(1795-1820)
[Illustration: JOSEPH RODMAN DRAKE]
Conspicuous among the young poets, essayists, and journalists, who
made up literary New York in the early part of the century, was Joseph
Rodman Drake, the friend of Halleck, and the best beloved perhaps of
all that brilliant group. Hardly known to this generation save by
'The Culprit Fay' and 'The American Flag,' Drake was essentially
a true poet and a man of letters. His work was characteristic of
his day. He had a certain amount of classical knowledge, a certain
eighteenth-century grace and style, yet withal, an instinctive
Americanism which flowered out into our first true national
literature. The group of writers among whom were found Irving,
Halleck, Willis, Dana, Hoffman, Verplanck, Brockden Brown, and a
score of others, reflected that age in which they sought their
literary models. With the exception of Poe, who belonged to a somewhat
later time and whose genius was purely subjective, much of the
production of these Americans followed the lines of their English
predecessors,--Johnson, Goldsmith, Addison, and Steele. It is only in
their deeper moments of thought and feeling that there sounds that
note of love of country, of genuine Americanism, which gives their
work individuality, and which will keep their memory green.
Drake was born in New York, in August 1795. He was descended from the
same family as the great admiral of Elizabethan days, the American
branch of which had served their country honorably both in colonial
and Revolutionary times. The scenes of his boyhood were the same as
those that formed the environment of Irving, memories of which are
scattered thick through the literature of the day. New York was still
a picturesque, hospitable, rural capital, the centre of the present
town being miles distant in the country. The best families were all
intimately associated in a social life that was cultivated and refined
at the same time that it was gay and unconventional; and in this
society Drake occupied a place which his lovable qualities and fine
talents must have won, even had it been denied him by birth. He was a
precocious boy, for whom a career was anticipated by his friends while
he was yet a mere child; and when he met Halleck, in his eighteenth
year, he had already won some reputation.
The friendship of Drake and Halleck was destined to prove infinitely
valuable to both. A discussion between Cooper, Halleck, and Drake,
upon the poetic inspiration of American scenery, prompted Drake to
write 'The Culprit Fay'--a poem without any human character. This he
completed in three days, and offered it as the argument on his side.
The scene of the poem is laid in the Highlands of the Hudson, but
Drake added many pictures suggested by memories of Long Island Sound,
whose waters he haunted with boat and rod. He apologized for this by
saying that the purposes of poetry alone could explain the presence so
far up the Hudson of so many salt-water emigrants. 'The Culprit Fay'
is a creation of pure fancy, full of delicate imagery, and handled
with an ethereal lightness of touch. Its exquisite grace, its delicate
coloring, its prodigality of charm, explain its immediate popularity
and its lasting fame. But the Rip Van Winkle legend is a far more
genuine product of fancy.
Drake's few shorter lyrics throb with genuine poetic feeling, and show
the loss sustained by literature in the author's early death. Best
known of these is 'The American Flag,' which appeared in the Evening
Post as one of a series of _jeux d'esprit_, the joint productions of
Halleck and Drake, who either alternated in the composition of the
numbers or wrote them together. The last four lines only of 'The
American Flag' are Halleck's. The entire series appeared between March
and July, 1819, under the signature of "The Croakers." Literary New
York was mystified as to the authorship of these skits, which hit off
the popular fads, follies, and enthusiasms of the day with so easy and
graceful a touch. Politics, music, the drama, and domestic life alike
furnished inspiration for the numbers; some of whose titles, as 'A
Sketch of a Debate in Tammany' and 'The Battery War,' suggest the
local political issues of the present day. There is now in existence a
handsome edition of these verses, with the names of the authors of the
several pieces appended, and in the case of the joint ownership with
the initials D. and H. subscribed.
Drake's complete poems were not published during his lifetime. Sixteen
years after his death by consumption in his twenty-sixth year, his
daughter issued a volume dedicated to Halleck, in which were included
the best specimens of her father's work. Many of the lesser known
verses indicate his true place as a poet. In the touching poem
'Abelard to Eloise,' in the third stanza of 'The American Flag,' and
in innumerable beautiful lines scattered throughout his work, appears
a genuine inspiration.
In his own day, Drake filled a place which his death left forever
vacant. His rare and winning personality, his generous friendships,
his joy in life, and his courage in the contemplation of his
inevitable fate, still appeal to a generation to whom they are but
traditions. The exquisite monody in which Halleck celebrated his loss,
links their names and decorates their friendship with imperishable
garlands.