iverse people, but always interesting and agreeable people. Perhaps at
times he carried his aversions a little too far. But he had reasons for
them, and a man of robust temperament and habit, it was not in him
to sit down under an injury, or fancied injury. I never knew a more
efficient journalist. What he did not know about a newspaper, was
scarcely worth knowing.

In my day Journalism has made great strides. It has become a recognized
profession. Schools of special training are springing up here and there.
Several of the universities have each its College of Journalism. The
tendency to discredit these, which was general and pronounced at the
start, lowers its tone and grows less confident.

Assuredly there is room for special training toward the making of an
editor. Too often the newspaper subaltern obtaining promotion through
aptitudes peculiarly his own, has failed to acquire even the most
rudimentary knowledge of his art. He has been too busy seeking "scoops"
and doing "stunts" to concern himself about perspectives, principles,
causes and effects, probable impressions and consequences, or even
to master the technical details which make such a difference in the
preparation of matter intended for publication and popular perusal.
The School of Journalism may not be always able to give him the needful
instruction. But it can set him in the right direction and better
prepare him to think and act for himself.

Chapter the Twenty-Eighth

Bullies and Braggarts--Some Kentucky Illustrations--The Old Galt
House--The Throckmortons--A Famous Sugeon--"Old Hell's Delight"

I

I do not believe that the bully and braggart is more in evidence in
Kentucky and Texas than in other Commonwealths of the Union, except that
each is by the space writers made the favorite arena of his exploits
and adopted as the scene of the comic stories told at his expense. The
son-of-a-gun from Bitter Creek, like the "elegant gentleman" from the
Dark and Bloody Ground, represents a certain type to be found more or
less developed in each and every State of the Union. He is not always a
coward. Driven, as it were, to the wall, he will often make good.

He is as a rule in quest of adventures. He enters the village from the
countryside and approaches the melee. "Is it a free fight?" says he.
Assured that it is, "Count me in," says he. Ten minutes later, "Is it
still a free fight?" he says, and, again assured in the affirmative,
say