st,' as well as
the printing of the Board of Customs. He also established himself as a
publisher and bookseller at No. 8, Charing Cross. But his principal
achievement was in founding The Times newspaper.

The Daily Universal Register was started on the 1st of January, 1785,
and was described in the heading as "printed logographically." The
type had still to be composed, letter by letter, each placed alongside
of its predecessor by human fingers. Mr. Walter's invention consisted
in using stereotyped words and parts of words instead of separate metal
letters, by which a certain saving of time and labour was effected.
The name of the 'Register' did not suit, there being many other
publications bearing a similar title. Accordingly, it was re-named The
Times, and the first number was issued from Printing House Square on
the 1st of January, 1788.

The Times was at first a very meagre publication. It was not much
bigger than a number of the old 'Penny Magazine,' containing a single
short leader on some current topic, without any pretensions to
excellence; some driblets of news spread out in large type; half a
column of foreign intelligence, with a column of facetious paragraphs
under the heading of "The Cuckoo;" while the rest of each number
consisted of advertisements. Notwithstanding the comparative innocence
of the contents of the early numbers of the paper, certain passages
which appeared in it on two occasions subjected the publisher to
imprisonment in Newgate. The extent of the offence, on one occasion,
consisted in the publication of a short paragraph intimating that their
Royal Highnesses the Prince of Wales and the Duke of York had "so
demeaned themselves as to incur the just disapprobation of his
Majesty!" For such slight offences were printers sent to gaol in those
days.

Although the first Mr. Walter was a man of considerable business
ability, his exertions were probably too much divided amongst a variety
of pursuits to enable him to devote that exclusive attention to The
Times which was necessary to ensure its success.

He possibly regarded it, as other publishers of newspapers then did,
mainly as a means of obtaining a profitable business in job-printing.
Hence, in the elder Walter's hands, the paper was not only unprofitable
in itself, but its maintenance became a source of gradually increasing
expenditure; and the proprietor seriously contemplated its
discontinuance.

At this juncture, John Walte