n_, news seven days old from New York to
Boston was swift enough for an express. Now, if we cannot obtain the
news from Washington in less than the same number of minutes, we rave
and storm, and talk of starting new telegraph companies. _Then_, four
snug little foolscap papers a month contained all that the world was
doing that any one cared to know. Now, a paper published every morning
as large as a mainsail needs a supplement; and I presume there is not an
editor in any of our large cities who publishes half the new matter he
gets prepared.

The second American newspaper was the _Boston Gazette_, the first number
of which was published in December, 1719, by William Brookes, the
successor of Campbell as postmaster. It was printed on half a sheet of
foolscap by James Franklin, brother of Benjamin Franklin, who served his
apprenticeship with him. The proprietor, printer, and publisher of the
_Gazette_, however, were soon changed; and in 1721 the _New England
Courant_ was established in Boston by James Franklin, who was both
proprietor and publisher. With the establishment of this paper commenced
the newspaper wars of America, which have continued ever since.
Franklin, piqued at having been ousted from the _Gazette_, commenced
attacking that journal with bitterness. He did not make the _Courant_ so
much of a newspaper as an essayist; and it was filled with discussions
of the prevailing religious opinions of that day, and with attacks upon
the public officers and the clergy. These essays were furnished by a
society of nine literary gentlemen, who were called a set of
freethinkers by some, and the 'Hell Fire Club' by others. Young Benjamin
wrote some of the essays, although the authorship was not at the time
known. Among other matters, inoculation for the small pox was then
warmly opposed as being highly improper. The character of the paper was
spirited, and its tone that of religious scepticism. It was not long in
attracting much of the public attention, and in provoking the resentment
of the colonial Government and clergy. The Rev. Increase Mather having
been claimed in the _Courant_ as one of its supporters, came out with a
long and wrathful contradiction of the assertion. 'I can well remember,'
says that eminent and excellent divine, 'when the civil Government would
have taken an effectual course to suppress such a _cursed libel_! which,
if it be not done, I am afraid that some _awful judgment_ will come upon
this land,