MARCH 1999 | Volume 283 No. 3   Victory at Sea Recent movies and books have celebrated the land battles of the Second World War. But for the United States the war began as a contest of sea power. The naval struggles in the Atlantic and the Pacific were vastly different but ultimately proved to be militarily decisive. And yet for many Americans the naval campaigns are the least familiar part of the conflict. A distinguished historian looks afresh at how the Second World War was waged upon the oceans. by David M. Kennedy Can of Worms There is a time-honored method, involving a wooden stake and a metal bar, whereby the skilled baiters of the Florida Panhandle can call worms out of the ground by the hundreds and even the thousands -- some of the best earthworms in the world, fishermen claim. One day the government decided to levy a new tax on this harvest. by Kenneth Brower   Reports Notes & Comment: The Market as God The Supreme Being of religious worship has sometimes been defined as omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent. Hmmm. The business pages embrace an uncannily similar theology. by Harvey Cox Urban Life: Pick Your Part The author writes, "We got in a long line of guys with hopeful expressions on their faces and socket wrenches in their hands, paid our one dollar apiece at the gate, and went in." by Ian Frazier Foreign Affairs: How to Steal a Diamond Little happens in Namaqualand, except "leakage." by Matthew Hart Humor, Fiction, & Poetry The Gilgul of Park Avenue A short story by Nathan Englander Web-Only: Worlds Apart An Atlantic Unbound interview with Nathan Englander. Dooryard Flower A poem by Ellen Bryant Voigt Knot A drawing by Guy Billout The seahorse symbol indicates that an article is supplemented with audio, an author interview, or other Web-only sidebar. Browse and search The Atlantic's online archive. Arts & Leisure Travel: On Top of the World Our correspondent ventures along the 800-mile length of the Karakoram Highway, the treacherous high-altitude track linking China and Pakistan. by Jeffrey Tayler Food: Doing Good by Eating Well The founders of the Slow Food movement believe, happily, that the best way to preserve endangered regional foods is to consume them. by Corby Kummer Books Taming the Savage Noble At Home With the Marquis de Sade, by Francine du Plessix Gray by Francis X. Rocca What Makes Poetry "Poetic"? The Sounds of Poetry, by Robert Pinsky by David Barber Brief Reviews by Phoebe-Lou Adams Other Departments 77 North Washington Street Contributors Letters (Send a letter to the editor.) The March Almanac The Puzzler by Emily Cox & Henry Rathvon Word Court by Barbara Wallraff All material copyright © 1999 by The Atlantic Monthly Company. All rights reserved.