It was a most delicate position which he occupied on _The Atlantic_ from 1866 to 1872, when Fields withdrew and Mr. Howells became sole editor. In the beginning, as he says himself, he ventured to distinguish mediocrity in some verses by Whittier. "He sent me a poem," says Howells, "and I had the temerity to return it, and beg him for something else. He magnanimously refrained from all show of offence, and after a while, when he had printed the poem elsewhere, he gave me another. By this time, I perceived that I had been wrong, not as to the poem returned, but as to my function regarding him and such as he. I had made my reflections, and never again did I venture to pass upon what contributors of his quality sent me. I took it, and printed it, and praised the gods; and even now I think that with such men it was not my duty to play the censor in the periodical which they had made what it was. They had set it in authority over American literature, and it was not for me to put myself in authority over them. Their fame was in their own keeping, and it was not my part to guard it against them." At another time, when a choice was accidentally enforced between a poem by Holmes and a poem by Emerson, Mr. Howells had the courage to request Emerson that his poem might be held over for the next number. Emerson wrote back to "return the proofs and break up the forms." "I could not go to this iconoclastic extreme with the electrotypes of the magazine," says Mr. Howells, "but I could return the proofs. I did so, feeling that I had done my possible, and silently grieving that there could be such ire in heavenly minds." From 1872 until 1880 Mr. Howells was sole editor of _The Atlantic_; and the rich social and literary experience which he gained during that term he has embodied in that most delightful of American bookmen's chronicles, "Literary Friends and Acquaintance." Mr. Howells's first piece of fiction, "Their Wedding Journey," was published in 1872, the year that he became sole editor of _The Atlantic_. Seven years ago in a newspaper interview, Mr. Howells made this statement in regard to this work: "I wrote 'Their Wedding Journey' without intending to make it a piece of fiction or considering it to be one after I had finished it. It was simply a book of American travel, which I hoped to make attractive by a sugar coating of romance. I was very familiar with the route over which I had taken the bridal couple, and I knew it was beautiful, and, like most American scenery, was not appreciated. The book was more of a success than I expected it to be. I attributed its success to the descriptions of American scenery and places. I gave it to a family friend and asked her to mark those parts of it which she thought real incidents. I was very much astonished and greatly pleased to find, when she returned it, that she had marked some passages which were purely invention. This made me ask myself if I might not hope to write a novel some day."