Year: 1872

France


A Cuban Journal ON tho Herald.


That journals published in Cuba by the
courtesy of the Spanish government should
marvel at tho HERALD for having despatched
a special commissioner to the island, whose
difficult mission was to inquire into the
state Of the insurrection, is very natural
The necessity of writing, if not thinking,
within certain police limits would take up so
much of their editors time that they could
not be expected to comprehend at once the
spirit of enterprise which would induce an
American newspaper to send its representative
so far from home on such perilous errand.
There is, apparently, so much peril in writing,
except according to the Spanish army manual,
that they cannot discover why any journalist
in free country could desire to share their
danger. Much more difficult, then, must it
be for them to explore the reason why the
HERALD should demand the liberation of its
imprisoned correspondent or aver that Spain
should take the consequences of refusal, even
to the necessity of a war, for the maintenance
of our citizens rights. 'The HERAID,' ex-
claims II Comercio, ''is not a power or
nation. At most it is popular
periodical in the country where it
sees the light" The very denial Of
this journal that the HERALD is power or
nation shows that it has an inkling of the
difference between the independent journal
that boldly speaks for national interests
without fear or favor and the restricted class
to which it belongs The HERALD may be "a
power or q nation" but it is in as much un-
certainty thereanent as Addison makes Cato
when soliloquizing on the locality and time
wherein the virtuous are to be happy. He
clearly thinks the conjecture must be answered
in another world, as "this world was made for
Cesar. e., the Spanish police. For the
information of II Concrete we may say that the
independent journal is power, and that in
proportion as its width of grasp takes in the
wants, aspirations and interests of the people
so it approaches being the mouthpiece of the
nation in its most popular sense. This is a
dignity too great for the narrowed minds of
some journalists to imagine, and hence we
have the Cuban papers endeavoring vainly to
define the HERALD.


An effect altogether odd in its way of this
journalistic abasement is the insistance that the
HERALD should have sent it's commissioner
with the understanding that he was to be
imprisoned if suspected, and shot when
the authorities had an inclination for
o reportorial bo,tue. This is comical as
well as deplorable. 1t is, of course, the condi-
tion on which II Concrete exists; but with all
the daring HERALD writer must occasionally
bring to bear on the duties Of his profession,
we must decline respectfully to accept it for
our correspondents, as We firmly denounced
what appeared an attempt to put it in practice
when our commissioner was detained at
Havana. But the suggestively bloodthirsty
C6mercio has another very brilliant idea. It
pictures the awful results which would accrue
if every newspaper in America sent an ex-
plorer or emissary to Cuba. Cespedes then
would (horrid thought y ''form an army of
correspondents, who could handle the pen or
the musket at their choice" Sublime Conner
cio you should be forthwith prosecuted, basti-
nadoed and garroted for disclosing such a
feasible plan to the Cuban revolutionists II
every newspaper in America sent corrc-
spondent thus doubly armed there would, we
fear, be little left of Spanish rule in Cuba, if
we could Judge from what they would be in
numbers and intelligence Leaving our read
ers to ponder over the wonders of a campaign
where every soldier in one army was a s'spe-
cial,' we will refer them for further amuse-
meut to translation of the article from
II Comercio, which we print in another
column.


Trouble Among the London Police.


Strikes are not unusual among the badly
paid laborers Of the Old World, nor are they
much to be wondered at but an organization
to demand an increase Of wages by the legal
guardians OF London's peace is decided
novelty. Such movement exists, and in fur
therance Of its object public meeting Of dis
contented policemen was held in the British