regard to the Mackays) made faces!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Before those formidable frowns and scowls",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The dogs fled, tail-tucked, with affrighted howls,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And horses, terrified, with flying feet",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "O’erthrew the apple-stands along the street,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Involving the metropolis in vast",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Financial ruin! Men themselves, aghast,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Retreated east and west and north and south",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Before the menace of that twisted mouth,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Till Jove, in answer to their prayers, sent Night",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To veil the dreadful visage from their sight!",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Such were the causes of the horrid strife⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The mother-wrongs which nourished it to life.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "O, for a quill from an archangel’s wing!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "O, for a voice that’s adequate to sing",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The splendor and the terror of the fray,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The scattered hair, the coat-tails all astray,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The parted collars and the gouts of gore",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Reeking and smoking on the banker’s floor,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The interlocking limbs, embraces dire,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Revolving bodies and deranged attire!",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Vain, vain the trial: ’tis vouchsafed to none",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To sing two millionaires rolled into one!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "My hand and pen their offices refuse,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And hoarse and hoarser grows the weary muse.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Alone remains, to tell of the event,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Abandoned, lost and variously rent,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The Bonynge nethermost habiliment.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}