It is not possible to write about the Newspaper without making some compressed reference to the history of the press. But the history of the press can be adequately treated only in a formidable and forbiddingly dull work. The fact is that the only interesting newspapers are live newspapers. It is practically impossible to read with attention the files of bygone journals except for the purposes of research. History has already eviscerated them and what history leaves only biography or statistics can put to any use. Confined as we are to brief space our best course is to deal only with living papers, the selection of which is indeed a sufficient task and to note only such facts in their complicated lives as will be of service to us in determining the character of the British press as it is to-day. Of all that exists anterior to these it will be sufficient to notice only those parts of our subject, which have succeeded in creeping into the history of our politics or our literature. Of the foreign press no more than a brief contemporary review can be given.

England was the last in Europe to develop its own press and when it came, it appeared in a full-fledged form that is startlingly modern. During the controversies of the Civil War pamphleteering and preaching were the great English weapons and owing to the seriousness of the times both often ran into volumes. It was not until the easier days of Queen Anne that we had our first daily paper with the Daily Courant of 1702. But two years later we had a much more important event in the advent of the Review. This was started by the true father of English journalism and the greatest of all journalists, as I venture to define the term, Daniel Defoe. As I propose to deal with his journalistic character later on, I shall confine my remarks here only to the story of the papers, which he published faithfully, if rather irregularly, for nine years. This immense work was practically entirely the work of Defoe’s own hands and in its 5,000 pages it included articles on almost every subject of human knowledge. It practically established the prevailing type of English journalism, which has survived to our time. This type is neither literary nor critical, which is the prevailing style with the French, nor the mere newsgatherer, such as certain popular journals have been everywhere, but pre-eminently an organ of opinion, dealing with current topics, so as to exert political influence. In fact he was found carrying out this function of influencing opinion to an extent, which modern notions of honour would never condone, for at one time of his life about 1718, he, a Whig and Nonconformist, is found taking a share in the conduct of three Jacobite and High Church organs, Mercurius Politicus, Dormer’s News Letter and Mist’s Journal, in order, as he says himself, “to take the sting out of them” in the interests of the Whig government of the period. This embodied a peculiar view of irony, not approved of even at the time.

The Review was soon followed by other famous names, the Tatler started by Steele in 1709, the Spectator by Steele and Addison in 1711, yet while their object of supporting the Whigs was partly achieved, these journals were too far removed from the popular type to secure permanent success. Atterbury, Bolingbroke and above all Swift were supporting the other side in politics in the Examiner, but although the wit, eloquence and brilliant literary qualities displayed by both these groups by far exceeded the equipment of Defoe in these respects these joint journalistic efforts never succeeded in following continuously the true path of development, which leads to our modern newspapers. The same may be said of two other celebrities Henry Fielding in the Champion and True Patriot, both Whig organs and of Johnson in the Rambler. In fact the only resemblance of the latter to a newspaper was that it appeared at regular intervals and had the general wish of the author to support Church and State, as they were understood by the Tory party.

With the well-known names of Wilkes, rake, demagogue and editor of the North Britain (1762–3) and Woodfall, editor of the Public Advertiser and publisher of the famous Letters of Junius we come nearer still to the modern spirit. In both these cases the original example of Defoe is followed of seeking for public support through the press against the power and authority of government and thereby of establishing the great English principle of its real and practical independence. The example and success of Junius has also to my mind had a far-reaching effect on our newspaper habits in helping to extend the practice of anonymity, which has contributed so powerfully to the wealth and influence of our leading organs. Finally with Cobbett, soldier, agitator and editor of the Weekly Political Register (1802–35) we come to the end of the predominantly personal note in English journalism, which started with Defoe. In many respects Cobbett strongly resembled the father of English journalism especially in his directness, ruggedness and fertility. But he was quite incapable of reaching the immortal heights, which Defoe touched more than once. Though he was too independent to stoop to deceit, he was capable of changing sides quite honestly, an inconsistency of which in his heart Defoe never was guilty.

From henceforward we begin to deal not with journalists, even if they were editors, but with influential papers established as impregnable properties, independent of government, of their own brilliant literary staff and sometimes, though rarely, of public opinion. This change was brought about by a succession of three able and tenacious men in one family and raised by the long service and controlling genius of a fourth to a degree, which has made it for ever the model of English journalism and to some extent of the press of the world. The history of the Times for half a century has become the history of the English press and the duration of its greatest power coincides with the most flourishing period in our journalism. That is why we may save ourselves time and space by taking the course of its development in some detail, leaving room only for the most recent history of other journals, which have more or less followed its example.

The Times was founded in 1785 by John Walter but received its present name only three years later. Its early course represented the general discontent of the middle-classes, which were the democracy of those times, with the rÉgime of repression and financial sacrifices enforced by Pitt, as the leader of the dominant aristocracy. For his enmity to government and fearless exposure of high-placed misconduct Walter suffered more than once in fine and imprisonment and only just escaped sharing Defoe’s exaltation to the pillory. His counter-weapons were however far more effective. He first understood the overwhelming importance and popularity of early news. Refused the use of the post for his foreign news packets he made himself independent of it and beat the government again and again. He published the news of the capture of Flushing twenty-four hours before the government received their despatches. His attacks brought to ruin Lord Melville, Pitt’s intimate friend. He had the temerity to send to the Peninsula Henry Crabb Robinson, the first of all war correspondents and his paper was the first to announce the battle of Waterloo.

