Let us reduce all this to plain English, and we have- what? Why, a
flag, consisting of the "azure robe of night," "set with stars of
glory," interspersed with "streaks of morning light," relieved with
a few pieces of "milky way," and the whole carried by an "eagle
bearer," that is to say, an eagle ensign, who bears aloft this "symbol
of our chosen land" in his "mighty hand," by which we are to
understand his claw. In the second stanza, "the thunder-drum of
Heaven" is bathetic and grotesque in the highest degree- a commingling
of the most sublime music of Heaven with the most utterly contemptible
and common-place of Earth. The two concluding verses are in a better
spirit, and might almost be supposed to be from a different hand.
The images contained in the lines
When Death careering on the gale
Sweeps darkly round the bellied sail,
And frighted waves rush wildly back,
Before the broadsides reeling rack,
are of the highest order of Ideality. The deficiencies of the whole
poem may be best estimated by reading it in connection with "Scots wha
hae," with the "Mariners of England," or with "Hohenlinden." It is
indebted for its high and most undeserved reputation to our
patriotism- not to our judgment.
The remaining poems in Mr. Dearborn's edition of Drake, are three
Songs; Lines in an Album; Lines to a Lady; Lines on leaving New
Rochelle; Hope; A Fragment; To-; To Eva; To a Lady; To Sarah; and
Bronx.
Pages:
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56