After leaving Russia, he soon returned to the United States, and, with lecturing and writing, occupied the time until again called abroad by a desire to see some localities visited by Goethe, and describe the great Paris Exhibition of 1867. Then followed those years of work at home, and travel abroad and at home, as his duties as author, editor, and correspondent demanded. In 1866 appeared his poem, “Picture of St. John,” which was immediately translated into Italian by an admirer in Florence. His poem, “The Ballad of Abraham Lincoln,” appeared in 1869, “Goethe’s Faust,” in 1871, “The Masque of the Gods,” in 1872, “Lars, a Pastoral of Norway,” in 1873, “The Prophet, a Tragedy,” in 1874, and “Home Pastorals, Ballads, and Lyrics,” in 1875.
In the spring of 1874, Mr. Taylor visited Iceland as the correspondent of the New York “Tribune.” He had visited Egypt, and was to return to America after a short stay in Europe, but the news of the Millennial Celebration, which was to take place on the island August 2d and 3d, called a large number of people to the festivities, and it was fitting that a great American newspaper should be represented. But neither the people of Iceland, nor the editors of the “Tribune,” nor Mr. Taylor, had any idea, when he set out, that his visit would be magnified into a recognition of the event by the people of the United States. His knowledge of the Danish language, and his study of the Icelandic tongue, according to his plan laid in Copenhagen eighteen years before, when on his way to the Northern Ocean, made him peculiarly fitted for the position in which he was, by a conjunction of unforeseen circumstances, unexpectedly thrown. But his genius was as spontaneous as it was persevering; for in a few moments of time, amid confusion, and conversation in which he took part, he wrote the poem, “America to Iceland,” which, when read to the Icelanders in their own language, on the occasion of their largest gathering, created the greatest enthusiasm. One verse ran thus,—
“Hail, mother-land of Skalds and heroes,
By love of freedom hither hurled;
Fire in their hearts as in their mountains,
And strength like thine to shake the world!”
Mr. Taylor’s printed description of the scenery, people, government, and geysers of Iceland, is a standard work on that almost unknown island, and is written in a vein readable and refined. As it shows rather the fruit of a cultured life than the processes of culture, its contents require no extended notice in a work like this.
In the winter (February) of 1878, President Hayes offered Mr. Taylor the vacant mission at Berlin, expressing, at the same time, his conviction that there was no other American living who could so nobly and creditably fill the position of Minister of the United States to the German Empire. Mr. Taylor’s fame as a German scholar; his relation, by marriage, to the German people; his popularity at home and in Germany; and his creditable performance of his duties in a like position at St. Petersburg, made it peculiarly fitting that he should represent the American people in that official capacity.
It was an office unsought by Mr. Taylor, but, nevertheless, it was most cheerfully accepted, as it would give him an opportunity to prosecute his studies of the life of Goethe and the life of Schiller, which could not be so well secured in any other way.