Such men are more powerful than governments and though the elder John Walter had relinquished part of his control in 1803 and had died in 1812, he lived long enough to hand over to the second John Walter privileges and responsibilities which were primarily of his own creation. The son was worthy of them and under him the Times rose to the assured position earned by his father’s fierce energy and his own discreet judgment. John Walter, the son, found himself in comparatively quiet times. He devoted himself to the problems of business management and succeeded in 1814 in being the first printer to make use of steam. It is not often that a paper is so well served by one man, as to be kept more than abreast of all rivals as well in mechanical as in editorial excellence. It took many years to place it well ahead. Circulations in those days were not what they are now, and the Times was not then the only expensive paper in London. But 10,000 a day was not bad for 1834 and four years after John Walter’s death in 1847 it was 40,000 and at the outbreak of the Crimean war the circulation rose to 51,000. Compare this with the circulations of other London papers of the time, ranging from 7,644 down to 2,667. There is no doubt about the figures because at that time every copy had to be stamped.

It was under John Walter, the son’s, rule, that the editorial duties expanded to an extent, which divorced them naturally from the proprietorship. The editor of the Times became something in himself. Sir John Stoddart (1810) and Thomas Barnes (1816) at first held this position but there was another power beneath them, hidden at the time, but better known now. Edward Stirling, it was, who as a leader-writer earned for his paper an imperishable nickname by the quaint assurance with which he once wrote: “We thundered out the other day an article on political reform—” Stirling, like the others, was the second Walter’s appointment and one of the many Irishmen, who have successfully carried their heads high in this growing profession. A greater Irishman still was J. T. Delane (1841), the most successful selection, as editor, ever made by a newspaper proprietor. There will be more to say about him later on.

John Walter, the grandson, took over his father’s power in 1847 just before the period of the greatest influence and almost the greatest prosperity of the Times. This was so much personally the work of Delane with the loyal support of his proprietor and the brilliant achievements of his famous subordinate Russell, that it will have to be dealt with more particularly in an account of the relations of these two men. So great was the success of the Times in restoring by its sole influence the efficiency of the army in the Crimea and in destroying the ministry responsible for the early failures in that war that for many years it rode unrivalled and without question on the top of the wave of power. Delane was succeeded as editor by his former correspondent in Constantinople, Chenery (1877) and Chenery again by Mr. Buckle (1884) and the latter in 1912 by Mr. G. G. Robinson. During all this period the high standard of literary excellence and editorial independence of the Times has been unfailingly kept up. The proprietorship passed into the hands of A. F. Walter in 1891 and recently to a company, in which the head of the house of Harmsworth has the chief interest.

Meanwhile modern forces had been at work undermining the commercial monopoly of the Times. The inordinate cost of things had originally been in favour of that organization, which first succeeded in forging ahead of its rivals. The tax on each newspaper originally 4d. in 1815 fell to a penny, and was abolished in 1855. The taxes on advertising were so high that in 1830 the Times paid the sum of £70,000 on this account, at a time when the total receipts from this tax amounted to no more than £170,000.[9] The paper duty was abolished in 1861 in the United Kingdom but this by itself, although important at the time, has had less effect on the relative position of English newspapers than the enormous cheapening of paper from the extension of the kinds of material, of which it can be made. Paper which cost 10d. or 11d. a pound in America during the ’sixties costs now only about one-tenth of that price. Consequently the door has been opened for cheap competition in all directions.

The prestige of the Times stands very high, but it had one shattering experience, the effects of which were far-reaching. The manager in 1886 accepted, as authentic, forged letters, purporting to come from Charles Parnell, and published them. The result was a trial of intense political excitement lasting 128 days and terminating dramatically by the flight and suicide of the forger, Charles Pigott and the utter discomfiture of the paper. Mr. T. H. S. Escott, a contemporary journalist of those days, remarks that “ten minutes’ reflection and the slightest practical use of table talk, that would long ago have reached Printing House Square, would have prevented the imposition’s success. C. S. Parnell never wrote a line except under compulsion. It was simply inconceivable that he should have troubled to disguise his caligraphy in the laborious production of folios representing the work of many days.” He compares the mistake made on this occasion with the trouble taken by Delane on receipt of Blowitz’s secret news of the threat made by Germany to reopen the war with France in 1875. Before publishing this news—after a fortnight’s research Delane had sent his best man, Chenery, to Paris and had made every personal enquiry about the truth of it himself.

