Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1884-06-01
The Old Printer.


And so, year after year, he wrought
among the boys on morning paper. He
went to bed about the time the rest of
the world got up, and he arose about the
time the rest of the world sat down to
dinner. He worked by every Kind of
light except sunlight. There were can
dies in the office when he came in; then
they had lard oil lamps that smoked and
sputtered and smelled; then he saw two
or three printers blinded by explosions of
camphor and spirit gas; then kerosene
came in and heated up the news-room on
summer nights like a furnace; then the
office put in gas, and now the electric
light swung from the ceiling and daZZled
his old eyes and glared into them from his
copy. If he sang on his way home a
policeman babe him ''cheese that" and
reminded him that he was disturbing the
peace and people wanted to sleep. But
when he wanted to sleep the rest of the
world, for whom he had sat up all night
to make a. morning paper, rOared and
crashed by down the noisy streets under
his window, with cart and truck and
omnibus; blared with brass bands,
hoWled with hand organs, talked and
shouted, and even the shrieking newsboy,
with a CHASTITY sarcasm, murdered the
sleep of the tired old printer by calling
the name Of his own paper.
Year after year the foreman roared at
him to remember that this wasn't an
afternoon paper, editors shrieked down
the tube to have a blind man put ON that
dead mans case; smart young proof
readers scrubbed sarcastic comments on
his work on the margin of his proof
sheets they didn't know how to read,
long-Winded correspondents learning to
write, and long-haired poets who could
never learn to spell, wrathfully cast all
their imperfectiOns upon his head. But
through it all he wrought patiently, and
found more sunshine than shadow in this
world; he had more friends than enemies.
Printers and foremen and pressmen and
reporters came and went, but he stayed,
and he saw newSrOOm and sanctum filled
and emptied and filled and emptied again
and filed again with new strange faces.
He believed in his craft, and to the end
he had silent pity, that came as near
being contempt as his good, fOrgiving old
heart could feel, for an editor who had
not worked his way from regular devil
ship up past the case and the imposing
stone.
He worked all that night, and when the
hours that are so short in the ball room
and so long in the compOsing-rOOm drew
YEARLY on, he was tired. He hadn't
thrown in a very full case, he said and he
had to climb clear into the boxes and
chase a type up into corner before he
could get hold of it. One of the boys,
tired as himself-but a printer is never
too tired to be good-natured-offer to
change places with him, but the old man
said there was enough in the case to last
him through this take, and he wouldn't
work any more tonight. The type clicked
in the silent room, and by and by the old
man said:
''Pm out Of sorts"
"And he sat down on the low window
sill by his case, with his stick in his
hand, his hands folded YEARLY in his lap.
The types clicked on. A galley of tele-
graph waited"
''What gentleman is lingering with D
1922 called the foreman who was always
dangerously polished and polite when he
was on the p0intof exploding with wrath
and impatience.
Slug Nine, passing by the alley, stopped
to speak to The old man sitting there so
quietly.
The telegraph boy came running in
with the last manifold sheet, shouting:
'EThirty!'
They carried the old man to the fore
mans long table and laid him down rev.
emily and covered his face.