"I would have, sir, A groatsworth of any news, I care not what, To carry down this Saturday to our vicar."
This was written news. In London, before a newspaper existed, there were private gazetteers, who made a living by picking up scraps of intelligence in taverns and barbers' shops. This class of persons continued even when there were newspapers; for the news-letter, as it was called, is thus described in the first number of the 'Evening Post,' issued in 1709:—"There must be 3l. or 4l. per ann. paid by those gentlemen that are out of town for written news, which is so far generally from having any probability or matter of fact in it, that it is frequently stuffed up with a 'We hear,' or 'An eminent Jew merchant has received a letter.'" The same 'Evening Post' adds,—"We read more of our own affairs in the Dutch papers than in any of our own." Sir Roger L'Estrange, who published 'The Intelligencer,' with privilege, in 1663, says that he shall publish once a week, "to be published every Thursday, and finished upon the Tuesday night, leaving Wednesday entire for the printing it off." The first advertisement in an English paper appeared in 1649.
At the beginning of the present century the public used to look with wonder upon their "folio of four pages," and contrast it with the scanty chronicles of the days of Charles II. and Anne. We of the present time, in the same way, contrast our newspapers with the meagre records of the beginning of the century. The essential difference has been produced by steam navigation, by railways, by the extension of the post, dependent upon both applications of steam, and by the electric telegraph. The same scientific forces and administrative organization that bring the written news from every region of the earth, re-convey the printed news to every region. It is sufficient to glance at the lists of foreign mails, and the low rates of postage from the United Kingdom, to see the enormous extent of that intercourse which enables our government, by the packet service, to transmit a letter for sixpence to the British West Indies, to Hong-kong to our North American colonies, to Belgium; to nearly all the German States, by an uniform British and foreign rate, for eightpence; to France, Algeria, Spain, and Portugal, for ten pence; to the Italian States for a trifle more; to Turkey in Europe for one shilling and five pence; and to India for one shilling and ten pence. With this certain and rapid intercourse, it is not likely that the least enterprising newspaper editor would have to repeat the doubt of L'Estrange, who says, "Once a week may do the business; yet if I shall find, when my hand is in, and after the planting and securing my correspondents, that the matter will fairly furnish more, I shall keep myself free to double at pleasure."
It is the external communication so wonderful in our own times, we repeat, which has chiefly changed the character of our newspapers. When we read in a London daily paper the one line,—"The Overland Mail—by electric telegraph,"—we have two facts of the highest significance. "The Overland Mail" would appear, of itself, a marvel great enough for one age. The Overland Mail has brought London within a month of Bombay. It has joined India most effectually to England for all commercial and state purposes. It gives us the news of India, by the aid of the electric telegraph, in as little time as we ordinarily received news from Vienna at the beginning of the eighteenth century. The steamer and the electric telegraph made the blood of England beat quicker in every heart, when our newspapers recorded, on the 13th of November, the most sanguinary and heroic battle of modern times, fought in the Crimea only a week previous. When Marlborough was setting out for his campaign of 1709, and so many political, if not patriotic, hopes, were fixed upon the probable issue, 'The Tatler,' then a newspaper, had the following paragraph:—"We learn from Brussels, by letters dated the 20th, that on the 14th, in the evening, the Duke of Marlborough and Prince Eugene arrived at Courtray, with a design to proceed the day following to Lisle, in the neighbourhood of which city the confederate army was to arrive the same day." The account of the movement of the great allied generals was transmitted from Brussels six days after the movement had taken place, Courtray being only distant forty-six miles; and the important news from Brussels, of the 20th May, was published in London on the 28th, London being distant some two hundred and fifty miles. The distance from Balaclava to London is about three thousand miles.
Old hand-gunner
The function of a great newspaper, in connexion with the positions of armies and the events of siege and battle, is as different from the function of the journalist of fifty years ago, as the rapid firing of the soldier of the Alma with his Minié rifle contrasts with the slow evolutions of the old hand-gunner. In the war with Russia the presence of the newspaper reporter gives a new feature, strikingly characteristic of our times and our country. It is necessary to have the earliest and the most detailed accounts of this eventful contest; for the people, one and all, understand that they are deeply interested in its issue, and that, if their country fails to assert the superiority of freedom and intelligence over slavery and barbarism, the material prosperity of that country can be of no long duration. Wisely, therefore, did the London daily papers each send their active, fearless, and eloquent correspondents, to endure some of the hardships of the march and the bivouac—to observe the battle-field, not secure from its dangers—to write of victories, surrounded by the dead and dying—to be the historians of a day, and thus to furnish the best materials for all future historians. The life of a London reporter, although a life of constant labour, is generally accompanied by much ease and comfort. The senate does not acknowledge his presence; but it provides the "stranger" with the best seat. He takes his place at the public dinner as an honoured guest—one whose absence would be more regretted than that of the city's mayor or the borough's patron. But in a campaign, where his duties are new, he must fight his way through every difficulty. His function is recognised in an age when it would be useless to suppress intelligence, even if it were possible. He finds a ready mess in every tent where a scanty meal is set out; he stands by the side of the commander, and gazes with him upon "the currents of the heady fight." How he wears after two months of unusual service we have some slight notion, when we read, in a letter to 'The Times' of November 30, that the writer had seen an officer who had lately parted from the special correspondent. "The chances of war had deprived him of nearly all his garments; and when last seen he was walking about in a rifleman's jacket, much too small for his portly person; and his nether garments had been converted into breeches by a constant scrambling amongst rocks and briers." Let us not forget our obligations to the men who, in peril and suffering, have made heroic action more familiar to us; and have contributed no mean part in giving a moral impulse to our country, as essential to future safety and honour as the material wealth which has made us a people amongst the foremost of the earth.