It is impossible to extend this brief account by a recital of many other triumphs of the leading British paper. Its supreme position was gained for it by the fortunate conjunction of talents and character of four able men, but looking at its whole career philosophically it is hard to deny that the true creator of this splendid property and source of political power was the old John Walter, who had the courage to fight Pitt and the English aristocracy at a time, when they appeared to be irresistible. It must be remembered that he led the middle-classes against the government in the days when no effective power remained in any institution outside the ruling classes except the press. At that period the wealthy bourgeoisie possessed too few votes to make its real power felt and if they had been less ably and forcibly represented they might ultimately have joined the forces of revolution. But Walter was not a demagogue like Cobbett. He was something of a statesman, while being wholly a journalist. He fought the government with his strongest weapons and beat them whenever they came upon his own ground. His successors filled in very ably and with expert professional skill and cool judgment the gigantic outline, which he left behind him, of a power able to control governments.

The year which imported the first great change in English journalism was 1855, when the stamp duty was finally removed. The first to take advantage of it and to challenge the sole control of middle-class sentiments and pockets was the Daily Telegraph. This paper, founded in 1855, was bought in that very year by a commercial genius, Joseph Moses Levy, who at once enlarged its size and brought its price down to a penny, which was the conquering touch. The property has been handled with cool judgment and the paper has held ever since the first place in the hearts and tastes of the lower middle-class. At one time it had the largest circulation in the world and it is still ahead of all penny rivals both in circulation and advertising revenue. The keynote of its management has always been a judicious conservatism, which knew the right moment to take a forward step but never took any that were unnecessary. It is still in the hands of the same family, whose representative is Lord Burnham. The editor is Mr. J. M. Lesage.

Another paper which came gradually forward about the same time in some rivalry with the Times was the Standard. Founded in 1827 it came into line with the progressive press by being reduced to a penny in 1858. In politics it represented the clergy and landed gentry and aspired to greater power of literary expression than any daily morning paper except the Times. One of its claims to distinction was the fact that the late Marquis of Salisbury, most brilliant of free-lances, wrote freely for it in his earlier days. Owned at one time by Captain Johnston, it was left by him in the charge of a very able journalist and manager, who brought it to great heights of prosperity during the Disraelian period of power. When Mudford relinquished control at the end of the century it began a decline, which has taken it through several proprietorships.

A rival to the Times on another side was the Morning Post, whose history divides itself easily into two halves. Founded in 1772 its early days were tinged with great literary distinction. At the turn of the century it had frequent contributions from Coleridge, Southey, Arthur Young and brought out some of Wordsworth’s greatest sonnets. Mackworth Praed was later a regular contributor. But in accordance with a well-known commercial law that with too much brilliancy there is too little money it passed ultimately to a paper-maker named Crompton in satisfaction of a bad debt. Crompton made a good choice of an editor in Peter Borthwick but it was Borthwick’s son, Algernon, who ultimately raised the paper to great prosperity after having bought it on his own account at a time, when it was still a somewhat speculative venture. The Morning Post through many vicissitudes had always preserved its extremely aristocratic and fashionable connections, to which Borthwick added tactful management, an eager desire for good and early news and a prudent distrust of mere ability. Five years after his purchase of the paper he had the courage to reduce the price to a penny in 1881, and in a few years reaped so assured a reward that he was able to improve his paper without damaging his property. At the present time it maintains a high standard of intellectual ability in many departments and contains more features of merit than any paper in its own rank. Borthwick became Lord Glenesk and the paper is still in the possession of his family. The editor is Mr. Gwynne and one of the noted men on its staff is Mr. Spenser Wilkinson, Professor of Military History at Oxford.

There have come down to us from the great days of the penny press two daily morning papers, whom the stress of competition has driven into the more popular ranks, yet which fortunately preserve several of their most valuable characteristics, as an inheritance of ancient days. The Daily Chronicle and Daily News together in 1904, took the final plunge to a halfpenny price, which will probably remain the ultimate minimum, unless we invent something equivalent to the three centimes price of one paper in Milan. The Daily Chronicle was the latest arrival among London daily morning papers, as it emerged from the Clerkenwell News in 1877 and for many years had a peculiarly strong local hold on London. It represented at one time a milder form of Liberalism, but just before the Boer war it surged up on a wave of aggressive independence of traditional views. The editor at that time, a brilliant journalist, Mr. H. W. Massingham, courageously held opinions about an editor’s rights, which would in effect have made newspaper proprietors rather more like mere annuitants, than some of them cared to be. The assertion of his views by resigning his position came at a moment when commercialism was not losing its hold on the press and his paper came under a more moderate rÉgime during the early stages of the war. After it became a halfpenny paper the Daily Chronicle adopted more popular features, shortening its articles and increasing its headlines. But it has passed through its change very reticently and this feature of considered progressiveness is carefully preserved by the present editor, Mr. Robert Donald. It is the private property of the Lloyd family. The change in the Daily News had much the same material effect on its outward appearance. But the inward transformation was reversed. Mr. (now Sir Edward) Cook in 1900 had taken an imperialist line about the outbreak of the war, while the Cadbury family, who had acquired the paper, took the opposite view. The effect was the same as with the Daily Chronicle. The Daily News now represents with much ability the views of the left wing of the Liberal party, not at all Socialist and quite distinct from the Labour Press. Its policy is highly sentimental and inclined to a disinterested humanitarianism, which opposes narrow national views. It somehow fails to exclude this tinge of feeling from its presentation of news, particularly in foreign affairs, and some people hold this to be a serious journalistic fault.

