The weekly democratic statesman. [volume] (Austin, Tex.) 1871-1883, 1881-12-22
NOT A SPECIAL CASE.

Again we must insist that names
of correspondents sending cOmmu-
nications must accompany the man.
uscript. Sometimes there appears
to be no real necessity for this, but,
whether the subject be one in which
the public is interested or not, we
must have the names of writers.
One who is backward about letting
the editor know the personal re-
sponsibility in an article can have
but little interest in its publication.
Usually, too, an editor learns all
about the mental calIbre and tend
encies of the minds of people, and,
though a communication may sound
well enough, the name of the
author may remind him of
fanatical fancies and cranks and
such things, and then he will know
what estimate to place on that which
sometimes appears to be sensible
communication. Thus an editor
generally knows who to avoid and
who to encourage, and therefore
he doubly insists on having names.
There are terrible pitfalls in the way
of the newspaper man, and the fact
has been discovered that sometimes
he falls into pit, set by CORES
pondent, more terrible even than
the grave. Let us illustrate: An eli
tor looks over his correspondence /;
he finds something that will do; it is
Sound in expression, moral in
tone, and the Mr.. or Mrs. A, B. or
G. who sends the name along, is sup
posed to be responsible. The manu-
script gets into type and then it gets
into the paper, and that very day
Mr.. or Mrs. A, b. or G. comes round
to say thanks. He bows the he or the
she to chair editors are always
exceedingly polite), and then the
question of the communication is
preached; the editor puts in few
mild and meditative words to begin
with, but soon his tongue grows
still; he listens, becomes nervous, and
the devil" comes in and calls for
copy, and then the editor frowns at
what the visitor accepts as a disap-
probation of disturbance the visitor
thereupon enlarges upon what
has already been said, and
after fifteen minutes the
"devil' calls "copy," and the
frown deepens on the editors brow,
and the visitor smiles and says, he or
she can stand such interruption, that
he or she is used to it, having as
ISOLATED so mnch with newspaper
men. Time passes, and the editor
knows that ten printers are cursing
the "devil' for the editor. Another
hour moves by and he becomes dis
traught with madness, begins to be
impolite to the him, but lift be her
he grows pale and quivers, and
looks as though he is going to be
asphyxiated. Then the she observes
that the gentle editor is not looking
well, and ne tells an awful lie about
his pampered childhood and youth
and ngjawbones, and how he has
an engagement with the dentist now
past due. Then he makes a
motion to go, and the she makes
motion to stay, and hands him roll
of manuscript, which the she says she
intended to read, and would do so
under other circumstances. The ed
itor thanks the she, bows her out of
the front door, the she promis-
ing to call tomorrow to hear the
editors approval of the matter in
the manuscript. Then the she goes
really does goat the end of two
hours, and the editor lodges around
the corner, cursing creation and cor
respondents in particular. The
editor steps back into the sane
tuna place anything but sane
tified-anythirg but a sanctuary
locks the door, and, pale and des-
perate, he contemplates murder
at the first sight of the devil or
correspondent. Unfit to write line
and too much out of balance to ju-
use the scissors, he clips
at random, steals items, plagiarizes,
and makes wooden editorials" and
the next morning the readers of the
paper say its editor is a wooden
head and a nincompoop, while
many say he is sot, and that he was
drunk all the day and the night pre-
vious, and that he is nice fellow to
preach morality and such stuff. The
way of the editor is hard, and I'M
less his shoulders be broad and his
mind well balanced he is unequal
to the pressure. This is what we
know generally on the subject treat
ed of, not specially, nor particularly
no, not at all.