THE Paper World says there's no use talking, the newspaper men of the press are to-day becoming more and more "color blind." In other words, they have lost that subtle flavor of description for which the public yearns. They have missed that wonderful spice and aroma of narration which is the life of all newspaper work.
We do not take this to ourself at all, but we desire before we say one word, to make a few remarks. The Boomerang has been charged with erring on the other side and coloring things a little too high. Sir Garnet Wolseley, in a private letter to us during the late Egyptian assault and battery, stated that if we erred at all it was on the highly colored side.
There is an excuse for lack of spice and all that sort of thing in the newspaper world. The men who write for our dailies, as a rule, have to write about two miles per day, and they ought not to be kicked if it is not as interesting as "Uncle Tom's Cabin," or "Leaves o' Grass."
We have done some 900 miles of writing ourself during our short, sharp and decisive career, and we know what we are talking about. Those things we wrote at a time when we were spreading our graceful characters over ten acres of paper per day, were not thrilling. They did not catch the public eye, but were just naturally consigned to oblivion's bottomless maw.
Read that last sentence twice; it will do you no harm.
The public, it seems to us, has created a false standard of merit for the newspaper. People take a big daily and pay $10 per year for it because it is the biggest paper in the world, and then don't read a quarter of it. They are doing a smart thing, no doubt, but it is killing the feverish young men with throbbing brains, who are doing the work. Would you consider that a large pair of shoes or a large wife should be sought for just because you can get more material for the same price? Not much, Mary Ann!
Excellence is what we seek, not bulk. Write better things and less of them, and you will do better, and the public will be pleased to see the change.
Should anyone who reads these words be suffering from an insatiable hunger for a paper that aims at elegance of diction, high-toned logic and pink cambric sentiment, at a moderate price, he will do well to call at this office and look over our goods. Samples sent free on application, to any part of the United States or Europe. We refer to Herbert Spencer, the Laramie National Bank, and the postmaster of this city, as to our reputation for truth and veracity.
A LITTLE PREVIOUS.
SPEAKING of elections and returns, brings back to our memory the time when it was pretty close in a certain congressional district in Wisconsin, where W. T. Price is now putting up a job on the Democrats.
In those days returns didn't come in by telegraph, but on horseback and on foot, and it was annoying to wait for figures by which to determine the result. At Hudson the politicians had made a pretty close estimate, but were waiting, one evening after election, at a saloon on Buckeye street, for something definite from Eau Claire county. The session was very dull, and to cheer up the little Spartan hand some one suggested that old Judge Wetherby ought to "set 'em up." Judge Wetherby was a staunch old Democrat and had rigidly treated himself for twenty years, and just as rigidly refused to treat anybody else. The result was that he had secured a vigorous bloom on his own nose, but had never put the glass to his neighbor's lips. He intimated on this occasion, however, that if he could get encouraging news from Eau Claire for the Democrats, he would turn loose. The party waited until midnight, and had just decided to go home, when a travel-worn horseman rode up to the door. He was very reticent, and as he was a stranger, no one seemed to want to open up a conversation with him, till at last Judge Wetherby, who couldn't keep the great question of politics out of his mind, asked him what part of the country he had come from. "Just got in from Eau Claire county," was the reply.
"How did Eau Claire county go?" was the Judge's next question. "O, I don't pay no attention to politics, but they told me it went 453 majority for the Democrats."
Thereupon the judge threw his hat in the air and for the first and last time in his life, treated the entire crowd of Republicans and Democrats alike. It was very late when he went home, also very late when he got down town the next day.
When he did come down he was surprised to find a Republican brass band out, and the news all over the city that the Republican candidate had been elected by several hundred majority. In the afternoon he learned that Hod Taylor, now clergyman to Marseilles, had hired a tramp to ride into the Buckeye saloon the previous evening and report as stated, in order to bring about a good state of feeling on the Judge's part. Judge Wetherby, since that time, is regarded as the most skeptical Democrat in that congressional district, and even if he were to be assured over and over again that his party was victorious, he would still doubt. It is such things as these that go a long way toward encouraging a feeling of distrust between the parties, and causes politicians to be looked upon with great mistrust..
Although Mr. Taylor is now in France attending to the affairs of his government, and trying to become familiar with the French language, he often pauses in his work as the memory of this little incident comes over his mind, and a hot tear falls on the report he is making out to send on to the Secretary of State at Washington. Can it be that his hard heart is at last touched with remorse?