The Daily News is a paper with a great past in spite of an unfortunate beginning. It was started by Charles Dickens at the height of his fame with some money from his hosts of friends and the more weighty confidence of his publishers. As has happened since on Bouverie Street account all the salaries in Fleet Street were raised. The story has been told more than once and a contemporary professional view of it was given by Russell of the Times. “The 21st of January, 1846, came at last and there was a wild rush for the first number. At the sight of the outer sheet, hope at once lighted up the gloom of Printing House Square, the Strand and Shoe Lane. I am not sure that there were not social rejoicings that night in the editorial chambers, which had been so long beset by dread. Dickens had gathered round him newspaper celebrities, critics in art, music and literature, correspondents, politicians, statists. Yea, even the miscalled penny-a-liner was there. But Dickens was not a good editor; he was the best reporter in London and as a journalist he was nothing more. He had no political instincts or knowledge and was ignorant of and indifferent to what are called Foreign Affairs; indeed he told me himself that he never thought about them till the Revolution of 1848. He had appointed as manager his father, whom he is said to have immortalized as Micawber....” Forster, who had been Dickens’ chief backer, took up the burden after three months for another three months himself but it was Eyre Crowe, as editor, and Charles Wentworth Dilke, as manager, who pulled the venture round into smoother waters. Their great success was made in handling the revolutions of 1848 and the complicated European disturbances which followed. Similarly it was the success of Sir John Robinson in dealing with the Franco-German war and the brilliant successes of Archibald Forbes, which brought the Daily News once more into the front rank of papers. The present editor is Mr. A. G. Gardiner.

In the history of English newspapers the most astonishing sky-rocket came with the advent of the Daily Mail in 1896. Its immediate and phenomenal success was one of those things, which can be explained afterwards, but was little expected at the time. It was the final result of a movement of great vitality in the press, which up to that time had remained unnoticed. What that movement was we shall see, when we come to discuss the various forms taken by our weekly press and the remarkable revolution, which started in the provinces and bore such astonishing fruit in London. The Daily Mail had just time to make an assured success in London and Manchester before the outbreak of the African war, an event, which has had the effect of making a fresh dichotomy in our politics and in all that depends primarily on politics including newspapers and to some extent society. It led to a new division between the sheep and the goats with a vehement acceleration in the old-time controversy, as to which was which. In that rearrangement of ideas all our newspapers bore their part but to the scientific management of all the arts of improved combustion of feelings and sentiments the Daily Mail added an energy which carried all before it. The use of the pens of Rudyard Kipling and of an exceedingly able special writer, the late G. W. Steevens, lent a striking advertisement to the popular passion but did not really create it. The years 1899 and 1900 offered an opening to a newcomer in journalism, which is not likely to be repeated. Here was a nation which had been talking about war for forty-five years without seriously experiencing it. Here was a journalism, not inefficient and not unobservant of new tendencies, but inclined to believe that dignity was profitable and that every wise man would look round twice before taking any serious step. The result to those, who had the privilege of taking advantage of it, was a commercial success at least equivalent to that of old John Walter, a century before, more easily realized and with possibly less far-reaching consequences. The editor is Mr. Marlowe and the property with several other papers is substantially in the hands of Lord Northcliffe and his associates. With a brief reference to the Daily Express, the Daily Mail’s strong popular rival on its own side in politics, to the financial papers such as the Financial Times, and the latest addition to London dailies, the Financier and Bullionist, founded in 1870 and London’s chief sporting daily, the Sportsman, owned by the Ashley family, we must pass on to the evening papers of the Metropolis. At one time London was very considerably behind the provinces in the development of its popular evening papers largely owing to the great cost of distribution and also because Londoners had always been more addicted to the morning paper habit. But of late the Evening News and the Star have placed themselves in the front rank of successful commercial exploitation. But they can hardly be said to exercise any serious influence on opinion. This function is exercised however to a very considerable degree by the penny evening papers, who secure the attention of the commercial and professional classes on their way home to dinner and often exercise an influence equal to that of the most powerful morning daily. They are able also to use effectually all the material and comment supplied by the morning press.

Of the four London penny evening papers the oldest is the Globe (1803). In its young days it was Liberal and preponderantly literary. It sheltered both Thomas Love Peacock and “Ingoldsby” Barham. At the present day in common with the Evening Standard, once the St. James’s Gazette (1880), it more or less repeats the function of a morning paper, as being chiefly devoted to news, with comment, as a subordinate feature. The Pall Mall Gazette is the spoilt child of journalism. Founded in 1865 under the editorship of Frederick Greenwood, it sprang at once to the position of being the darling favourite of intellectual London, which it has never entirely lost in spite of alternate periods of hideous sensationalism and considered dulness, in spite of a complete reversal of politics and of every imaginable transformation of “make-up” and journalistic devices. In its early years it had a ring of noted contributors, such as George Eliot, Charles Reade, Sir James Stephen, R. H. Hutton, James Hannay, Anthony Trollope and Tom Hughes. Through the brother of the editor, James Greenwood, and his adventures as an “Amateur Casual” it first introduced to London the sensational realism, which was afterwards carried by a later editor, W. T. Stead, to intolerable lengths. Besides Stead, Lord Morley and Sir Edward Cook have been editors and Lord Milner was once a member of its staff. It is now the property of Mr. W. W. Astor and is edited by one of the most influential journalists in London, Mr. Garvin. It is safe to say that no Conservative morning paper wields more power in the councils of the party than the Pall Mall Gazette.

