The Northern Guardian. — 1893-02-04 (Hartlepool, Cleveland, England)

STREET BALLAD WRITING AS A BUSINESS.  "Write it myself? Of course I did," was the reply recently given to a query. "Don't you see printed at the bottom `By John Smith, Champion Ballad Writer of the World?' Well, I'm John Smith." The speaker had jest finished his day's work, having supplied me with the last copy of a doleful ditty which he had been singing in the neighbourhood of the Old Bailey on the morning of a recent execution. His voice was not melodious, but the words were to the point, the last of about forty verses concluding with the statement that "on the dreadful scaffi-old " the culprit "must breathe his last." He was a street bard; his appearance was not, perhaps, equal to the bards of old, hut, like Homer, he sang his own lays. I wish I'd brought another hundred copies with me," be went on; "I didn't expect to find so many people here. Anyhow I've sold two hundred, that's sixteen and eightpence at a penny each ain't it? Oh, it wouldn't pay much if I didn't sell more than that. I daresay I shall get rid of another three hundred in the outside districts to-morrow, and you see I supply them wholesale at a halfpenny each to half a dozen other men. I expect to sell between four and five thousand of these before I have done. It ain't all profit, you know. First of all I have got to get the block for printing the likeness of the murderer, or the scene of the disaster, if it is a wreck or a railway accident. Oh yes, I write on all sorts of subjects ; anything sensational, ghastly, or horrible sells like winking. Of course, in cases of murder a good many of the verses are used several times with a little alteration. Well, the hlock costs from three.and-sixpence up to five shillings, and the printing about four shillings a thousand. _One like this takes me about three days to write ; there's thirty-eight verses you see, and it ain't everybody that can turn them out in that style. That's about the usnal length, but sometimes they run longer. The Loss of the Princess Alice' took close on a hundred verses. How that one did go, to be sure; I sold over 13,000 altogether. No, that ain't the highest; the one I wrote on Lefroy was the best in that way. I had 15,000 printed, and could have sold another thee sand, 'The [Ass of the Enrydice ' did not bring in a great deal. I can judge the market pretty well now, and seldom have many left ; of course, I made a few mistakes that way when I started. Oh, I sing 'em all to the same tune."—Casaell'a Saturday Journal.  urgeon Dentist and Ch.-t, 2, Burn Road tiv mantes' walk from Stranton Cburc.h). Artificial Teethin Cold, Platinum, or Vuloaolte at lowest (Swiss coonsten, rah stud wo kruaashlpi  "THE NORTHERN GUARDIAN" Branch Office at Hartlepool has been removed from Milbank Crescent to MIDDLEGATE, facing Northgate. The Office is open from 9 a.m. until  Awarded First Prize Medal—Adelaide Jubilee Exhibition, IeST, and Sydney Centenary Exhibition, 1888.  TO PICTURE FRAME MAKERS AND DECORATORS  In London for English CHEAPEST HOUSE Mouldings aft the and Foreign Picture Frame and Room newest designs—two million feet in stock--Veneefed and Fancy Mouldings, &c., Picture Frames of every description, Oleographs, lc. Wholesale Carver and Gilder. Every Requisite for the Trade and Exportation. Special attention to Country Orders. Full particular, in Pattern Book and Catalogue (85 pages 4to demy, revised for 1891), for three penny stamps. IT. Morel], 17 and 18, Great St. Andrew Street, Bloomsbury, London. Stock Lists and Prices of Glass Monthly Free. PLEASE NOTE vol