In 1875 he became assistant editor of that staid and stately magazine the _Atlantic Monthly_, thereby adding to his fame, while it brought him into intimate relationship with the best current thought of the time. Few American literary men have not, at some time of their career, been closely allied with the press. Mr. Lathrop has been no exception. For two years, from ’77 to ’79, his brilliant pen guided the destinies of the _Boston Courier_. In 1879 he purchased Hawthorne’s old home, “The Wayside,” in Concord, Mass., making it his home until his removal to New York in 1883. His present residence is at New London, Conn., where a beautiful home, with its every nook consecrated to books and paintings, tells of an ideal literary life and companionship. Mr. Lathrop’s genius is many sided. This is often a sign of strength. Men, says a recent critic, with a great and vague sense of power in them are always doubtful whether they have reached the limits of that power, and naturally incline to test this in the field in which they feel they have fewer rather than more numerous auguries of success. Into many fields this brilliant writer has gone, and with success. In some he has sowed, in others reaped a golden harvest. He was a pioneer in that movement which rightfully held that an author had something to do with his brain-work. It seems strange that in this nineteenth century such a proposition should demand a defender. Sanity, however, is not so widespread as the optimists tell. The contention of those that denied copyright was, “Ideas are common property.” So they are, says our author, but granting this, don’t think you have bagged your game? How about the form in which those ideas are presented? Is not the author’s own work, wrought out with toil, sweat and privation—is not the labor bestowed upon that form as worthy of proper wage as the manual skill devoted to the making of a jumping jack? Yet no one has denied that jumping-jacks must be paid for. This was sound reasoning and would have had immediate effect, had Congress possessed a ha’penny worth of logic. As it was, years were wasted agitating for a self-evident right, men’s energies spent, and at length a half-loaf reluctantly given.