In this respect it meets a worthy rival on the Liberal side in the Westminster Gazette. Founded by Sir Edward Cook and the late Sir George Newnes as an offshoot of the Pall Mall Gazette in 1892, in consequence of the staff of the latter having to go into the street, because they could not manage a change of opinions with a change of proprietorship, it has always held a very remarkable position in its own party. It is the only penny daily paper in London, which supports the Liberal party and government. Its editor, Mr. J. A. Spender, has thus had a greatness thrust upon him, which few could consistently maintain. What his paper has to say every day on current politics receives an attention from the leader writers in provincial papers of the next morning, the extent of which they might be reluctant to acknowledge. The Westminster Gazette may be classed decidedly amongst those important things, which we are accustomed to call an “Institution.” For so young a paper its success has been phenomenal and one of the deep-rooted causes of its power is due to the fact, that it is probably the only paper in the capital on the Liberal side in politics, which is habitually read by an influential section of its opponents.

Curiously enough the Labour press in the United Kingdom is still in its infancy, which is less than one would expect in a country, where Trade Unionism has been so strong. Hitherto it has been confined to one or two weeklies, such as the Clarion, founded by Mr. Robert Blatchford, a writer of unusual talent, the Labour Leader and others. But within the last year London has its Labour morning daily, the Daily Herald and the Daily Citizen is shortly to appear in Manchester.

When we come to consider the weekly and monthly periodicals of the metropolis the number and variety of them is staggering. It is possible to deal with them only in groups and mention expressly a few, which must be taken to be not necessarily the most important ones but those which are perhaps the best representatives of their class. In dealing with illustrated journalism we have not yet altogether done with the dailies, as London has three daily illustrated papers, the Daily Graphic, a penny paper and two halfpenny papers the Daily Mirror and Daily Sketch. The rise of the last two to sensational circulations is probably the most striking new feature in newspaperdom since the meteoric success of the Daily Mail. The Daily Mirror was accidentally a pioneer in this direction because it was actually founded by the Harmsworth group with the intention of being a ladies’ daily paper and as such it was an absolute failure. But the publishers with a commercial acumen that was almost uncanny swerved in their design at once, dropped all the feminine part of it and continued it as a picture newspaper of the simplest kind with results in a bounding circulation, which is far from having reached its limit. This phenomenon is intimately connected with the popular success of the cinematograph theatres and points to a trait in the public of to-day, which will probably go far before it is exhausted. It is due to the intense modern desire to see things and judge them, each for oneself. Written matter, views, opinions and criticisms are not desired by the masses. There is a very marked desire for information but solely of a positive kind. Men are inclined to shun guidance or leadership and intensely desirous of forming first-hand judgments about everything. Of weekly illustrated papers London has quite a number. There are the pioneers of this class, the Illustrated London News, founded by Herbert Ingram in 1842, the Graphic (1869), the Sketch (1892), the Sphere (1901), the Tatler, all three founded by Mr. Clement Shorter, and Country Life. Of these the latter is the most original in character, being concerned with the pursuits, sports and residences of the country gentry. By throwing open to the middle-classes of the towns all the inner history of the life and manners of a secluded class it has achieved a remarkable success. The illustrated press in England has reached a very considerable standard of technical excellence in reproduction and shows great ingenuity in obtaining pictures and photographs; but it has never succeeded in obtaining reading matter to hold its own against the pictures. At one time it was markedly ahead of foreign effort in the same sphere, when there was little else abroad but L’Illustration, Ueber Land und Meer, and Harper’s and Collier’s Weeklies. This is hardly true at the present moment; the French and German illustrations now surpass ours in technical excellence and for reading matter the Philadelphia Saturday Evening Post is unexcelled. The circulation of the latter is probably four or five times as great as all the English illustrated weeklies combined.

Some of the reproaches to which the British daily press is perhaps open, for instance, with regard to the meagre amount of space devoted to matters of purely scientific or intellectual interest, as compared with the German press, or as to the somewhat easy-going critical standards which prevail in their treatment of literary and artistic questions, may be redeemed by urging the merits, variety and influence of our important and serious weekly periodicals. No country in the world has such a diversity in this respect nor maintains so consistently a high standard. Whereas a German requires his most serious interests to be taken care of in his daily paper, an Englishman is more indulgent because he knows that his hobbies and specialities can be properly nourished by a suitable weekly paper, of which we have all kinds. In finance and banking we have the Statist (1878); for general economic questions and the review of investments the Economist (1843). In the special British interests in sports, games and country pursuits generally we have that quite unique organ the Field, founded in 1853. This project was originally started by Webster, an actor, but not carried by him to any degree of success. It came into the hands of Mr. Sergeant Cox, who besides being a leading lawyer, was something of a publishing genius, for he not only carried the Field to success, but also established prosperously the Queen, the chief ladies’ paper and the Bazaar, as well. The Field ranks as an authority in international sport and has a following far outside this country. Its present editor is Mr. T. A. Cook.

