Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-08-27

paper stuff going through his hands In case
his colleagues of Bumbledon had missed
anything in Africa. Then the news got
another going over after it reached Eng
land Altogether, the bottle was not only
well corked, but the cork was driven IN
At least, SO the English government
thought.
Now the Beers were not at all modest
in their demands, and they charged all the
traffic would bear" England was anxious
for peace and did not care to have this
phase of her concessions coming out before
peace was concluded Yet the Daily Mail
of London printed very accurate record
of the conference proceedings from day to
day There was no date line On the story
No authority was quoted for the paper $
statements and as the Mail Is regarded
as a rather sensational sheet, every one
simply read the reports and remarked that
the Mail was guessing al the situation. AS
matters developed little at a time peo-
pie had to agree that the Mail had been
guessing pretty well. And when the whole
terms of the agreement We're printed in
official form 1t was found that the Mail
had been quite correct all the way through.
1t was not till good while atterward
that the scheme was divulged by the Mail
itself. The paper had scraggy-mustach-
ed, mild-mannered young fellow by the
name of Wallace it's chief corre-
spondent in South Africa, who could
not only write mighty good stuff, but who
was quite as good a newspaper man as
kitchener was a soldier. Now 1t was not
much of a trick to get the proceedings OF
the Anglo-Boe conference in South Africa.
But TO cable them as such was impossible.
Wallace had a friend who was mining
engineer over in Johannesburg, and the
mining engineer had an office in London.
Wallace every day wired over to his en-
gineer friend the negotiations that were
In for ca a of a nf min n q
property. The mining man cabled the ne
tations to his London office, and thence 1t
was quietly sent around to the Daily Mail.
Now If you just knew that the 'venders''
referred to in the dispatches were the Beers
and the purchasers" were the British the
course. of the negotiations became as plain
as print. They were simply written into
plain English in the Mail office and thus the
proceedings of the conference were printed
from day to day. When the Beers were
pressing for representation in the local
parliament. they were simply claiming
more seats the board of directors"
When they wanted more money 1t was re-
ferred to as vendors demanding increase
In price" and so on. 1t was all very easy
when you once had it explained.
There have been other achievements In
the news line less notable. For instance
one of the numerous South American revo-
lutions was reported to New York in the
guise of market quotations sent to firm in
the produce business there. When the
Spanish-AInerican war was on one of the
correspondents of a news agency in the
field arranged a code for reporting events
by the use of ship names that did not exist
in the marine register, and latitude and
longitude figures where the mythical ships
were supposed to be sighted. This scheme
was never put into operation. the managers
of the agency deciding that they would
abide by the censor and not print anything
that he did not pass.
Very probably after the Portsmouth con-
ference Is over II will develop that there
was some more or less elaborate plan for
forestailing information. Hut 1t cannot be
expected that the scheme Will be given
away till after the negotiations close.