nowhere is there any sense of restraint, but everywhere a
delightful sense of ease--the freedom of one great poet shining
through the freedom of another great poet, as the sun shines
through the sky. It is the ideal English translation of Homer;
and we congratulate Mr. Bryant upon having finished it (for we
believe he has); and congratulate ourselves that it is the work
of an American poet.

We offer the like congratulation to Mr. Bayard Taylor for his
translation of "Faust," which occupies the same place, as regards
German Poetry, that Mr. Bryant's translation of Homer does to
Greek Poetry. The difficulty of the task which Mr. Taylor set
himself, the task of rendering the original in the measures of
the original, was never met before by any English translator of
"Faust"--never even attempted, we believe--and, to say that he
has accomplished it, is to say that Mr. Taylor is a very skilful
poet--how skilful we never knew before, highly as we have always
valued his poetical powers. He enables us to understand the
_Intention_ of Goethe in "Faust," as no one besides himself
has done; and, among the obligations that we owe him for the
enjoyment he has given us, we must not forget the obligation we
are under to him for his _Notes_. They are scholarly, and to the
point. There is not one too many, not one which we could afford
to lose, now that we have it. What _might_ have been written,
under the pretense of _Notes_--what another translator might not
have been able to resist writing--is fearful to think of--Life is
so short, and Goethe's Art so long!

The year has been fertile in American verse. How much Poetry it
has produced is a question into which we do not care to enter. It