The drum motif illuminates two of the play’s themes: Conscience Over Country and Freedom and Liberty for All. It is first introduced in the play’s epigraph, in a quotation from Henry David Thoreau that states: “If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured, or far away” (1). Metaphorically, the “music” Thoreau speaks of represents a person’s ideals or dreams, or the principles and scruples that guide their choices. He believes that every individual must be free to follow their own drummer and not be expected to match their steps—or choices—to either others’ choices or an authority figure’s dictates.

The drum motif resurfaces in Henry’s war dream, in which Edward Emerson appears as a drummer boy, playing a “snare drum [that] snarls a military cadence” (92). Ball, dressed as a general, chants “Learn to kill!” in time with Edward’s drumbeat (93). The drumming “build[s] snappishly” as soldiers march to its rhythm and follow Ball’s orders to shoot; however, Henry does not obey.