Jonathan and His Continent Part 15

_Balfour doesn't care a_----

During his late visit to America, Mr. Joseph Chamberlain was invited by the members of a New York club to a dinner given in his honour. At the eleventh hour the right honourable gentleman, being detained in Was.h.i.+ngton on State business, was obliged to send and excuse himself.

Next day, I read in the _New York Herald_:

_One dinner less for Joe._

While I was in the United States, the papers were constantly speaking of a financier named Jacob Sharp. Accused of fraudulent dealings, this gentleman had been arrested, but subsequently released, untried. The press indulged in much comment on the matter, and such remarks as: "All mortals have their trials except financiers."

One morning the newspapers were obliged to desist from their attacks: poor Jacob had pa.s.sed away from earth.

The same day, I met the editor of one of the large daily papers.

"Well," said I, "here is a fine occasion for a grand head-line to-morrow; you are not going to let it slip, I suppose."

"What do you mean?"

"How can you ask? Why, _Jacob gone up the ladder_! of course."

"Splendid!" he exclaimed.

"_Pends-toi_, my dear editor, thou didst not find that one."

"I must have it. How much will you take for it?"

"I'll make you a present of it," said I.

Next morning, the death of the financier was told in two columns, headed:

_Jacob gone up the ladder._

If ever I wanted to apply for a journalistic post in America, this would be my most weighty recommendation in the eyes of my future chief.

I did not know what lively reading was until I saw an American newspaper.

American journalism is, above all, a sensational journalism. If the facts reported are exact, so much the better for the paper; if not, so much the worse for the facts. Beyond the date, few statements are reliable. But the papers are always lively reading. Picture to yourself a country where the papers are all _Pall Mall Gazettes_, with this difference, that the articles, instead of being always by "One who knows," are oftener by "One who doesn't."

To succeed as a journalist in America, it is not necessary to be a man of letters, to be able to write leading articles _a la_ John Lemoinne; the only qualification necessary is to be able to amuse and interest the reader; this must be done at any cost; all styles are admissible except the heavy.

The accounts of trials in the police courts or at the courts of a.s.size eclipse the novels of M. du Boisgobey. I, who never read tribunal reports in the English newspapers, was more than once surprised in America to find myself deeply interested in the account of a trial for murder, following all the details of the case and unwilling to miss a word. Alternately moved and horrified, I would read to the end, then, pa.s.sing my hand across my forehead, I would say to myself: "How silly; it is mostly fiction, after all!"

The American journalist must be spicy, lively, bright. He must know how to, not _report_, but _relate_ an accident, a trial, a conflagration, and, at a push, make up an article of one or two columns in length upon the most insignificant incident. He must be interesting, _readable_, as the English call it with reason. His eyes and ears must be always open, every sense on the alert; for, before all and above all, he must keep ahead in this race for news; if he should once let himself be outdone by a _confrere_, his reputation would be blasted.

But you will perhaps exclaim: "What is the poor fellow to do when there is no news?" What is he to do? And his imagination, is it given him for no purpose? If he have no imagination, he had better give up the idea of being a journalist in America, as he will soon find out.

This is how one American reporter made a reputation at a bound. The Chicago people are still proud to tell the story.

The young fellow was taking a walk one evening in a retired part of the town, on the look-out for what adventure history does not say. All at once, a human form, lying motionless on the ground, attracted the sight of our hero. He drew near to it, stooped down, and found it to be a corpse. His first impulse was to immediately seek a policeman and tell him of the discovery.

But a second idea came; it was more practical, and he adopted it. This was it:

His paper comes out at two in the afternoon, so that by running straight to the police station he would be making the matter public, and furnis.h.i.+ng his brother reporters with a column or two for their morning papers. It is a catch, this corpse, and not to be lightly given away.

What to do? Simply this. Our journalist drags the body into an empty building near at hand, and carefully hides it. At eleven next morning, he _discovers_ it by chance, goes as fast as possible to make his declaration to the police, and then hastens away to the office of his newspaper with two columns of description written overnight. At two o'clock, the paper announces "Mysterious murder in Chicago: discovery of the victim by one of our reporters!"

