Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1897-08-05


 Depew and lis "JelIese-A Tired Let
 or Reporters.
 like to brag about newspaper men who have done good work, because the men themselves don't like 1t. For one newspaper man to chant the praises of others of his craft is considered taboo, 7 and the very fact of it's being tabooed makes it exceptionally tempting at times, so frail are we all. The proper professional attitude for newspaper according to convention--is that of being always slightly bored and of hating above all things to see his own or another newspaper mans name i'll print. As 10 being in love with his pro- fession-well, that's all right for q new hand just from college, but now-ratsl
 Don't you believe a word aboutnews- paper work making genuine newspaper men tired. They couldn't keep away from it if they tried If Robinson Cru soc had been D newspaper man, he would have printed daily edition of the Juan Fernandez Gastaway in blunt stick type on the sand ill front of his hut every morning and got out an extra when he captured Friday.
 And itmust be that age and rank and station don serve to benumb this feel ing. When Sir Edwin Arnold happened to be i'll st. Louis few years ago, a sudden crisis ill India Russians and Englishmen glaring at each other across the rugged crests of the Pamirs, the Roof of the World "-made an inter view with him of especially timely value. It came into my days work to see him, and at the close of the inter view he fell to talking about the incl dental phases of 8 possible Russo Eng fish war.
 Should such war be declared, said Sir Edwin, ''I would instantly go to the front for my paper '-the Lon don Telegraph-'' and serve as q special correspondent. It is the most faseinat- ing work in the profession, and there is none more fascinating outside. .
 And moment later the English poet and newspaper editor was telling me that he considered James Whitcomb Riley the most distinctively national of living American poets, and that to his mind Riley owed much of this to the fact that he was newspaper poet, instead of a magazine poet
 If I only had Dr. Chauncey NJ De pew here to join in this talk about newspaper men, then you'd begin 10 realize what fine fellows they really are Dr. Depew couldn't live without newspaper men. They visit him i'll his private office i'll the New York head- quarters of the New York Central rail. road, and they laugh at the jokes in his after dinner speeches and boom him for the presidency of the United States and for anything else he may desire simply because they like him and he likes them The first and only time I ever SAW Dr Depew was at the Republican national convention of 1899 in Mime l apolis, whither Dr. Depew repaired az one of the Big Four" of that very 1 lively convention. He WAS surrounded six deep by newspaper correspondents l facing them, tall and irrepToaehably l g1oomed, looking for all the world like the swell old heavy father in "The l Banker's Daughter, y and giyin, out all the news he consistently could, sup pose. And when he had exhausted his l budget fer the time being he turned in aud gave them Depew jolly of the press which was really daisy in it's line. Of course I'm not going to tell l you what he said, because, honestly, it was bit steep, but 1 just want to give you all idea that l would be greatly re- enforced in this talk if I could have Dr. 1 Depew here to take hand in it.
 Talking of conventions and bearing i'll mind my already expressed disbelief 1 Ill the possibility of newspaper man j ever getting tired of newspaper work, 1 want to make q kind of exception. The tiredest lot of newspaper men 1 ever saw was at the close of the famous all night session of the Democratic na- tional convention of that same year. 1S92-in Chicago It was the night of the great anti-Cleyeland fight made bv Tammany i'll the last ditch; the night when Bourke Cochran made the great est speech of his life; the night when such an orator as Daniel of Virginia was hooted from the platform because the convention was actually too ex- hausted to listen; the night when Cleye- land was nominated. With one recess, if am not mistaken, the convention remained ill session from 10 o'clock one morning until 4 o'clock the next It was d crucial session, too. and kept correspondents on the alert every mo- ment. Bourke Coel1ran's speech against Cleveland was made about 2:50 in the morning, and dying man would have been forced 10 listen and thrill at it's eloquent inyective and maste1ly sar- casm. But after that came the awful slump of utter weainess. When tho convention adjourned, day had broken over Chicago and the streets were gray in its early light. White faced and limp, the corps ef special correspond ents almost staggered out and made their sleep blind way to their respect i've hotels. Tired? Yes but it was as n