Journal, has adopted the expedient, profitable to
himself, but annoying to the other fellows, of en
closing a notice with his rejected manuscript,
naming some particular publication by which he
thinks the orphan might be adopted. His record
of these wandering manuscripts for 1890 shows
that he received 2,280 poems, 1,746 stories, and
11,179 miscellaneous articles. Of these, only
one per cent was accepted.
Nor has the position and pay of a reporter gone
through a less evolution. In most newspapers
and especially the country press, there are stereo
typed forms for announcing the startling array of
births, deaths, marriages, visits, receptions, trials
and accidents which usually fill the columns, and
it is an easy matter for one to adopt them and so
graduate into a reporter via the roller washing
course. In this way the "devil" often becomes
the master. Here the collection of news is of
vastly more importance than itsarrangement, and
the salary diminishes in consequence. One hot
July morning a young man, a college graduate of
one brief summer's week, mounted the stairs of
an editorial office to lay himself a sacrifice upon
the altar of public curiosity. The editor viewed
with contempt the samples of genius which the
young man presented in the college paper and
asked for the first question how much salary he
wanted. The collegian remembered his four long
years of plodding after the fleeing Minerva and
estimated his trained (?) services at $2O per week.
The reply impressed itself so firmly that it can be
reproduced; "Well, young fellow, .you may have
brains, but brains don't go in newspaper work;
we want legs. If you can get up and hustle from
2 o'clock in the afternoon till 4 next morning
and move so fast the flies wont light on you, I'll
give you $2.50 a week." Ilium rut?.
In England, so it is said, contrary to the
American custom, one of the prime requisities of
a reporter is that he shall have had a collegiate
education, and secondry, that he shall be a good
stenographer, both conditions implying , special
training. The brains. are. not relegated.. to .the
THE FREE LANCE:
editor-in-chief and the ,legs.to the news-gatherer, ,
but each must possesses qualifications. which will
roughly fit . hith for:any line from minor editorial:
to common• criminal, and he is permitted to 'work'
up any field for which he :displays an 'aptitude.'
His bearing must fit him for entering a reception'
in high life, and his:conversational abilities ade
quate for turning an interview, either.around or•
concealed, to the tOpici most 'pertinent. 'Then in'
accord with his 'requirements, he is paid a ..salary
sufficient to support him welt, with increased conic
pensation and' Privileges:as he devel'op's.' ,• ; ';
However there are signs that the demand for.
intellectual work on a newspaper is increasing.
Current Literature, through whose column one'
can easily feel the pulse of the world's liter.try
circulation, frequently contains notices of college
bred men,. and those who have gained some liter
ary repute being engaged upon newspapers. Speci.:
alists are paid per article ; compensation for con-;
stant work is in 'proportion, to ability, ..an,l
hours assigned 'which yet permit of some
en
joyment in life. Every indication points to
larged permission to specialists and a growing re
gard for educated labor. It is true that the field
of journalism needs lifting from its present level
of scandals, murders, divorces and prize fights,
but so long as the people demand these so long
will they appear. The best chances for improve
ment lie in the elevation of the popular taste, for
which better writers, are needed and in the dis
crimination of certain papers which shall cater to
higher taste and satisfy it with higher writing.
George W. Curtis, himself the ideal of an edu
cated man, with ideal facilities in editing Harper's
Weekly, is reported as having recently said that
journalism, with its accompanying diplomacy,
politics, lecturing and literary demands, offers
one of the best openings to young men who have
any tendency toward composition or speaking.
One needs but to note the number of prominent
men who were or are connected with the press, to
verify this statement. In fact the press seems in
dispensible to. political advancement. Every col-