m, alas! in the office
of the Herald. To be plainer: decent average housekeeping in the city
of New York now costs a hundred dollars a week; and there is but one
salary of that amount paid in New York to a journalist who owns no
property in his journal. The consequence is, that there is scarcely an
individual connected with a daily paper who is not compelled or
tempted to eke out his ridiculous salary by other writing, to the
injury of his health and the constant deterioration of his work. Every
morning the public comes fresh and eager to the newspaper: fresh and
eager minds should alone minister to it. No work done on this earth
consumes vitality so fast as carefully executed composition, and
consequently one of the main conditions of a man's writing his best is
that he should write little and rest often. A good writer, moreover,
is one of Nature's peculiar and very rare products. There is a mystery
about the art of composition. Who shall explain to us why Charles
Dickens can write about a three-legged stool in such a manner that the
whole civilized world reads with pleasure; while another man of a
hundred times his knowledge and five times his quantity of mind cannot
write on any subject so as to interest anybody? The laws of supply and
demand do not apply to this rarity; for one man's writing cannot be
compared with another's, there being no medium between valuable and
worthless. How many over-worked, under-paid men have we known in New
York, really gifted with this inexplicable knack at writing, who, well
commanded and justly compensated, lifted high and dry out of the
slough of poor-devilism in which their powers were obscured and
impaired, could almost have made the fortune of a newspaper! Some of
these Reporters of Genius are mere children in all the arts by which
men prosper. A Journalist of Genius would know their value, understand
their case, take care of their interest, secure their devotion,
restrain their ardor, and turn their talent to rich account. We are
ashamed to say, that for example of this kind of policy we should have
to repair to the office named a moment since.

This subject, however, is beginning to be understood, and of late
there has been some advance in the salaries of members of the press.
Just as fast as the daily press advances in real independence and
efficiency, the compensation of journalists will increase, until a
great reporter will receive a reward in some slight degree
proportioned