have quoted in the preceding number, that the Editor may, if so inclined, reach that station which death alone prevented his able and amiable coadjutor from attaining.

It shall now, therefore, be my pleasing duty to select, as evidence which may substantiate the praise I have bestowed, as many of the passages thus alluded to, as the limits of my paper will allow; and in doing this, it is my wish, having already given some beautiful specimens of the Editor's poetical powers, to bring forward, in the first place, those parts of the poem which, either from what has been said in the Advertisement, or casually dropped in the Notes, may, with some degree of certainty, be attributed to the pen of Mr. Eastburn. In the first canto of "Yamoyden" a picture of Aquetnet, or Rhode-Island, and the opposite shore of Pocasset, is touched with great sweetness and grace. As the poem was avowedly suggested and commenced by Mr. Eastburn, and his friend informs us, that with the fourth stanza he has introduced some verses relating to the previous history of the Indian wars, we may safely ascribe the lines preceding this stanza to the original projector of the work. [Here the same quotation is given, which was made in our Review of Yamoyden' No. 5 of the Repository, commencing:] The morning air was freshly breathing,

The morning mists were wildly wreathing,' [&c.]

In the second canto, which paints in very vivid and pathetic colours the conjugal affection of Yamoyden and Nora, and the despair of the latter in being forcibly carried off with her infant from her cottage during the absence of her husband, we are introduced, for the first time, to some lyrical effusions, a mode of giving variety to the fable to which the authors have frequently had recourse in the subsequent portions of the work. Of these productions, whose spirit of poetry is such as uniformly to do credit to the writers, one has been acknowledged by the Editor as inserted since the death of his friend; and of the remainder, there are three, written in the same metre, which, from an allusion in the notes with regard to one of them, I am inclined to attribute to Mr. Eastburn. The first of these which I shall copy, is founded on a superstition still cherished by the present race of Indians called Creeks, who believe, that in the vast lake from which issues the river St. Mary, and which occupies a circuit of near three hundred miles, there is, among the many islands with which it abounds, one which may be justly termed a paradise on earth. [Note to Canto II. from Bertram's Travels.]-How

beautifully Mr. Eastburn has availed himself of this superstition, will be seen in the following lines, which are supposed to be sung by Nora, in order to soothe her sorrows in parting, under circumstances of danger and apprehension, with her beloved Yamoyden.

[The five stanzas, commencing:-)

"They say that afar in the land of the west.' [&c.]

I shall now, as forming a striking contrast with these lines, insert the comparison which Mr. Eastburn has very ably drawn between the genius and character of Philip of Pokanoket and the late Emperor of France. It is a noble tribute to the heroism, the patriotism, and unsubdued energy of the American chieftain, and one which places him in the light in which, there is little doubt, he will be considered by every future bard and historian. It is a specimen, also, of the spirited and harmonious construction of the metre in which the greater part of the poem is written, and must consequently impress on the mind of the reader a very high opinion of the talents which could, at so early an age as that of Mr. Eastburn and his friend, exhibit such a mastery in numbers.

[The stanza, commencing:-]

Thou of the ocean rock!' [&c. &c.].

From the fourth canto, which is entirely devoted to a detail of the religious, magical, and sacrificial rites of the American Indians, and which, though somewhat too long, and rather inartificially connected with the business of the poem, is written with great strength of fancy, and splendour of expression, I feel gratified in being able to select a lyrical specimen which displays, indeed, very uncommon powers. It is entitled THE PROPHECY, and put into the mouth of an Indian Priest whilst under the supposed influence of inspiration. In grandeur of imagery, and sublimity of sentiment, in a rich and sonorous flow of versification, and in a spirit-stirring enthusiasm in the cause of freedom, it exhibits much which has a claim to very distinguished and almost unqualified approbation.

[Here the whole six stanzas are given, beginning:-]

'O heard ye around the sad moan of the gale,

As it sighed o'er the mountain, and shriek'd in the vale?
'Tis the voice of the Spirit prophetic, who past;

His mantle of darkness around him is cast;

Wild flutters his robe, and the light of his plume

Faint glimmers along through the mist and the gloom :" (&c.]

Having thus supplied my readers with some specimens of what, I have reason to think, is, in a very great degree, if not exclusively, the composition of Mr. Eastburn; specimens which must assuredly give birth to a high estimate of the genius and poetical talents of their author; I conceive it in justice due to the Editor and joint Composer of "Yamoyden," notwithstanding the very admirable proofs of his powers which I have quoted from the various insulated stanzas annexed to different portions of the poem, to produce also, from the body of the work, some instances of what I know, from the prefixed advertisement, has originated solely from his pen; more especially as they cannot fail of showing how closely approximated were these young men in taste and talent.

