Sacramento daily record-union., 1890-07-27
THE COUNTRY NEWSPAPER.
PICTURES FROM LIFE BY ONE WHO
HAS BEEN THERE.
The People Who Come and Go aud What
They Are After-Decorative Art
in the Newspaper Office.

The People Who Come and Go aud What
They Are After-Decorative Art
in the Newspaper Office.
from an Occasional Correspondent of the SUN
DAY UNION.
What weight Of Importance the news
paper carries in its columns. How we like
to see our name in print, yet how few of us
like to admit it. We say society and per-
soRal columns are humbug, and yet read
over yard of names to "see who was
there" We may owe the butcher, baker
and candlestick maker, but if our name
appears at Mrs. Blanks big affair that is a
passport into society. When brains were
distributed we may have only been fa-
yored to the extent of half teaspoonful,
and these few may all run to baseball and
small talk, but once in the service no one
will question our ability to tell beans
when the bag is open.
Mrs. Blanks wealth may have been ex-
torted from widows and orphans, but that
is shrewdness and business capacity; there
may be tales extant Of highly favored
reputation back in the shadowy past, but
gilded sin is pardonable and the past is
covered with aglamour of silks and Jewels
her taste is vulgar, but that is her natural
way, and there is nothing affected about
her; her actions are rude as bar maid,
but that is cute and copied by her satell-
ties, but in little Mrs. Brown, whose hus-
bands salary is $l5 week, it would be de-
nounced heartily. But she is Queen of
the whirl, and to be out of that is out of
the world.
There is no use for us to try to revolu-
tionize this state of affairs, though we
know she is no fit associate, by all means
let us cringe and toady to her and have our
names coupled with hers in every affair
the papers notice. 1t will make us popu-
lar.
Even the most humble journal has
whole loads of queer experiences demon
strating the fact that the average man will
work harder for little newspaper notorie-
ty than he will for crance in heaven.
They will write their own obituaries and de-
mand the proofs for inspection and reyis-
ion-almost. Speaking of these, there are
communities where it is more than per-
sons life is worth to die, for as soon land
sometimes sooner) as the spirit wings its
flight the poetry machines are set in mo-
tion. and until long after the daisies
sprout il is one "demnition grind" If it
is sacrilege to smile at the wrong font
meters and rhymes, the Recording Angel
will turn deaf ear and let that sin go un-
recorded. When they commence thusly
can you suppress grin?
Darling Tudie thou hast left us,
Thou hast scooted up the fiume,
FILTERED up the golden stairs to geasus,
And thy loss we deeply mourn.
A young man about to leave his native
heath for more worlds to conquer, once
brought bottle of wine into an office to
revive the boys spirits, and while the ruby
red gurgled down their gullets, he brought
out pencil and notebook, penned the fol-
lowing and hung it on the hook:
"Our popular and energetic young
friend, Jimmy Fresh, departs tomorrow
for the metropolis. He will be greatly
missed in large circle of friends among
whom he was great favorite, and who
wish him every success in his new enter
prise"
That native sons courage faded like
stars before the sun when we consider the
fellow who wrote up his own marriage
festivities, and in the event of changing
his abode from Mud Springs to Fiddle
town, added: Mud Springs loss will be
Fiddletown's gain"
All sorts of people find their way into
the dusty sanctums. The most pompous
and arrogant will favor an eight by twelve
office with their presence for the sake of a
few complimentary words in a little sheet.
The blushing buds who come in "iust to
look around" and beg and implore the ed
itors not "to put their names in the pa
per-" are the ones who desperately grab
the next mornings issue and pout and
frown and call the editor "mean thing
because they have no personal. How they
twitter at each other, with one eye on the
good-boking compositor under sixty-five
cent straw hat, and holding up their
dainty frocks from contact from the inky
atmosphere they wade around in. Oh,
girls! you are sweet, deceitful little Great
ures.
Alas. even the honest old granger who
never practiced deceit in his life-unless
to irrigate milk or baptize his dried apples
falls victim to the spell. He lumbers
up stairs, lights in the middle of the room
and proceeds to tell all he knows. As he
warns up he becomes more and more con-
idential, and finally he leans against a
case, builds miniature fences with the
quad box, and his clover scented locks put
the types to fight. All the jokes from
boyhood to date are faithfully recounted,
and the smiles that illuminate the room
he takes unto his own bosom. He gives
the history of the basket of fruit he depos-
its on an unlocked form, and the butter
nut coat and high-water overalls are
bowed out with an urgent appeal to come
again. While inky fingers grapple his
luscious peaches he is iubilant over the
prospect of six-line local in response to
his donation.
You have heard of the exchange fiend
No? Well, he is an animal with an appe-
tite for reading like an Indian has for pie
He never gets quite filled up. Each day
at mail time he comes scooping in aud
stuffs his pockets with the best exchanges,
leaving the poor editor to get out his pa
per with a "War Cry" and sour Dumb Ani-
mais." He is greedy as miser, and once
buried in a patent outside story all the
powers on earth and in heaven could not
gain sign of life from his carcass.
Disorder, like untrue-exaggerations
abounds in great plenty in the sanctum.
1t is p,rt of the business. Tradition tells
of man who swept his office twice in one
month, but such proceeding was Incom-
patible with newspaper work. His office
is now used as cow stable, and the un-
natural editor is gaining livelihood by
digging CLANS. Sometimes person with
fastidious tastes might suffer fracture of
the nerves at the conglomeration in the
corners, as every known article from set
of harness to a tombstone, a bottle of cod
liver oil to a moving machine, abounds
there in quiet confusion. Each print who
tarries while leaves some little remem-
brance-"a broken ring, faded flower. a
tress of golden hair"-but more commonly
a pair of dusty brogans with grinning toes,
which painted and striped would make
capital wood boxes.
1t is not considered folly nor extrava-
gance for a composing-room to possess
stained glass. Every paper with $50 SUBJ
scribers and patent outside can afford
them, for they are the work of nature, ac-
complished with dust, ley and tobacco
juice in fantastic characters. A portierre
of grey silken texture replaces the ven-
n. l.