In the realm of general culture and literary criticism the British “heavy weeklies” deservedly stand very high. But it is in accordance with the serious nature of the English and Scotch genius that literary questions are dealt with not by themselves alone but are tinged with either a political or religious spirit, thus dividing their readers into watertight compartments. The first of these in point of dignity is the AthenÆum, founded in 1828, with which are associated the well-known names of the elder Dilke, Hepworth Dixon, Norman Maccoll, and Mr. J. C. Francis. Of higher literary quality may be ranked the Times Literary Supplement, which although nominally a part of the Times is practically an independent weekly under the charge of Mr. B. L. Richmond. As Literature under the hands of H. D. Traill it attained at once a very high standard, which has been steadily raised without any falling away. The reviews in its columns have the widest range of interest and learning and they are surpassed in serious excellence by no other journal in the world.

A very famous name revived appears in the Spectator which was founded in 1828 by a group of Radicals round Joseph Hume. Its great days of literary and political influence date from the combined control of the paper by R. H. Hutton and Meredith Townsend. At the present moment it is probably more widely known outside the bounds of the kingdom than any other of our weeklies. Under the editorship of Mr. J. St. Loe Strachey it combines moderate Conservative views with a strong support of Free Trade. Another famous but more modern name is the Saturday Review, a paper which at one time employed more brilliant pens than were ever elsewhere united in one cause in England. In its golden days it was served together by the late Marquis of Salisbury, Sir Henry Maine, Goldwin Smith, Sir William Harcourt and Mr. Walter Pollock. It has always supported an extreme Conservatism. A newer review of the same type but even more pronouncedly political than either of the others is the Nation, which was founded by Mr. Massingham in 1907 to fill a gap made in Liberal journalism by the termination of the Speaker, whose place it assumed. It is conducted with intense seriousness and great ability and in spite of the fact that its intentions are mainly social and political, the literary standard maintained is very high. It would be impossible to omit the insertion here of one excellent little literary weekly, which circulates widely at the price of one penny, T.P.’s Weekly. Humble as it appears by the side of its sixpenny contemporaries it yet probably does as much to keep up a genuine and popular taste for literature as the best of them. The editor, Mr. T. P. O’Connor is one of the most experienced and versatile journalists in the kingdom.

Closely allied to the literary and political reviews are the religious papers, which are of all prices and connections but resemble one another in this, that, after pursuing their primary object of representing a section of religious thought, they are to a considerable extent also literary reviews. The paper, which is most obviously the connecting link between the two classes is the British Weekly. Comparatively a late comer into the field and originally founded to lend its support to Nonconformity in general, yet the extraordinarily wide and well equipped mind of its editor, Sir Robertson Nicoll, has elevated it almost to the status of a literary magazine. Coming to more specifically religious papers we have first of all the Guardian (1846), the official representative of Anglican views and interests. Its former editor (1878–81) Mr. D. C. Lathbury raised it up to be a power in the country, which has been continued by the Rev. Walter Hobhouse to the present time. Since 1905 it has been a penny paper. The High Church party is represented by the Church Times (1863) and the Evangelical fringe, which runs into Nonconformity, by the Christian World (1857) founded by James Clarke, whose son, Mr. Herbert Clarke is the present editor. This is largely an independent journal, whose readers are drawn to a great extent from those both inside and outside of the Church. The Christian (1870) is still further advanced in the Low Church direction, as its old name, the Revival testifies. Liberal views in religious matters are supported by the Christian Commonwealth, whose present editor, Mr. Albert Dawson had been secretary to Dr. Joseph Parker. It has come to a great extent under the influence of the Rev. R. J. Campbell. The Roman Church in Great Britain has a very important organ, The Tablet (1840), which, when it was founded by Frederick Lucas was to some extent independent and rather advanced in thought for those times. Since 1868 it has become official by passing into the hands of Cardinal Vaughan and it is now controlled by Cardinal Bourne. Its present editor is Mr. J. Snead-Cox and well-known contributors are Mr. Wilfrid Ward, Monsignor Benson, Mr. W. S. Lilly, Mr. Hilaire Belloc, Alice Meynell, and Katharine Tynan. The Jewish Chronicle (1841) fulfils an obvious mission. It attracts attention, as a periodical, by the singular feature of adding to the time-honoured classification of Births, Marriages and Deaths, also Betrothals, Forthcoming Marriages and In Memoriam notices, the distinction between numbers four and five in the series being original. The articles, while written in a religious spirit, cover a wide ground of interest and exhibit no narrow prejudices. The editor is Mr. Israel Davis. The most singular of the religious papers comes last, the War Cry, which circulates to the extent of about 300,000 weekly among members of the Salvation Army at home and about the same number in twenty-four foreign editions abroad. As it accepts no advertisements, it has to depend entirely on sales for its revenue.

