Bryant’s son-in-law and biographer, Parke Godwin, states that in the years 1826–29 we can trace his labors in the _Evening Post_ in longer and better book reviews, more attention to art, clearer characterizations of public men, and frequent suggestions of reform in city affairs. This is in part misleading. The frequent suggestions for local improvements were an old feature of the journal, and did not become more numerous. Characterizations of public men were not often written nor were they important. More books were noticed, especially those of Bliss & White and the young firm of Harpers, because there were more books--the _Post_ remarked that in the last three months of 1825 no less than 233 volumes had come from the American press, apart from periodicals, of which 137 were original American works; but mere notices were furnished, not reviews. More than once Bryant, who unmistakably penned these notices, apologizes for their brevity and sketchiness by saying that he had not had time to do more than glance through the book in hand. However, the frequency of these notices, and the inclusion of much literary gossip and book announcements, gave the newspaper an increased literary flavor. There was, as Godwin says, more news of art, for Bryant was interested in painting, and supplied long critical descriptions of new canvases by Dunlap and Washington Allston, both his friends. There was an increased amount of news about Columbia College and those professors, Anthon, Da Ponte, and Henry J. Anderson, whom Bryant knew well. The English magazines and newspapers were read more diligently, and interesting items from them grew in number. Bryant took in charge the filling of the upper left-hand corner of the news page with poetry, and we see fresher and better verse there--verse by Thomas Hood, Bishop Heber, Hartley Coleridge, and other Englishmen who preceded Tennyson and Browning. The poet wrote some fresh little essays; as editor of the _United States Review_, for example, he had compiled a curious article from an old colonial file of the New York _Gazette_, and he made another on the same topic equally curious, for the _Evening Post_. A few of the essays were satirical--e.g., one of April 23, 1828, dealing with the fashion of indiscriminate puffery that had grown up in dramatic criticism.