scholarship, and special study of the subject
entrusted to them; not one single word was
dropped by the great orators in last night's
debate, finishing at two A.M., which I do not
find recorded for my perusal, while the vapid
prosings of the dreary members have such pith
as was in them extracted into a few lines. For
my gratification, and that of a hundred thousand
other readers, a gentleman throughly competent
for his task has recorded his opinion of the merits
of the new tenor who last night made his first
appearance at our Opera; while glancing a little
lower down, one may experience quite a glow of
satisfaction in reading the noble names of the
superb ones who were present at the Princess's
reception. In the next column, I can see exactly
how stands the latest betting on the coming
races, and I also find it chronicled—in a manner
which I confess I never could comprehend—
how yesterday's races were run, how Cœur de
Lion had it all his own way to Nobb's Point,
closely followed by Butcher Boy, Gipsy, Avoca,
and Tatterdemalion; how, at the distance,
Butcher Boy and Avoca ran out, and collared the
favourite; and how just before the finish, Smith
called upon the mare, and Avoca answering,
was hailed the winner by a head. How on earth
do they know all this? I believe these racing
reports are exact descriptions of the struggle,
but how do the reporters manage to see all this
in a lightning flight for a mile and a half, or
how do they manage to distinguish the colours
of the horses? Sometimes I have fancied there
are some things in a newspaper which I could
do myself, but assuredly this is not one of
them. I find, too, that my journal must have
several sporting gentlemen attached to it, for in
the same column I read an account of a yacht
match at Erith, with critical remarks about the
manner in which the Flirt was sailed by her
noble owner, and a vivid description of a cricket
match at Lord's between the elevens of Rutland
and Yorkshire, with a laudatory notice of Mr.
Bales's "five-er" with a leg-swipe. In a corner
of this column I also find quotations from the
cotton market at Manchester; from the corn
markets at Leeds, Liverpool, Scotland, Ipswich;
from Messrs. Sheepshanks' trade circular in
regard to the colonial wool sales; and from the
latest prices of hay at Smithfield and
Whitechapel, where I find "the market is dull, with
fair supplies." There also is spread out for me
shipping intelligence informing me what vessels
have arrived at, or passed by way of, our own
ports, what vessels have been spoken with in
far distant latitudes; there I get a meteorological
report of the actual and probable state of
the weather all over the United Kingdom, and in
the immediate vicinity I find an elaborate report
of the state of the mining market, whence I
glean that Wheal Mary Anne advanced twenty
shillings, and that Cotopaxis were rather flatter.

Hundreds of others are in the employment
of my journal. In its interest a famous writer
has taken the pilgrim's staff, and wandered
through America desolated by her civil war;
has passed through Mexico, and lingered
among the islands of the Spanish Main, duly
transmitting vivid descriptions of his
adventures, and of the result of his observations.
In the same interest, at all the principal
continental cities, notably at Paris, Berlin, Vienna,
Petersburg, and Madrid, my journal has its
agents: quiet gentlemanly men: now, gay
bachelors going into the fast society of the Cercle
and the Jockey Club; now, steady middle-aged
men, regular attendents on the Börsen Halle,
now quaffing horchata, and puffing cigarettes on
the Puerta del Sol, now colloquing with P. and
O. captains at Alexandria, or chaffing "griffs"
at Suez; but always having ears and eyes wide
open, be it for a political "shave," a dancer's
triumph, or a rise in the markets, and always
transmitting that intelligence instanter by letters
or telegram to my journal. In the same
interest two gentlemen are attached, one to
the head-quarters of the Danish, another to
the German army; solemnly precise men are
gliding about the Exchange, writing in their
memorandum-books the latest quotations from
Capel-court, the latest "done" at Gurney's,
the latest whisper from the Bank parlour; one
member of the staff is flying away in one of the
compartments of a royal train, while another is
pursuing his inquiries among the starving poor
of Bethnal-green; one reporter has just buttoned
up his note-book containing the charge of the
judge to the jury trying a murderer, while
another is taking down the chairman's "speech
of the evening" at a charity dinner; the fire
"which was still blazing fiercely when we
went, to press," the murder up Islington way,
which was committed late last evening, the new
farce, "on which the curtain did not fall till
past midnight;" all are recorded in my journal,
which also gives utterance to the cries of
innumerable indignant amateur correspondents.
Although I always wondered in a vague kind of
way at the manner in which my journal was
produced, when I knew nothing about it, I
think my astonishment has even been greater
since I saw the working of the vast engine of
social progress. Arriving at about, ten o'clock
in the evening, I found an intelligent guide
awaiting me, and by him was first conducted
into the library—not necessarily a portion of a
newspaper establishment, but here interesting
as the depository of the volumes, from their
earliest sheet, of the Times and the Morning
Chronicle, once conspicuous in journalism, now
defunct. I took down a volume of the Chronicle
hap-hazard, and opening it at the date
February 4, 1792, read a protest of the Irish
Parliament on a vote of congratulation to the
king on the marriage of the Duke of York
with the Princess of Prussia. The Irish
gentlemen were "dissentient" because they
could not "consistently with principle or
honour join in thanking a sovereign whom it is
in the highest degree criminal to deceive, in
having entered on the government of Ireland a
viceroy under whose administration measures
inimical to the public welfare had been supported
with success, and every measure beneficial