the article was to show the
writer's power of humour. Serious speeches and even sermons are
reported in a vein of flippant jocularity. The same trait often
obtrudes into the review of books of the first importance. The
traditional "No case--abuse the plaintiff's attorney" is translated
into "Can't understand or appreciate this--let's make fun of it."

By the best papers--and these are steadily multiplying--the
"interview" is looked upon as a serious opportunity to obtain in a
concise form the views of a person of greater or less eminence on
subjects of which he is entitled to speak with authority. By the
majority of journals, however, the interview is abused to an
inordinate extent, both as regards the individual and the public. It
is used as a vehicle for the cheapest forms of wit and the most
personal attack or laudation. My own experience was that the
interviewer put a series of pre-arranged questions to me, published
those of my answers which met his own preconceptions, and invented
appropriate substitutes for those he did not honour with his approval.
A Chicago reporter made me say that English ignorance of America was
so dense that "a gentleman of considerable attainments asked me if
Connecticut was not the capital of Pittsburgh and notable for its
great Mormon temple,"--an elaborate combination due solely to his own
active brain. The same ingenuous (and ingenious) youth caused me to
invent "an erratic young Londoner, who packed his bag and started at
once for any out-of-the-way country for which a new guide-book was
published." Another, with equal lack of ground, committed me to the
unpatriotic assertion that neither in Great Britain nor in any other
part of Europe was there any scenery to compare with that of the
United States. But perhaps the unkindest cut of all was that of the
reporter at Washington who made me introduce my remarks by the fatuous
expression "Methought"! Mr. E.A. Freeman was much amused by a reporter
who said of him: "When he don't know a thing, he says he don't. When
he does, he speaks as if he were certain of it." Mr. Freeman adds: "To
the interviewer this way of action seemed a little strange, though he
clearly approved of the eccentricity." This gentleman's mental
attitude, like his superiority to grammar, is, unfortunately,
characteristic of hundreds of his colleagues on the American press.

The distinction between the editorial and reportorial functions of a
newspaper are apt to be muc