“risen up Earth’s greatest nation.” “The Biglow Papers” had appeared in the _Atlantic_. There also had been printed his “Blondel” and “Memoriæ Positum R. G. Shaw;” but since the article in December, 1861, “Self-Possession _vs._ Prepossession,” and another in January, 1863,[11] he had not made that magazine the vehicle for prose articles on public affairs, as had been his practice during his editorship of it. Now, at the close of 1863, he entered upon an engagement which was to give him a new medium for communication, and one which he used effectively for the next ten years. The _North American Review_, which had been founded by a number of cultivated gentlemen in Boston in 1815, was modelled on the famous quarterlies of Great Britain, and had for fifty years been the leading representative in America of dignified scholarship and literature. At times it had been spirited and aggressive, but for the most part it had stood rather for elegant leisure and a somewhat remote criticism. For the last ten years it had been conducted in a temperate and careful way by the Rev. Dr. Andrew P. Peabody, who held by the old traditions. But its fortunes were at a low ebb, it no longer was a power, and the publishers, hoping to reinstate it in authority, applied to Lowell to take charge of it. He saw the opportunity it would give him, and he accepted the offer, but only on condition that Mr. Norton should be associated with him as active editor. The advertisement put forth by the publishers was such as to quiet the minds of any who might be uneasy over a change of conduct; for, after naming the now editors, it characterized them as “gentlemen who, for sound and elegant scholarship, have achieved an enviable reputation, both in this country and in Europe; and whose taste, education, and experience eminently qualify them for the position they have assumed. Of the former it may be said that his essays in the periodical which, under his editorship, reached the summit of its fame, surpassed in vigor and force those of any contributor; of the latter, that he has ‘added new honors to the name he bears by the extent and variety of his knowledge, and by the force and elegance which he has exhibited both as a writer and a speaker.’ And of both, that their thorough loyalty to the liberal institutions of our country, and their sympathy with the progressive element of the times, renders them peculiarly fitted to conduct the _Review_, which has by competent authority been pronounced ‘the leading literary organ of the country,’ and of which it has been said ‘it has not its equal in America, nor its superior in the world.’” The advertisement continued in measured phrases to announce the policy of the review, and it would have been difficult for its old subscribers to detect any promise of change, though as a matter of fact, while the term scholarly could equally well be applied to it in the next ten years, the scholarship was more exact, the scope