Bellows Falls times. [volume] (Bellows Falls, Vt.) 1856-1965, 1871-06-23
worthless if too many barnacles are al
lowed to form upon its hulk.
DEAD HEADS

worthless II too many barnacles are al
lowed to form upon its hulk.
DEAD HEADS
are the barnacles of newspaper. They
accumulate with surprising rapidity and
stick like brothers. Here they will pro-
pose to help you by securing subscribers
or holding those you have there they
promise to send in news: some will give
you an advertisement and expect the pa
per to be "thrown in"-the same as la
dies sometimes expect gilt Of two dol
lars worth of buttons and thread when
they buy ten dollars worth of dress 9TH
ers will expect the press, as a matter of
course, to supply them gratis because
they, likewise, are servants, either of
list grows, until sometimes it am cunts to
hundreds, and rarely to less than scores
and what is it all worth Not one
quarter what it costs. / know an editor
who feels too poor to dress we'll enough
to attend church, and yet whose contri-
buttons to the support of the gospel ex
ceed one hundred dollars year. Half
OF it or more goes to persons whom he
does not know, and less than one-third
of it did he ever subscribe If it were a
charity given in any other form he would
be both thanked and praised by the ben
efciaries, though probably he would be
watched by his creditors, who would be
likely to think he had better "be Just
before he was generous" The editor
knows he is doing wrong, but he dislikes
to be small, and so he takes gentle hints
and bleeds at every pore. There is only
one safe rule, and that is, to do business
as business and not as charity. If we
have anything to give, let us give it as
others do--consciously, willingly, from
surplus and not from stock.
THE PEACHES ON THE PRESS.
There is widely prevalent notion
that country newspapers are published
for the accommodation of their patrons
rather than for their enlightenment. AS
a consequence, every man who gets mar
ried expects to inform his friends of it
through our columns without expense,
though he pays for his license and pays
the minister for the amen. Others, too,
if father, a brother or a member of their
Lodge dies, though he may have been
unknown to ninety-nine one hundredths
of our readers, and like Pollock's man
may have meyer looked "beyond the Wis.,
ible circle that girt him round" yet ex-
pect us to yield quarter of a column for
resolutions, run in the usual mould, and
quick to upbraid us if we are unwilling
to cucumber our paper to that extent
without reward | have heard of one
case, of recent occurrence, which well
illustrates this tendency 30 trench for
private ends upon the space which the
editor feels he ought to use for the best
entertainment and advantage of the
greatest number: A respectable man,
rather prominent in his town and some-
what known throughout the country pa
per, hearing OF it, made brief and ap-
propriate editorial mention of the mourn
ful fact After few days neighbor Of
the deceased communicated a similar ar
ticle and this also was published. A
week or two after this his pastor sent,
in regular form, notice OF the death,
followed by several paragraphs giving
religious history Of the good old man,
with the request that the bill for publish
ing the same should be sent to his son.
TINS was doue and in few days the son
made his appearance, red IN the face,
and wanted 10 know ii that was the way
the editor treated bis ''old subscribers"
The editor explained that he had done
merely as directed, but this did no good
and the man finally laid down the usual
alternative, ''cross out the charge or stop
my paper Here l drop the curtain
because | promised not to tell the result,
but what would you have done Would
you not have asked the man, If, as an
''old subscriber" he had not received his
moneys worth? Would you not have
tried TO convince him that simply be-
cause you bought his butter he ought
not to be expected to give you his cheese?
Would you not have told him that set
ting up the type and printing the paper
costs you money, and that you ought not
to gratuitously embalm his fathers MEM
ory any more than the undertaken his
remains After all this you might have
continued to send the incorrigible your
paper as a missionary measure, but you
would never have wanted to meet him
again in this world, nor expected to in
the next.
In the cities all notices of marriages
deaths, appointments and all other busi-
ness and many religious notices are paid
tor. In the country there is ten times
as much need that they should be, though
hundred times less disposition to do 1t.
| would not myself recommend that the
ordinary short notice OF death be charged
for, but the Benedict who does not feel
liberal enough to pay the printer fifty
cents for announcing to the world his
consummated bliss, deserves to have his
hanpiness s'sour on" him and suspicious