r Calef, of Boston, officiated as
marshal at the funeral of his friend, Gen. Francis Walker. In so doing
he caught a cold, of which he died. An evening paper hereupon
published a cartoon showing Major Calef walking arm in arm with Death
at General Walker's funeral.

Americans are also apt to be proud of the number of their journals,
and will tell you, with evident appreciation of the fact, that "nearly
two thousand daily papers and fourteen thousand weeklies are published
in the United States." Unfortunately the character of their local
journals does not altogether warrant the inference as to American
intelligence that you are expected to draw. Many of them consist
largely of paragraphs such as the following, copied verbatim from an
issue of the Plattsburg _Sentinel_ (September, 1888):

George Blanshard, of Champlain, an experienced prescription clerk
and a graduate of the Albany School of Pharmacy, has accepted a
position in Breed's drug-store at Malone.

Clerk Whitcomb, of the steamer "Maquam," has finished his
season's work in the boat, and has resumed his studies at
Burlington.

I admit that the interest of the readers of the _Sentinel_ in the
doings of their friends Mr. Blanshard and Mr. Whitcomb is, perhaps,
saner and healthier than that of the British snob in the fact that
"Prince and Princess Christian walked in the gardens of Windsor Castle
and afterwards drove out for an airing." But that is the utmost that
can be said for the propagation of such utter vapidities; and the man
who pays his five cents for the privilege of reading them can scarcely
be said to produce a certificate of intelligence in so doing. If the
exhibition of such intellectual feebleness were the worst charge that
could be brought against the American newspaper, there would be little
more to say; but, alas, "there are some among the so-called leading
newspapers of which the influence is wholly pernicious because of the
perverted intellectual ability with which they are conducted." (Prof.
Chas. E. Norton, in the _Forum_, February, 1896.)

The levity with which many--perhaps most--American journals treat
subjects of serious importance is another unpleasant feature. They
will talk of divorces as "matrimonial smash-ups," or enumerate them
under the caption "Divorce Mill." Murders and fatal accidents are
recorded with the same jocosity. Questions of international importance
are handled as if the main purpose of