The professional and technical press of Great Britain is too complicated and extensive for any one mind to grasp. It includes a myriad of small papers catering for little pockets of trade and others which in their own sphere have all the authority of the Times itself. They obtain support from an amount of advertising very much larger in proportion to their text than the ordinary dailies or general weeklies so that they sometimes constitute properties of great value. To begin with the medical profession the earliest surviving paper devoted to this subject is the Lancet (1823) whose story merits a little digression. Its founder was Dr. Thomas Wakley, a man of unusual character and resolution, who in the ordinary course of events would probably have lived an uneventful and successful life as a general practitioner. But he was brought painfully in touch with public events in a sufficiently odd way to justify repetition. He was still a young man at the time of the Cato Street conspiracy for which Arthur Thistlewood was condemned and hanged. Now the executioner of Thistlewood conceived the dramatic idea of cutting off his head and holding it up to the public saying, “This is the head of a traitor.” This incident had a singular reaction on Wakley. He was then a doctor attending at St. Thomas’s Hospital and for some unknown reason a popular rumour, which spread among the roughs with whom Thistlewood was a hero, attributed this decapitation to a St. Thomas’s doctor, quite unjustly. At any rate Dr. Wakley was set upon one night and badly treated by some unknown scoundrels, his house was burned down and his practice was ruined. Not only that, but his story of his wrongs was hardly believed and he had to undertake a difficult lawsuit in order to recover his insurance money. Wakley was greatly distressed and angered at his misfortune and owing to his friendship with Cobbett and other journalists turned his mind to the press and he planned and founded the Lancet. This has come through to very substantial success after a singularly stormy start in life. In one year he had to stand eighteen libel actions but he won them all. As an illustration of the way journalism was looked upon in those early days we may quote from a report of one of Sir Astley Cooper’s lectures in which he specifically referred to the Lancet and stated that though he could not prevent the report of his lectures he had succeeded in inducing the editor to keep his name out of the paper, for, he said, “I felt myself disgraced and degraded by my name forever appearing in the press.” There are not many men, who would echo those sentiments now. The editor of the Lancet is Dr. Squire Sprigge, who has written Wakley’s life.

Another later rival in the same field is the British Medical Journal, the official organ of the British Medical Association, a body founded as far back as 1832 under the name of the Provincial and Surgical Association by Sir Charles Hastings. In 1856 the Association took its present title and issued its journal as a regular medical organ. The connection with its parent organization lends considerable weight to its opinions and adds to its technical excellence but may to some extent limit its independence in discussing questions affecting merely the interests of the profession.

The legal profession is not calculated to support a press of its own as advertising is not encouraged and there is no general trade or commerce attached to it. For the reports of cases they depend on the efficient rendering of the Times Law Reports and for special legal points on the Solicitor’s Journal. The engineering profession is so closely allied with one of the most powerful and wealthy industries of the country, that it supports a number of wealthy papers. Of these the oldest is now the Engineer founded in 1856 by Edward Charles Healey and still in the hands of the same family. The present editor is Mr. L. Pendred. Engineering was founded ten years later and it is edited in conjunction by Messrs. Maw and Raworth. The two earliest electrical papers are the Electrical Review (1872) and the Electrician (1878). Besides these are many others both weekly and monthly of which perhaps the most remarkable is a workman’s paper, the Mechanical World published at 1d. in Manchester. Allied to these and overlapping the engineering trade are the Iron and Coal Trades Review, the Hardware Journal and the Ironmonger, the chief journal of the metal trades. The latter was founded in 1859 by the old family firm of Morgan Bros., who are proprietors also of the Chemist and Druggist, the Grocer and other papers. The present editor is Mr. A. C. Maygis. Perhaps the oldest of all technical journals is the Mining Journal, founded in 1835. Another old established property dealing with an entirely different line is the Gardener’s Chronicle (1841) founded by, among others, Sir Joseph Paxton, Dilke and the printer of Punch, Bradbury. The first editor was Dr. Lindley and famous contributors have been besides Paxton, Sir Joseph and Sir William Hooker, Berkeley, Sir Thistleton Dyer and Thomas Moore, the curator of the Chelsea physic garden. A new arrival among trade papers, but a very wealthy one, is the Draper’s Record. This property had an early precarious existence until it came into the hands of the late D. G. Macrae, who is said to have given it so many weeks to get to the stage of making a profit, which it did in the very last week allowed to it. Its income now runs into five figures.

With regard to our one established humorous journal Punch, founded in the same year, 1841, as the Gardener’s Chronicle and by the same printer, it is as impossible to say anything new about it as to leave it out. Famous men without number have written and drawn for it, of whom I may mention, Mark Lemon, Douglas Jerrold, John Leech, Sir John Tenniel, Charles Keene and Du Maurier. The present editor, Mr. Owen Seaman, is a supreme master of polished and pointed verse.

