New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1913-01-12
Began to Consider.

Began to Consider.
That pat an end 10 Lord Northcliffe's
| known attitude Of critical consideration
Of "Punch's" presumed imprcgnability.
| he began to take steps. He settled
down to really serious consideration
Of Punch" and it is fairly obvious,that
he spent some time in going through
it's files for he decided that IL was not
really a humorous paper.
He conRdcd what little doubts he had
on this head to contributor who
writes occasional articles in THE Daily
Mail" under the caption OF The Let
| tcrs Of an Englishman," and this con-
/ tributor's opinion Of Punch" was made
known TO the great British public a day
or two later through the medium of an
/ article on the editorial page OF The
daily Mail" entitled The Decay Of
/ Humor"
I'm this article. having laborcd little
10 prove that England had an inhcri-
lance Of humor. An Englishman' goes
on to ask, what have we done
with it?"
Direct from Chaucer.
! He explains. I'VE have treated it as
we have treated our other inhcritances.
I Whatever seems of worth or value to
Ius we tramplc under foot or turn into
la supcrstitution. The humor
which we derive from Chaucer In
direct line we think we may crystalline
/ i'm our only comic paper. Punch Is
ours. and why should we ask more?
with that weekly masterpiece To de-
| fend us, are we not proof against all
/ the attacks Of enviOus foreigners?
/ You have no wit says the French
man. You can't see joke, says the
! Yankee And we murmur, There is
Punch" to confute you; and once
some were foolish enough 10 think the
answer sufficient.
| Punch then. is our superstition OF
humor, our official comic paper. II is a
| kind of trade journal Of funny men. 1t
I
and cutter or the court circular. About
! the mahogany table, which | am told is
made of deal, there gather together all
! the brilliant wits Of the age. Even
when they carve their names upon the
deal-mahogany with an hieratic gray
! ity they are holding their sides with
laughter. Their weekly banquets. it is
said. are marvels of so brilliant an
hilarity that the heroes who assist at
them can neither eat nor speak. Much
Of this we must take on faith, for the
cream of the humor does not get into
! the columns Of the paper. ..
One Of the Stock Jokes.
ut is one of the stock jokes Of
! Punch that a foolish busybody inter
cepted the genial editor with the OBJ
! lection that '"Punch" is not what II
was The genial editor is said to have
replied. 1t never was. The fact
, is that the genial editor spoke no more
! than the literal truth. Punch is never
so good as IT was. It's initial elevation
was not great, but it has descended
: from it with unfailing vigor. :.
! Punch, the official headquarters of our
humor. is what it always was, never as
good as it was.
, "As we turn over its pages to-day
| the writer concludes, ''in some uncer-
, tainty as TO which are jokes and which
are advertisements, we remember with
mild surprise the stories we have
heard about il. Its lack of urbanity,
the narrowness Of its outlook, proclaim
| il the mere child of a parish. Though
| il be read i'm the suburbs, IL Is still the
puzzle Of France, the sad despair of
America"
| That this article had deciding in
nuence on Lord Northcliffe's attitude Is
very clear. II convinced him of the
necessity Of turning Punch" into
humorous paper, and with this object
in view he decided TO buy Punch
lock. stock and barrel But its pro-
prietors, Messrs. Bradbury and Agnew,
would not sell; at least, not at price