Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1899-09-08
OUR NEW YORK LETTER.
Clement Scott Not to Be Dra-
matte Critic of the Herald.

Thereby He Saves Himself Much
Hard Luck-How n French Foreign
Editor of BENEFITS Paper Was
DOwned.
New YORK, Sept. I'll Special. 1T was
announced the other day that Clement
Scott, the English dramatic critic who
has been sending copy about London ac-
tors and theaters to Mr.. Benefits Her
aid for some time, was soon to be made
its chief dramatic critic.
"A later announcement is that he has
decided not to take the place. In this
he shows wisdom. AS The Herald's chief
dramatic critic he would have been led a
lively dance.
A Herald story.
Mr.. Bennett is great newspaper pub
Usher, doubtless. Otherwise his Herald
could not go on and make money unceas-
ingly in the face of divers frightful
breaks and stupendous blunders any one
Of which would have done irreparable
damage to almost any other paper. Rath-
er more than ten years ago Mr.. Bennett
became highly dissatisfied with the work
on The Herald's foreign desk. just what
was the matter nobody now remembers.
1t wasn't of much consequence really
too little display for a cablegram about a
coaching trip in France, the omission for
one day of n weather report from Paris,
or something of that sort. Anyway, the
foreign editor was discharged, and a per-
sonal friend of Benefits was sent on
from Paris to take the place.
This man had been minor officer in
the French army. He was charming
man to know, but entirely without news
paper training and quite incapable Of
putting English upon paper save ''as she
is wrote" To tell all the stories still ex-
tant in The Herald office of the way this
poor creature was deviled by the whole
Herald force would take a newspaper
page. There isn't language to tell his own
mental anguish while the devilng was
going on. OF course there were two
points to be gained in making him I'M
comfortable. One was the simple one Of
having fun with him, the other was to
get him fired. This latter point might
have been carried inside of a week had
he not had an exceptionally conscientious
assistant, for naturally the Frenchman
did some awful editing. Thanks to the
assistant, however, nothing really serious
happened till the great storm at Samoa,
in which a number of American. German
and British ships were destroyed and
lot of brave tars were drowned.
News of the catastrophe was received
just before midnight, when the assistant
foreign editor CHANGED to be out of the
office. The story seemed almost unbe-
lievable to the FreDchman, despite the
fact that 1t was received through the
regular channels, and he was badly puz-
zled. So he carried it to one of his most
persistent tormentors-a close friend of
his predecessor.
"Think it's doubtful, hey?" queried the
tormentor. well, you don't have to
print it, do your
And he didn't print it in the first edi
ton, either, the result being that The
Herald was beaten by all its contempo-
raries on the most important news that
had come in for many long day. That
| it appeared at all that morning was due
solely to the assistants timely return TO
| the office. 1t goes without saying that
there was another change at The Her
| AIDS foreign desk and that right speed
! lily.