Amongst the passages pointed out in this advertisement, as being additions to the original matter subsequent to the death of Mr. Eastburn, is one which the Editor has designated by the title of "a sermon." It is introduced into the third canto, and placed in the mouth of a Christian Priest belonging to the Settlers, who, it will be recollected, were induced to emigrate to America, in order to escape the religious bigotry and persecutions which, at that time, prevailed in their native country. The preacher is recapitulating the sufferings of those who expired as martyrs mid the flames lighted up in England by the intolerance of papal zeal, and he thus apostrophizes the island from which he had fled:

'O England! from thine earliest age,
Land of the warrior and the sage!
Eyrie of freedom, reared on rocks

That frown o'er ancient ocean's shocks!' [&c.-See Poem.] These lines, though in their opening adumbrated from a well known passage in Sir Walter Scott's Lay of the Last Minstrel, yet exhibit, both in their imagery and versification, a large share of vigour and spirit. The skill of the Editor, indeed, not only in the fabrication of the octo-syllabic metre, but in the construction of the more varied lyric stanza, is strikingly apparent in the parts which are confessedly the produce of his pen, nor are his descriptive powers less prominent in these portions of Yamoyden, than we found them to be in the Spenserian stanzas quoted in the preceding number. Of these assertions, the annexed extract, forming an entire stanza of the sixth canto, and taken from a part of which he has acknowledged himself the introducer, will afford, I should imagine, very adequate proof.

'His boat was nigh; its fragile side,
Boldly the 'venturous wanderer tried ;
Along they shot o'er the murmuring bay,

As they bore for the adverse bank away.' [&c.]

I have thus endeavoured, by a pretty extensive adduction of instances, to place the poetical merits of Mr. Eastburn and his Friend, in a conspicuous point of view; and, from what has been brought forward, I think it will readily be allowed, that to many of the qualifications necessary to constitute the genuine poet, more particularly to vividity of description, and energy of versification, they have established a just claim. They appear, indeed, to have been assimilated very closely, both in their powers of conception and execution, and, recollecting how unfavourable were many of the extrinsic circumstances which accompanied their joint efforts in the composition of "Yamoyden," they have produced a work which, notwithstanding some defects in the fabrication of its fable, and some indications of haste and incorrectness in its style and metre, will obtain for itself not only a considerable share of present admiration, but will long preserve the memory of its youthful writers on the records both of genius and friendship.

[From the same, by DR. DRAKE.]

Art. 29.-The Judgment, a Vision. By the Author of Percy's
Masque. 8vo. Eastburn. New-York.

-Mihi visus eram lato spatiarier agro :—
Agmina gemmatis plaudunt cœlestia pennis,

1821.

Pura triumphali personat æthra tubâ.—MILTON.

I seemed to wander in a spacious field;

The trumpet shakes the sky, all æther rings,

Attendant angels clap their starry wings.-CowPER.

IN a preceding number of these Essays, my readers will, no doubt, recollect a slight notice of Mr. Hillhouse, as the author of a poem entitled, "The Judgment, a Vision," to which was annexed, on my part, a promise of taking it into consideration. It is with no small pleasure that I now enter upon the redemption of this pledge, fully satisfied, that, in so doing, I shall gratify many beside myself. The subject, indeed, seems naturally to introduce itself here, having just closed the preceding number by a very striking passage on the necessity of a Day of Retribution, both in a moral and religious point of view; and the poem I am about to expatiate upon, places the scene before us with a strength and distinctness of imagination, with a vividity and

force of colouring, which cannot but excite emotions at once intensely interesting and awfully sublime.

A theme, however, more arduous, or from preceding associations, more difficult to execute with propriety and effect, could scarcely have been chosen; for, as the author has observed in a short notice prefixed to his work,

'Beside its intrinsic difficulties, the subject labours under a disadvantage too obvious to have escaped notice. It has so generally occupied the imaginations of believers in the Scriptures, that most have adopted respecting it their own notions: whoever selects it as a theme, therefore, exposes his work to critisism on account of its theology, as well as its poetry; and they who think the former objectionable, will not, easily, be pleased with the latter. The object, however, was not to declare opinions; but simply to present such a view of the last grand spectacle as seemed the most susceptible of poetical embellishment.'

Yet undeterred by the extreme hazard which must unavoidably attend the choice of a topic so hallowed and momentous in its nature, several of our own poets have ventured to essay their powers in describing the horrors and the mercies of the Last Day. Among these Young and Ogilvie may be mentioned as taking the lead in the couplet metre, and Glynn and Bruce, in blank verse. Of the production of the first of these poets, Johnson has remarked, that while "many paragraphs are noble, and few are mean, yet the whole is languid; the plan is too much extended, and a succession of images divides and weakens the general conception; but the great reason why the reader is disappointed is, that the thought of the Last Day makes every man more than poetical, by spreading over his mind a general obscurity of sacred horror, that oppresses distinction and disdains expression." Of the languor and extension here noticed, no reader of the "Last Day" of Young can be insensible; for it is, in fact, only in the third book of his poem that the subject properly commences; but I cannot yield assent to the opinion, that, however awful and sacred be the theme, it is on that account the more insusceptible of poetical imagery. The aversion of Dr. Johnson to scriptural and devotional poetry is well known, and the example of Milton is of itself sufficient to prove, that, let the subject be ever so exalted, it may, where grandeur conception and simplicity of design are united, admit, if we exclude the too daring attempt at personifying the Deity, of additional interest when embodied in the colours of poetic inspiration.

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