The morning papers were outdone; the evening ones nowhere.

This is the kind of talent you must have in order to stand a chance of making your way in American journalism.

Crimes, divorces, elopements, mesalliances, gossip of all kinds, furnish the papers with three-quarters of their contents. A mysterious affair, skilfully handled, will make the fortune of a paper.

For several weeks, during the months of February and March, the American papers were talking about a young lady of good family in Was.h.i.+ngton, who, it appeared, had become engaged to a young Indian named Chaska, a tawny brave of the Sioux tribe. There were descriptions of the wild man; descriptions of the festivities which were to be held in his honour at the camp of the great chief, Swift Bird; descriptions of the gorgeous ornaments with which the members of the tribe would be adorned--nothing was wanting: day after day fresh details were added. Then the despair of the young lady's family was pictured. The threats of an indignant father, the tears of a distressed mother, nothing, it seemed, could touch the heart of the fair one but the piercing eyes of Chaska.

At last the marriage takes place, not only in broad day, but in church.

It is not Swift Bird who blesses the young couple; it is the parish clergyman. Romance gives place to verity; and, without the slightest sign of being disconcerted, the papers announce (in a few lines only this time) that the young lady has married a clerk in the _Indian Affairs Office_.

All this is as nothing. It is when there is a criminal case to handle that American journalism becomes simply sublime.

The criminal is no sooner arrested than the reporters hurry to his cell, and get him to undergo the curious operation now known throughout the world as _interviewing_. He is treated with all the consideration due to a man in his position. "Mr. So and So, of the _Earthquake_, presents his compliments to Mr. Blank, charged with murder, and requests the favour of a few minutes' conversation." To be accused of an important crime gives a man a certain standing in America. The more atrocious the crime, the more interesting the accused; and columns upon columns of print supply the public with his slightest sayings and doings. He is the hero of the day. From the prison, the reporters go to hunt up the witnesses, whom they also interview in their turn. Regular examinations, these interviews!

If there is any love story mixed in with the affair, if there are a few piquant details, you may easily imagine that the public gets the worth of its penny.

The American is gallant, and when the victim is of the feminine gender, I can a.s.sure you the accused generally gets a pretty drubbing in the press.

American journalism carries the spirit of enterprise still further. Not content with trying criminals, it hunts them out and brings them to justice. Policeman, magistrate, public prosecutor, judge--the journalist is all these.

I know of several American newspapers having quite a staff of detectives--yes, detectives. If a criminal escapes justice, or an affair remains surrounded by mystery, these new-fas.h.i.+oned journalists are let loose every morning on a search for the criminal, or to try and pick up threads of information that may lead to the clearing up of the mystery.

These detectives are employed, not only in cases of crime, but work just as hard over a divorce or an elopement: it is journalism turned private detective agency. A newspaper that can boast of having brought a criminal to justice, discovered the hiding-place of an unfaithful wife, or run a ravisher to earth, is rewarded by an increased sale forthwith.

The slightest thing that can make the paper attractive is seized upon with avidity. The headings, which I have spoken of, are called into requisition on all occasions, and there is nothing, down to the mere announcements, that will not suggest to a wide-awake editor one of these wonderful eye-ticklers. Thus the Sat.u.r.day list of preachers for the morrow is headed in the _New York Herald_:

_Salvation for all_; or _Guiding Sinners Heavenwards_, or _Dodging the Devil_.

In one paper, you will see the list of births, marriages, and deaths, headed respectively: _The Cradle_, _the Altar_, and _the Tomb_; in another, more facetious: _Hatches_, _Matches_, and _Dispatches_.

In a society paper, much given to gossip, I noticed the news of the fas.h.i.+onable world distributed under the following t.i.tles:

_Cradle_ (list of births);

_Flirtations_ (list of young people suspected of a tender pa.s.sion for each other);

_Engagements_ (promises of marriage);

_Tiffs_ (sic);