After this brief and inadequate account of the technical press we must turn a moment’s attention to the general weeklies of London, which have the largest circulations in the world and represent the really popular tastes of the clerk, the artisan and the growing boy. Their history is peculiarly interesting because it includes the origin of the most vital and astonishing revolution that our press, at any rate, has ever seen. But before I come to describe this revolution we must notice first the three or four metropolitan weeklies, which supply the news, mostly of criminal or sporting matters, to the seven and a half millions, who live in and around London. The oldest is Lloyd’s Weekly News, established in 1842, which has reached a circulation of one and a quarter millions in round figures. The News of the World (1843) was at first a family paper published at threepence with a large circulation for those times, which fell away under old-fashioned management almost to nothing. But it came into the hands of two able business men, the proprietors of the Cardiff Mail, the late Lascelles Carr and Sir George Riddell, who modernized it, not without some loss of sedateness, and raised its circulation to two and a quarter millions a week, in all probability the largest in the world. Reynold’s Weekly News (1852), an extremely Radical popular organ and the People, allied with the Globe, each have a large following. Finally the Sunday Chronicle of Manchester is the best representative of some very widely circulated papers in the provinces with issues running up to a million in many cases.

The revolution in the English press, which has extended to every corner of journalism, except the “heavy weeklies,” originally started in the provinces and spread to London with three rather insignificant gossipy and anecdotic penny weeklies. But the causes of the movement were very far-reaching and may be said to have had their true origin in Forster’s Education Act of 1870. This measure brought into existence as new readers an enormous number of immature minds ready for the simplest information and oldest stories, as yet quite unsophisticated and disinclined to raffishness or vice. The older newspaper proprietors utterly failed to see the growth of these new and potential readers and made no effort to meet their needs. In fact one may say that it was almost impossible for journalists of the old school for the first time to cater for the untrained ineptitude of people who were equipped with mobilized wits and eager minds. The task was undertaken by entirely new men.

The pioneer of this movement was the late Sir George Newnes, who made the fortunate venture of starting Tit-Bits in Manchester in 1880. The name exactly describes the paper. The next in order was Answers, started in 1888 by the two young brothers Harmsworth, one of whom is now a peer and the other a knight. This paper was originally intended to contain answers to correspondents but, as no one corresponded, the paper had to become something else, so it became a fair imitation of Tit-Bits. The third Pearson’s Weekly, was begun by C. Arthur Pearson, who was for some time Newnes’s manager in London.

If the movement had stopped there, it would not have had an important influence on the British press. But these pioneers were all men of exceptional ability, activity and insight. Their rapid success gave them command of great sums of money and the power of obtaining more of it from the public. They had moreover an inside view of the public mind, which enabled them to see, not only what the public mind required at the moment but what it was likely to want next year. Because it must be borne in mind that the newly-invented public of the Education Act, which was satisfied with Tit-Bits in the eighties wanted something more in the next decade and a further advance in the new century. So the houses of Newnes, Pearson and Harmsworth became great publishing firms bringing out new periodicals, books and ultimately daily papers in great profusion. All three firms came to considerable fortune and left their mark on the daily press. Newnes established successfully the Westminster Gazette, Mr. Pearson the Daily Express and the Harmsworths the Daily Mail. The latter house has obtained the most striking and comprehensive success. Their enterprises have divided themselves into two groups. One, the original proprietors of Answers consisting of Lord Northcliffe and his brother Sir Harold Harmsworth, has produced a series of successful but trivial papers and has overlaid on that a popular educational publishing system on a grand scale, which is of much greater benefit to the public than is usually recognized. Their second venture in conjunction with Mr. Kennedy Jones embraces the Evening News, the Daily Mail, the Daily Mirror and other papers. This energetic, self-assertive and ever-increasing popular press excites in many old-fashioned readers something akin to a disgust, that is quite needless. These good folk should recognize that what is suited to a million readers can hardly cater also for the tastes of a restricted cultivated class. If the great American circulation-monger Hearst comes over to England, as rumours repeatedly assert, it will be apparent at once how much better the Daily Mail is, than it need be.

Perhaps the only branch of the weekly press, which has not yet found a niche in our Valhalla, is the group of ladies’ papers. The doyenne of these is certainly the Queen, started by Serjeant Cox and more or less followed in style by the others, which devote approximately the same proportion of space to illustrations of fashions and brides and titled hostesses. As they are mainly high-priced, well-printed journals appealing only to wealthy readers, they are doomed to a fatal mediocrity and give a male reader, who should imagine that women read nothing else, a painful impression of their intellectual status. Happily there is no reason to suppose that this is the case. Besides the Queen, we have the Lady’s Pictorial (1880); the Lady (1885); Woman (1889); the Gentlewoman (1890); and the Ladies’ Field (1898). On the other hand lady journalists, writing for papers of all kinds including the leading dailies, have already made a very considerable mark on our press. In some respects they have shown a greater aptitude for this calling than men, but they are not able to get about the country to all kinds of places so well as men and they cannot be expected nor even asked to endure the manifold hardships often required from reporters and correspondents.