The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1897-05-17
WAR NEWS.
. Newspapers Most Expensive Luxury
Cost of Collection.
London Mail.

CiANAC AoA
Reporting a war is not alone arduous and
hazardous work for the war correspondent;
it is the daily newspapers most expensive
form OF enterprise: War news must travel
per readers would not be content now to
wait three or four days for details of Wa
dian mutiny reported by the slow methods
employed during those historic events
would not do for the present generation.
Telegraphing must be employed in these
times on the most lavish scale. Battle mar
ratives must be served piping hot. In the
FrancO-PruSsion war a special train and a
special steamer was the most enterprising
speed method devised by one distinguished
correspondent for getting himself and his
copy from Sedan to England. War pictures
by telegraph may be said to have had their
birth in the war of 1901. A young Irish
doctor-an amateur in Journalism-rode
away from the scene of the Napoleonic de-
bacle, through all the risks of the theater of
war, over the Belgian frontier, on to the
nearest telegraph office, possessed of ade-
quate appliances, and narrated over the
wires a graphic story, which ugh the
newspapers the real art of reporting war.
SO that some years later, when the sun
went down over the historic battlefield of
ISandlWana, in which the prince imperial
lost his life, it seemed the proper course for
Archibald Forbes to ride off through all the
long hours of the night to a telegraph sta
ton and cable a war narrative which in
vividness has not perhaps been eXcelled
since.
DIVISIONS Oh cADeIlSG, Dul lclCSI dpillllS 10
the prime duty of to-day. From this point
of view the Graeco-Turkish war, though
not what may be termed of first import
ance. happens to be taking place in the
most expensive European zone. AS we go
east the cost of telegraphy increases. At
home press kilograms for publication are
transmitted from any part of the United
Kingdom at rates which work out to the
average charge of Id for eight words. This
scale would make the Geographic cost of
a close column of the Daily Mail los. But
les would not pay for eight lines of the
Daily Mail from Larissa or ElaSsona.
From St. Petersburg or Moscow tele-
grams cost Sled per word. The rate
for kilograms from Turkey is 61@d per word;
charge for transmitting from LarisSa or
Athens 1000 w~ords-about a column, would
be at "a per word, just $50.
Since the war opened telegraphic dis
patches extending to 1000 words and over,
have been published in the Daily Mail from
each of its four correspondents now on
Grecian territory-from the Meluna Pass,
from Larissa, from Arta and from Athens.
Outside the European system cabling be-
comes a pastime for the wealthy. -Four
words to or from Buluwayo for a guinea
is a very strong incentive TO tersenesS or
r~eticence. But that is not where the tele-
graph reaches its zenith. The highest rate
we know is los Sd for one word to parts
of the Japanese empire; 1t varies for other
parts of Japan down to SIS per word.
Delagoa bay is at present a point of
much interest and Importance, and a cable
gram of one word from there costs 5s Id;
from the Orange Free State the charge is
SIS % each word; from British east Africa,
IS Sd; from Cape Town, IS.
Cabling from Australia ranges from As
Sd per word from west and south Australia
to As I'D from New South Wales, n 9s
sd per word from Queensland.
1t viii therefore be seen that when war
breaks out in any distant part of the world
a newspaper must be repaired TO spend a
small fortune ii il would have anything but
meager reports of the lighting.