No More Learning

columns of facts and opinions, rumours and occur rences ? How come these voices from all quarters of the globe to teach and to amuse ? What hidden influ ences, what strange machinery, what ever-active, never- tiring elements, what active brains are atwork to achieve this continuous result ?
It is somewhat curious that, whilst so many pens
have now for generations been busy in labouring for the Newspaper Press, no one of them ever found time to
its history. Various writers have expa tiated on the importance of the subject, but no one has hitherto ventured on its treatment as a distinct topic, except in meagre articles for cyclopaedias, or discursive papers in a magazine. The reason of this,
attempt
has existed in the feeling that none but a could obtain the materials for completing the task, and that those who had power over the
materials had not time to use them for such a purpose. And, in truth, the man who once becomes a journalist must almost bid farewell to mental rest or mental lei sure. If he fulfils his duties truthfully, his attention must be ever awake to what is passing in the world, and his whole mind must be devoted to the instant exami nation, and discussion, and record of current events. He has little time for literary idleness with such lite rary labour on his shoulders. He has no days to spend on catalogues, or in dreamy discursive searches in the
stores of public libraries. He has no months to devote to the exhaustion of any one theme. What he has to deal with must be taken up at a moment's notice, be ex amined, tested, and dismissed at once, and thus his mind is kept ever occupied with the mental necessity
perhaps, journalist
OPINIONS ON THE NEWSPAPER.
of the world's passing hour. Else, most assuredly, some Newspaper writer would long since have written his tory of the Newspaper Press, for the public have been reminded often enough how important, how curious, and how interesting the subject must be.
Thinkers of all classes have borne testimony in favour of the Newspaper Press. Scholars, statesmen, essayists, jurists, reviewers, novelists, and poets, have been ready to bear witness to the importance of Jour nalism, and of the Liberty of the Press. In the ripe autumn of his years and knowledge, Dr. Johnson said, "I never take up aNewspaper without finding something
should have deemed loss not to have seen; never without deriving from instruction and amusement. " There an anecdote on record of Lord Mansfield and the press —A foreigner who had visited our courts of
justice, remarked to Lord Mansfield that he was sur prised to find them attended by so few of the public. "No matter, sir,"replied the Chief Justice, "we sit every dayinthe Newspapers. " It the Newspaper that secures that publicity to the administration of the laws which
the main source of its purity and wisdom. "To say, then, an English Judge incorrupt," observed Dr. Parr, "is scarcely to praise him. " This one triumph of the Newspapers. Another high legal authority, Lord Lynd- hurst, declares —"lam sure, that every person will be willing as am to acknowledge, in the most ample terms, the information, the instruction, and amusement derived from the public press. " To pass from legal to ministe rial authority, we find Canning declaring, that "he who, speculating on the British Constitution, should omit from his enumeration the mighty power of public
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THE FOURTH ESTATE.
opinion, embodied in a free press, which pervades and checks, and perhaps, in the last resort, nearly governs the whole, would give but an imperfect view of the Government of England. " From an English, let us turn to a French statesman. M. Thiers says : — "The Liberty of the Press affords a channel through which the injured may challenge his oppressor at the bar of the nation ; it is the means by which public men may, in case of misconduct, be arraigned before their own and succeeding ages; it is the only mode in which bold and undisguised truth can press its way into the cabinets of monarchs; and it is the privilege, by means of which, he who vainly lifts bis voice against the corruptions or prejudices of his own time, may leave
his councils upon record as a legacy to impartial posterity. The cruelty which would deafen the ear and extinguish the sight of an individual, resembles in some similar degree his guilt also who, by restricting the freedom of the press, would reduce a nation to the deafness of prejudice and the blindness of ignorance. The downfall of this species of freedom, as it is the first symptom of the decay of national liberty, has been in all ages followed by its total destruction, and it may be justly pronounced that they cannot exist separately. " From the days of Milton to the present hour, the world has been urged to recognise the importance of a free press. Macaulay, in his sketch of the condition of the
EnglishlabourersinthedaysoftheStuarts, says,asaproof of their unhappy state when compared with their suc cessors in our time:—"No newspaper pleaded their cause;" and, in his review of Southey's Colloquies on So ciety, argues against the interference of a government
VALUE OF FREE DISCUSSION. r
with the freedom of the press. "Men are never," he says, "so likely to settle a question rightly, as when they dis cuss it freely. A government can interfere in discus sion, only by making it less free than it would otherwise be. Men are most likely to form just opinions, when
they have no other wish than to know the truth, and are exempt from all influence either of hope or fear. Government can bring nothing but the influence of hopes and fears to support its doctrines. It carries on controversy not with reasons, but with threats and bribes. If it employs reasons, it does so not in virtue of any powerswhichbelongtoitasagovernment. Thus, instead of a contest between argument and argument, we have a contest between argument and force. Instead of a contest in which truth, from the natural constitution of the human mind, has a decided
