Page:Halleck.djvu/67

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RED JACKET.
47

And furthermore—in fifty years, or sooner,
We shall export our poetry and wine;
And our brave fleet, eight frigates and a schooner,
Will sweep the seas from Zembla to the Line.

If he were with me, King of Tuscarora!
Gazing, as I, upon thy portrait now,
In all its medalled, fringed, and beaded glory,
Its eye’s dark beauty, and its thoughtful brow—

Its brow, half martial and half diplomatic,
Its eye, upsoaring like an eagle’s wings;
Well might he boast that we, the Democratic,
Outrival Europe, even in our Kings!

For thou wast monarch born. Tradition’s pages
Tell not the planting of thy parent tree,
But that the forest tribes have bent for ages
To thee, and to thy sires, the subject knee.

Thy name is princely—if no poet’s magic
Could make Red Jacket grace an English rhyme,
Though some one with a genius for the tragic
Hath introduced it in a pantomime—

Yet it is music in the language spoken
Of thine own land, and on her herald-roll;
As bravely fought for, and as proud a token
As Cœur de Lion’s of a warrior’s soul.