the religion of force and courage. You have now in the library a complete collection of Northern poetry, I mean the two volumes of the Corpus Poeticum Boreali. Unfortunately you have not as yet a good collection of the Sagas and Eddas. But, as in the case of the vaster subject of Greek mythology, there is an excellent small book in English, giving an outline of all that is important—I mean necessary for you—in regard to both the religion and the literature of the Northern races, Mallet's Northern Antiquities. Sir Walter Scott contributed the most valuable portion of the translations in this little book; and these translations have stood the test of time remarkably well. The introductory chapters by Bishop Percy are old-fashioned, but this fact does not in the least diminish the stirring value of the volume. I think it is one of the books that every student should try to possess.
With regard to the great modern masterpieces translated into English from other tongues, I can only say that it is better to read them in the originals, if you can. If you can read Goethe's Faust in German, do not read it in English; and if you can read Heine in German, the French translation in prose, which he superintended, and the English translations (there are many of them) in verse can be of no use to you. But if German be too difficult, then read Faust in the prose version of Hayward, as revised by Dr. Buchheim. You have that in the library; and it is the best of the kind in existence. Faust is a book that a man should buy and keep, and read many times during his life. As for Heine, he is a world poet, but he loses a great deal in translation; and I can only recommend the French prose version of him; the English versions of Browning and Lazarus and others are often weak. Some years ago a series of extraordinary translations of Heine appeared in Blackwood's Magazine; but these have not appeared, I believe, in book form.
