first two years he spent in newspaper work, for the most part with the
_Evening Post_, but, one day in November, 1887, a man whom he had never
seen came into his office and unfolded a new opportunity. Two years
before a rather miscellaneous group had launched an ambitious literary
undertaking. This was a monthly periodical, which, it was hoped, would
do for the United States what such publications as the _Fortnightly_ and
the _Contemporary_ were doing for England. The magazine was to have the
highest literary quality and to be sufficiently dignified to attract the
finest minds in America as contributors; its purpose was to exercise a
profound influence in politics, literature, science, and art. The
projectors had selected for this publication a title that was almost
perfection--the _Forum_--but which, after nearly two years'
experimentation, represented about the limit of their achievement. The
_Forum_ had hardly made an impression on public thought and had
attracted very few readers, although it had lost large sums of money for
its progenitors. These public-spirited gentlemen now turned to Page as
the man who might rescue them from their dilemma and achieve their
purpose. He accepted the engagement, first as manager and presently as
editor, and remained the guiding spirit of the _Forum_ for eight years,
until the summer of 1895.

That the success of a publication is the success of its editors, and not
of its business managers and its "backers," is a truth that ought to be
generally apparent; never has this fact been so eloquently illustrated
as in the case of the _Forum_ under Page. Before his accession it had
had not the slightest importance; for the period of his editorship it is
doubtful if any review published in English exercised so great an
influence, and certainly none ever obtained so large a circulation. From
almost nothing the _Forum_, in two or three years, attracted 30,000
subscribers--something without precedent for a publication of this