until 1881, living during this period in Cambridge. He was not only editor
of the magazine; he was really its chief contributor. Any one who takes the
trouble to examine the pages of the _Atlantic Index_ will see how far his
work outnumbers in titles that of all other contributors, and the range of
his work was great.

He wrote a large proportion of the reviews of books, which in those
days constituted a marked feature of the magazine. These reviews were
conscientiously written, and showed penetration and justice, but they had
besides a felicitous and playful touch which rendered them delightful
reading, even though one knew little or cared little for the book reviewed.
Sometimes, though not often, he wrote poems, but readers soon learned
to look with eagerness for a kind of writing which seemed almost more
individual with him than any other form of writing. We mean the humorous
sketches of every-day life, in which he took scenes of the commonest
sort and drew from them an inherent life which most never suspected, yet
confessed the moment he disclosed it. He would do such a common-place
thing as take an excursion down the harbor, or even a ride to town in a
horse-car, and come back to turn his experience into a piece of genuine
literature. A number of these pieces were collected into a volume entitled
_Suburban Sketches_.

It is interesting to observe how slowly yet surely Mr. Howells drew
near the great field of novel-writing, and how deliberately he laid the
foundations of his art. First, the graceful sketch which was hardly
more than a leaf out of his note-book; then the blending of travel with
character-drawing, as in _A Chance Acquaintance_ and _Their Wedding
Journey_, and later stories of people who moved about and thus found the
incidents which the author had not to invent, as in _The Lady of the
Aroostook_. Meanwhile, the eye which had taken note of surface effects was