it will not be because he has nothing of importance to communicate, but because he does not exactly understand the best mode of communicating it. His style is generally languid, oppressed with words brought in to limit propositions, and the sentences are unconnected by that fusing spirit which gives directness and movement to narration and disquisition. These defects are perhaps the more observable, as the style is ambitious to the extent of suggesting an effort after correctness, and, with little freshness and energy, is replete with images seen through an unimaginative haze of words, and implying the absence rather than the possession of poetical power. The fault of the work, in short, is the fault of a person unpracticed in composition, and substituting a heavy rhetoric for a natural style; the merits are of a kind which the purest and raciest writers might be proud to claim. * * * * * _The Penance of Roland, a Romance of the Peine Forte et Dure, and Other Poems. By Henry B. Hirst, Author of Endymion, etc. Boston: Ticknor, Reed & Fields. 1 vol. 16 mo._ This volume, though it contains nothing equal in classic beauty and grace to the exquisite poem of Endymion, has striking merits of another kind, indicating that the author’s genius is versatile, and can roam at will into many regions of song. The Penance of Roland is a long and spirited ballad story, giving free play to a variety of strong passions, and hurrying the reader swiftly along on a rushing stream of musical verse to the conclusion. The author has united narration and description in such an artistical manner, as to make his representations of scenery and moods of mind aid instead of obstructing the story; and he produces a strict unity of effect, by making every thing serve the dominant idea of the poem. In this power of grasping a leading idea, of conceiving a poem, Mr. Hirst is ever pre-eminently successful. This was the great charm of Endymion, and it is just as observable in the smaller pieces contained in the present volume as in that longer work. Of the whole nineteen there is not one which is merely a collection of melodious lines, embodying certain fancies and imaginations, but each is a short poem, imaginatively conceived and artistically executed. We have no space to refer to them individually, but it can be said of them generally, that they display a profound insight into the mysteries of melody both in metre and rhythm, and evince great strength and subtilty of imagination in the embodiment of varying moods of mind. The volume is a rich addition to the poetical literature of the country. * * * * * _History of the National Constituent Assembly. By J. F. Corkran, Esq. New York: Harper & Brothers. 1 vol. 12mo._