Wheeling Sunday register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1882-1934, 1898-10-23

ana WQ1 tn0uE4G 70 ~ ~ 4HVQy 81 -
vision. Rochefort referred to him ~
"unAt to throw to dog owned BY 9
Dreyfusard." Now he refers to him as
"a soldiere OF probity. anxious to safe
guard the honor Of our glorious army. I"
Just forty-eight hours separates that
difference Of opinion. Does the Paris
public mind? Not in the slightest.
Ever since Faure became President,
Rochefort has never referred to him
without some foul and unclean epithet
and innuendo. To-day, because Faure
is supposed to stand against revision, he
is covered with fulsome praise.
But the choicest Billingsgate is re-
served for the rival editors and writer's.
In two recent numbers OF the Intransi-
geant and the Libre Parole the follow
ing epithets, for instance, used in refer
ring mainly to rival journalists: Felon,
rascal, scoundrel, villain, miscreant,
caitiff, reptile, wretch, viper, monster,
devil, hell-hound, pimp, renegade, friend
of Germany, valet of William II, anti
patriots, haters of France, German spies
and English spies.
A good many Of the paragraphs are
modelled as follows-for it should be
explained that the Paris newspapers
are by law compelled to insert the an
m OH o1y
Blank writes to say that his sister is
not married to an Englishman, that
he has never on any occasion shouted
Down with France that he has not
sent his son to be educated in Ger
many, that he never said the army
chiefs deserve hanging. All we have
to say is that the opinion of patriotic
Frenchmen will not be altered in the
slightest by any drivel that he may
care to write. And we would like to
know, moreover, whether it is not true
that his uncle was cashiered from the
army for fraud?" The uncle referred
to is merely an invention of the jour-
nalist's fertile mind, but probably by
the time that has appeared the at
tackled man has got tired of denials
and lets it go at that.
But there is another feature in
which the picture OF English journal
ism sixty years ago, as drawn by
Thackeray, is true Of Paris journalism
of to-day. The men who write these
things are personally very often good
fellows, and between themselves
pleasant friends, and it is an amusing
fact that the papers which are most
and the Intransigeant and the Radical
and the Jour-are all published in the
same building and printed from the
same presses. The personelle of the
stats, of necessity, often meet one an
other, naturally exchange the civilities
of the day, often take drink together
at the cafe opposite and, with perhaps
the exception Of the editor in chief,
are the very best of frinds.
These facts, which l get from one OF
the best posted Englishmen in Paris
journalism, have been suggested by the
drama Of last week, of which you will
have read. A deputy was attacked
and in that attack the wife in some
measure suffered. She went to the Of
fee of the paper and began to shoot
"prcmiscuous." The wrong man, of
course, was hit and nearly killed. He
knew nothing whatever of the Offend
ing paragraph. The week before the
editor of paper was waylaid and all
but killed by ruffians who were, with
out much doubt, hired for the purpose
by the editor of a rival paper.
1t may not, by the way, be generally
known that the newspaper, which to-
day is a necessity to all classes, Or
iginated in rather a peculiar way in
France. During the early part of the
seventeenth century a physician named
Renaudot resided in Paris. He was
an inveterate gossip, and owed much
of his professional success to his repu-
tation as a collector of news, patients
seeking him as much to obtain tidings
of what was going on in the world as
on account of his medical proficiency.
In order to increase the number of his
patients he obtained permission from
the government to print sheet every
week for distribution among his Glen
tele. The first Of these sheets appear
ed in 1852, and so great was their pop
ularity that the ingenious physician
soon had many imitators. The first
publications of the kind in all countries
were in the nature of newsletters in
the form CT ephemeral sheets, with ir-
responsible editors, ard next followed
the weekly, and, finally, the daily
paper. M. MacM., Sd.