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Typo: A Monthly Newspaper and Literary Review, Volume 7
[miscellaneous paragraphs]
The following is quoted as a whole tragedy of talent unrecognized: « There are four in the family, and all have genius. The daughter writes poetry no one will publish; the son writes plays no one will act; the mother writes novels no one will read; and the father writes cheques no one will cash! »
A « star » actor, while in Wellington, lately received the following letter from a stage-stricken youth: « Dear sir—I hope you will excuse Me takeing the liberty of writeing this note to you but I have wrote a dramer and would like to dispose of it if you wish and let Me know I will send it to you so as you can look over it I am Just writeing to the paper to know if there has ever been a dramer wrote before in New Zealand. » He ought to send his play to some of the country papers that publish original poetry. It could scarcely be worse than the average spring effusions. But even a Wanganui weekly might draw the line at a « dramer. »
In mischief, the boys in a New Zealand mining town would be hard to beat. Lately, a traveller for a wholesale house had an experience which he will long remember. He was pushing a certain « fire annihilator grenade, » and employed the local youths to collect old packing-cases, &c., for a big bonfire which was to be swiftly extinguished by the specific. The boys cheerfully did as they were asked—and more. The exhibition was advertised, and was largely attended. The structure was well ablaze when the first bottle was thrown. To the amazement of the company, a tremendous column of fire rose to the heavens, and a second and third grenade, hurled into the flames with the energy of despair, produced alarming results. The young wretches had secretly got access to the sample bottles, emptied their contents, and re-filled them with kerosine!
« The Sins of Editors » is the subject of a communicated article in the Stationer, Printer, and Fancy Trades Register for August. Several of the well-known « shady » practices of the lower class of papers are enumerated, but some of the instances given are not of every-day experience, and are worth quoting. A proprietor-editor (he says) commissioned me to translate some articles for his paper. Two months after my translations had been published, I wrote and asked for the remuneration, which, so far, had not been forthcoming. The reply to my presumptuous application was a letter couched in terms of the greatest astonishment, and containing the information that my name had been published at the head of the articles as the translator, and that that was considered ample! Strangely enough, I did not view the matter in that light at all, and insisted upon being paid for laborious work which I had been requested to undertake. Finally, after much trouble, I received fifteen shillings, this being, the editor said, the usual rate of pay for three long closely-printed newspaper columns. And this was one of the wealthiest weekly newspapers in the kingdom! Another very wealthy, important, and favorite weekly newspaper is guilty of a sin which is the most exasperating of all. The editor actually files all the manuscript he receives, and if your contribution is not suited to his paper, you get it back, if you have been careful to sends stamps for the purpose, with a clumsy hole pricked through every page. Of course, it is necessary to write the whole thing over again before you can submit it to any other editor, and I think the carelessness and selfishness of such wilful destruction of the property of others is nothing short of disgraceful.
The Electrician has been endeavoring to discover which is thə best language for the telephone, and has arrived at the conclusion that the Chinese language must be awarded the palm. The Celestials speak principally in monosyllables, with simple rising and falling inflections, and the wires take kindly to this form of conversation.
Mr C. H. M'Gurrin, the famous American shorthand and type writer has given a demonstration of his wonderful speed abilities in the use of the Remington machine, when he succeeded in writing 208 words in a minute, thus beating all previous records in the history of typewriters. The sentence used was that always employed in speed tests, « Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of the party, » which was written over and over again Mr M'Gurrin, while blindfolded, wrote from dictation 117 words a minute, and also transcribed at about the same rate a brief address while it was being delivered.
The following letter has been received by a well-known firm: « To the Ben. Franklin Printing Company, Chicago, Ill. Gentlemen Sirs,— I would be pleased to see some of your publications. Please send me some samples, especially your almanac, Poor Richard, and any other samples you have to send out. If you, have a prospectus, send me some, and I will take pleasure tacking them up in conspicuous places. » - « Unfortunately, » comments the National Publisher and Printer, « the last Poor Richard's almanac went out of print over a hundred years ago. Perhaps the writer can obtain a copy of one if he is willing to pay a dollar for each year that has elapsed since its publication. »
The late Mr P. H. Gosse worked out the dimensions of the New Jerusalem in cubic feet, and thence estimated the population it could accommodate. An equally mathematical writer in the Boston Transcript has calculated the present population of the celestial and infernal regions respectively. The absence of fundamental data renders it difficult to check his returns; therefore we may (provisionally) assume their correctness. According to this authority, heaven contains 1,800,000,000 souls, and hell, 175,000,000,000. The only practical conclusions we can draw from these figures are that there is some consolation for the man who generally finds himself in the minority; and further, that government by the majority is presumably infernal.
The London correspondent of the Birmingham Daily Post says that the election afforded an example of newspaper enterprise which was at once so novel and so effective as to deserve special mention. The Evening News and Post printed each night an « election edition » for every London borough that was being polled, a blank space being left for the numbers. A batch of these papers was taken to some convenient spot in the constituency, with a staff of men, who immediately the figures were known, impressed them with rubber type on the blank space, and these copies were sold by hundreds in the streets as soon the returning officer had officially announced the result. The novel experiment worked with success throughout, and is to be numbered among the curiosities of present-day journalism.
Col. Ingersoll is suing the Rev. A. C. Dixon, a Baptist minister of New York, for alleged slander in a statement made about his relation to publishers of indecent literature. The words, as given in the New York Herald, are:—« Infidelity fosters impure literature. A few years ago it was found that pictures and impure publications were passing through the mails. Anthony Comstock decided to stop it. On investigation, whom should he find representing publishers of impure literature but Col. Ingersoll, paid to pollute the minds of the young of this generation. » Mr Dixon admits using the words quoted, but not in public, as alleged, and herein is the novelty of the situation. Mr Dixon uses a phonograph, and when preparing his sermons, speaks into the phonograph; the phonograph repeats it to his private secretary, and when reporters desire abstracts of his sermons, the secretary writes them off the phonograph. In this case, the passage quoted had been spoken into the phonograph, and was taken from it and sent to the New York papers. The remarkable part, however, is that Mr Dixon did not actually repeat these words in public, « but I should have done so, » he says, « if they had not escaped my mind. » To avert any possible reproaches of cowardice, he reaffirms them, and declares his willingness to meet the charges before a court of justice. The case will raise several novel legal points. The ordinary reader, however, will wonder why the complainant has waited so long to clear himself. The same charge was publicly made years ago by a more prominent man than Mr Dixon—the Rev. Joseph Cook, in his Boston lectures. It has been printed and reprinted in America and England, and circulated by tens of thousands. There was a notable breach in the American freethought camp on this very question.