New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1880-04-25
THE RECORD OF FIFTY YEARS
8TT.AsT TRIBUNE CffAPTER.

Xxx.
A LAST TRIBUNE CHAPTER.
s.az ppivArr history or ANEWsr ArxR-- METHODS
AND MIsrAKKS--DoMEsTIc CRITICS =" TOM
lscoKrR--G0op CORY AND BAD-BiDpIEG THE
OLD orFIcE .fAREwEIIr-THE YOUNG PoEIs-
ssn: i. q. srsDMAN--fHE DIAMOND WEDDING
NEwsrApgR coRRRsPoNDEECg, PAST AND PRES
HSr.
Could there be anything more interesting
than the history Of q leading newspaper IN
telligently and cleyerly writtenS Apart from
other considerations, 1t would, In fact, be the
history Of notable political chances ana
changes Of parties rising 70 meet the exl-
rencles of tho time, surviving while they were
needed, and dying when they were needed
no. longer. But this relation OF newspapers
to public affairs Is nos what is mainly IN
my mind, as begin this paper. l am
tl,inking Of the private experiences the int
nor vicissitudes, the memories and mortali-
ties, and that tradition OF triumphs and OF
failures Of which the public know 80 little
ssd OK watch an old Journalist knows so much.
If may venture TO say so, the Office of
newspaper is republic tempered by despo-
tisn. The men who make journals are obliged
ia think for themselves, but this intellectual
independence must be kept within certain
lisnits. Still, an editorial writer who has any
hraine soon finds out what he may say. and
what he may not say, and how far he may
nut his priyata opinions into bis articles.
when / asked for some convenient rule to
gu;de mo In whiting for THE TRIBUNE, MIR.
Greeley told me that there could be none !;
abut YOU win be safe," he said. "whie you
keep within the general tone of the
neWspaner; and If you write what we don't
!, want. you may be perfectly sure that we shall
not print itn Yet it is always delicate
business. What seemed excellent In the even :
ING cid not seem so fine in the morning.
: Nswspaper writers make awful mistakes, wen
calculated to fill the bosom Of the editor-in
chief with despair. Things get into the col
umns which ought to have been kept out OF
them. Constant vigilance is the price OF
safety. even Of the comparative sort An ILL
considered article may bother newspaper
3 and be perpetual source of irrita ton for a
year TO come.
Take: for instance, that wonderful article
Al a Miscegenation which wrote for The
TRIBUNE. in which, half sportyely and nan
seriously, demonstrated that the marriage OF
blacks aud whites was just what this great
and glorious Republic needed. The trouble
Was that the irony was so finely spun that no
body could see it, and everybody thought that
the writer was in absolute earnest Those
were times in which We had to be careful
what we sald and MIR. Greeley, who
saw endless controversy ahead, was angry
Y enough at the appearance of the ar
fieIe' He did not scOld me; am
prcud 20 gay that he never did that but
ishaye reason to believe that he scoided the
& manager, who then expressed his mind to me,
who'll answered Just as well. 1t was IKE that
enene IN Sheridan's "Rivals," in which the
master kicks the fOotman, and the tootnan
kicks the page. ,a. e
,; the unceasing attention which it exacts, OF
The iudiciOus care which 1t requires, the great
public Of readers takes no account. lnOSe
who come to breakfast table, more or less
bilious, expect to find IN their morning sheet
Something like perfection. and do not mean
. sas ' L. But But when they glance
hastily over the columns, and then Jn-
8 dicialIy declare that there is, nothing in
them, they may often forget that there is
everything in them of importance which mas
happened in the whole world during the last
tWenty-fOur hours-that fifty, seventy -nye,
tisse AM, snso critics were sleeping, their heads,
4 - CARLYLE saws, "full of the tOobshest
dreams H--worked to make up this great com
pendium, this map. the picture OF day, lts
jiuctnations and It's vast concerns" IL might
lead the dissatisfied purchaser to revise hls
Judgment, If he could stand, between ana
: 3 o'clock in the morning, In the composing
room of q great journal, and witness the M
resnIafed Offices. which eharacteriZes the
nlake-up y of the sheet which ne sometimes
s. uismisses so contemptuOusly. The night edl-
4 for f then in state to speak to anybody
nationally, might tell hlm that the great point
s was NOT 30 much what should go in as what
ehould be left out. For there never was a
Inorplng paper yet which was big enough tor
All the matter prepared for it; and there mover
can be. The larger the sheet the more news
will come to it--fOT every additional column
three columns of intelligence, or OF matter OF
eome SORT. will demand admission. Again, the
rule Is that there shall be no mistakes it Is
memorable, yet thrice happy is the journal IN
mistakes than the sagaciOus public ever fnds
out. Nowhere is a newspaper 80 criticised as
Ia its own Office.
Tha other day Mr.. Thomas N Rocker, who
s was long foreman of The TRIBUNE, and who
B rtijl serves it in another capacity, told me
that he bad been connected with It ever since
sic first day of lite publication. In fact,
hope that he viii not mind my mentioning
tlsat be who laid the first type in the cases
has grown white In the service, and has no end
Of "reminiscences of his own under his frosty
poW.D How many "torIns" no has "mafe
upn il would DO a great ar1thmetcal job to
compute, as well as how many miles OF copy
be has cut up, pasted and distributed. !, He
has stored away more anecdotes OF Mr.
Greeley than any man living. One of the
strangest things Ia that there should be go
many printers, no longer on the newspaper,
i who know ms aud whose names and races
haya entirely passed out of my memory. L
meet them on the cars and in the street.
and they como up 70 me and put
onl their hands and hope that am
well. and begin to talk OF tho old times in a
genial way which quite upsets me. They re-
member alI about the character of the copy
che astcniehing and TO eyes unfamiliar with
Il, altogether iilegible chirograPhy OF Mr..
Greeley: the almost equally difficult hand
writing Of Nj. HlldreCh; the beautiful manu-
srript which they got from this member OF the
sfsff or the other. These men were Interested