Waterbury Democrat., 1902-11-29
AS YOU LIKE IT
Some Stray Leaves From a Reporters
 Note Book


 A newspaper is sold the cheapest of any commodity on the face of the earth Considering the great amount of work there is put upon the publication of q newspaper, and the cost of getting It out, there is nothing made and sold which brings such a price. For the reason that the majority of the people have no idea of the infinite labor and expense attached to the publication of a newspaper, they are apt to regard the copy they receive as of small value.
 John M Armstrong of New York has been sued by his wife for divorce. She claims that he is incorporate ln his habits, and indulges in too much drink. John M Armstrong has filed counter claim He declares that his wife is intemperate in another direc- ton, and indulges in too much Christ ian Science That her devotion to the cult has wrecked his home; that the members of the sect have poisoned her mind against her husband" and that she paid for lectures $100, of which she could il afford to spend. The issues are fairly joined, and the case in this shape goes to the court.
 Some parts of the country out west are not very densely populated, judg- ing from the manner in which a Wa terbury young man who is at present working for the. government in that part of the country, writes about. He writes to friend that he is now locat- ed forty-five miles from nowhere and that he will have to wait until the river freezes before he can send or re- ceive any mail. Even at that he en- Joys the country and the experience which he is receiving. He says that he will have an abundance of materi al for several interesting novels by the time he returns home.
 '"rhere must be a number of dis honest men in this city, said the As You Like It Mans friend. the business manager. recently. And the writer be- Iieyes il ''How often do vou se% advertisements inserted in the papers about money or jewelry or some article more or less valuable being 1ost,'' the business manager continued, 'tan9 how seldom you see the articles re- turned even if reward is offered. Of course there are cases when the arti- cies are returned and tine. finder won't take any reward. And again there fire faw cases where the finder of lost articles adyertises them. But these cases are few and far between. The majority of lost articles are never re- coyered.'' y
 Only on the theory of prejudice so pronounced as to forbid a just consider ation of the rights of the matter at is- sue can the recent verdict of British jury awarding a considerable sum in damages against an English newspaper for having published a dramatic criti- cism of unfavOrable character be eX- plained. According to the cable news, the evidence brought out in the hearing of the case made it plain that the critic was amply warranted in what he had written, and might, it is said, with propriety have condemned the play un- der discussion in much stronger terms Nevertheless, on the showing that a fa<oraDle report on the same play in the same paper a year before had re- suited in larger receipts than had fol- lowed the adverse criticism, verdict for the plaintiff was rendered.
 &a4 s.
 English newspaper readers, says q trade journal. do not tolerate papers which cut articles in two; or in other words, continue parts of stories over to other pages. The Newspaper Owner and Modern Printer. in an article on this subject, says in part: 'sThere is one American newspaper vice that English journals are happily free from. News articles are not chopped in two when the middle happens to come at the bottom of a column. and the continual tion made on some other page. The American idea is to get as many heads as possible at the tops of columns. and is so far Iaudable: but if an article be not interesting or important enough to over-run a column on it's own page, it should either be boiled down within the single column proportions or made the subject of two distinct articles in different parts of the paper. This lat ter course was aropted by the Daily Express. with it's recent royal pro cession reports. with the best results"
 had chat with an old farmer to-day about the weather and after discussing the subject for a while I asked my friend from the rural dis tricts if he thought we were going to have any snow this winter. After pulling at his chin whiskers for few seconds and eyeing me closely to make sure that I was not joking he said that there could be no doubt about that and related an incident that occurred when he was a boy about half cen tury ago. He said he used to drive a pair of cattle for his father ard when he knocked off Thanksgiving eve. the weather was so fine he couldn't get the oxen to go into the barn and after chasing them about for half an hour or so, he decided to let them remain out all night The next morning over ten feet of snow was piled up against the kitchen door and they had to dig their way out to the barn. The oxen sought shelter under ledge about half a mile from the house and finally pIoughed their way home when they got so hungry they could stand it no longer. He thought our New England winters are growing milder every year, ip.>S yrOu7G not advise 3nvbOdy to do