town and calls at the
office of the oldest established local paper. There his wishes are reduced
to writing for him, he pays his money, and his advertisement appears. If
there is an farmer advertising for a man, as is often the case, he at the
same time takes the address, and goes over to offer his services. The
farmer and the labourer alike look to the advertisement columns as the
medium between them.

The vitality and influence of the old-fashioned local newspaper is indeed
a remarkable feature of country life. It would be thought that in these
days of cheap literature, these papers, charging twopence, threepence, and
even fourpence per copy, could not possibly continue to exist. But,
contrary to all expectation, they have taken quite a fresh start, and
possess a stronger hold than ever upon the agricultural population. They
enter into the old homesteads, and every member of the farmer's family
carefully scans them, certain of finding a reference to this or that
subject or person in whom he takes an interest.

Some such papers practically defy competition. In the outlying towns,
where no factories have introduced a new element, it is vain for the most
enterprising to start another. The squire, the clergyman, the lawyer, the
tenant-farmer, the wayside innkeeper stick to the old weekly paper, and
nothing can shake it. It is one of the institutions of agriculture.

The office is, perhaps, in a side street of the quiet market-town, and
there is no display to catch the casual purchaser. No mystery surrounds
the editor's sanctum; the visitor has but to knock, and is at once
admitted to his presence. An office could scarcely be more plainly
furnished. A common table, which has, however, one great virtue--it does
not shake when written on--occupies the centre. Upon one side is a large
desk or bureau; the account-books lying open show that the editor, besides
his literary labour, has to spend much time in double entry. Two chairs
are so completely hidden under 'exchanges' that no one can sit upon them.
Several of these 'exchanges' are from the United States or Australia, for
the colonists are often more interested and concerned about local affairs
in the old country than they are with the doings in the metropolis.
Against the wall, too, hangs a picture of a fine steamer careering under
sail and steam, and near it a coloured sectional map of some new township
marked out in squares. These are the advertisements of an Atlantic o