contained little more matter than may be found in a
single column of a daily paper of our time. What is now called a
leading article seldom appeared, except when there was a scarcity of
intelligence, when the Dutch mails were detained by the west wind, when
the Rapparees were quiet in the Bog of Allen, when no stage coach had
been stopped by highwaymen, when no nonjuring congregation had been
dispersed by constables, when no ambassador had made his entry with a
long train of coaches and six, when no lord or poet had been buried in
the Abbey, and when consequently it was difficult to fill up four scanty
pages. Yet the leading articles, though inserted, as it should
seem, only in the absence of more attractive matter, are by no means
contemptibly written.

It is a remarkable fact that the infant newspapers were all on the side
of King William and the Revolution. This fact may be partly explained
by the circumstance that the editors were, at first, on their good
behaviour. It was by no means clear that their trade was not in itself
illegal. The printing of newspapers was certainly not prohibited by any
statute. But, towards the close of the reign of Charles the Second,
the judges had pronounced that it was a misdemeanour at common law to
publish political intelligence without the King's license. It is true
that the judges who laid down this doctrine were removable at the royal
pleasure and were eager on all occasions to exalt the royal prerogative.
How the question, if it were again raised, would be decided by Holt
and Treby was doubtful; and the effect of the doubt was to make the
ministers of the Crown indulgent and to make the journalists cautious.
On neither side was there a wish to bring the question of right to
issue. The government therefore connived at the publication of the
newspapers; and the conductors of the newspapers carefully abstained
from publishing any thing that could provoke or alarm the government. It
is true that, in one of the earliest numbers of one of the new journals,
a paragraph appeared which seemed intended to convey an insinuation that
the Princess Anne did not sincerely rejoice at the fall of Namur. But
the printer made haste to atone for his fault by the most submissive
apologies. During a considerable time the unofficial gazettes, though
much more garrulous and amusing than the official gazette, were scarcely
less courtly. Whoever examines them will find that the King is always
mentioned w