advantage over falsehood, we have a contest in which truth can be victorious only by accident. " Other modern writers
have been equally decided in their declared opinions. " The Newspaper," quoth Bulwer, " is the chronicle of civilization, the common reservoir, into which every stream pours its living waters, and at which every man may come and drink ; it is the Newspaper which gives to liberty practical life, its perpetual vigilance, its unrelaxing activity; the Newspaper is a daily and sleepless watchman that reports to you every danger which menaces the institutions of your country, and its interests at home and abroad. The Newspaper informs legislation of the public opinion, and it informs people of the acts of legislation; thus keeping up that constant sympathy, that good understanding between people and legislators, which conduces to the mainte
s THE FOURTH
nance of order, and prevents the stern necessity for revolution. The Newspaper is a law-book for the indolent, a sermon for the thoughtless, a library for the poor. " Another novelist, Captain Marryatt, echoes the same strain when he declares, that "Newspapers are a link in the great chain of miracles which prove the
greatness of England, and every support should be given to them. " The English Opium-Eater is eloquent on the quiet useful victories of the press. " Much already has been accomplished: more than people are aware; so gradual and silent has been the advance. How noise less is the growth of corn! Watch it night and day for a week, and you will never see it growing ; but return, after two months, and you will find it all whitening for the harvest. Such, and so imperceptible in the stages of their motion, are the victories of the press. "
By the value and fidelity of these various services, now rendered day by day, the Newspaper has earned its power and its position ; has grown with increasing years, and strengthened with increasing rectitude, until it has received the cognomen, and wields the power of a Fourth Estate. To trace the steps by which, from
small beginnings, it has reached its present elevation is the chief object of the following pages.
ESTATE.
CHAPTER II
NEWS-LETTERS AND NEWS-WRITERS FORERUNNERS OF NEWSPAPERS.
" News of the morning ? — I would fain hear some,
Fresh from the forge. " Ben Jonsok.
Date of the First English Newspaper. —Its Author, and his craft. — What constitutes a Newspaper. — The News-letters. — Ben Jonson's Sketch of the News- writer's Office. — The Staple of News. — Cavaliers and Roundheads, and the modes of circulating News. —Cromwell at the Blue Boar, Holborn. —Coffee and News-letters at Cambridge. — Titus Oates and Mr Coleman. —Tragic End of a News-writer. —The Newspaper Forgery and its Detection. —Dr. Johnson and the Acta Diurna. — Venice and its Gazettes.
WHEN the reign of James the First was drawing to a close; when Ben Jonson was poet laureate, and the personal friends of Shakspeare were lament
ing his then recent death; when Cromwell was trading as a brewer at Huntingdon ; when Milton was a youth of sixteen, just trying his pen at Latin verse, and Hampden a quiet country gentleman in Buckingham shire ; London was first solicited to patronise its first Newspaper. There is now no reason to doubt that the puny ancestor of the myriads of broad sheets of our time was published in the metropolis in 1622, and that the most prominent of the ingenious speculators who offered the novelty to the world was one Nathaniel Butter. His companions in the work appear to have been Nicholas Bourne, Thomas Archer, Nathaniel Newberry, William Sheffard, Bartholomew Downes,
10
THE FOURTH ESTATE.
All these different names appear in the imprints of the early numbers of the first
Newspaper— The Weekly Newes. What appears
and Edward Allde.
to be the earliest
(1622), and has the names of Bourne and Archer on
sheet bears date the 23rd of May
the title ; but as we proceed in the examination of the subject, we find that Butter becomes the most conspi cuous of the set. He seems to have been the author and the writer, whilst the others were probably the
publishers ; and, with varying titles, and apparently with but indifferent success, his name is found in con nection with Newspapers as late as the year 1640.
No claim for very great originality or genius can be put in for Butter. His merit consists in the simple fact that he was the first to print what had
long been written—to put into type what he and others had been accustomed to supply in MS. ; the first to give to the News-letters of his time the one character istic feature which has
distinguished
ever since. He offered the public a printed sheet of
News to be published at stated and regular intervals. Already hosts of printed papers, headed with the word "Newes," had been issued; but they were mere pam
phlets— catch-pennys, printed one now and another
then, without any connection with each other, and
each giving some portion of intelligence thought by its author to be of sufficient interest to secure a sale. The Weekly News was distinguished from them all by the fact of its being published at fixed intervals, usually a week between each publication, and that each paper was numbered in regular succession, as we have News papers numbered at the present
Newspapers
day. Holding to
THE FIRST NEWSPAPERS. 11
this description of what a Newspaper is, and on the authority of the earliest printed papers in the public libraries, to Nathaniel Butter belongs the renown of
being foremost as a Newspaper projector.
The step he took, though great in its ultimate
consequences, was one very simple and natural, and easily understood. He had been a News-writer; an author of News-letters : one of a class of persons then engaged in London as general correspondents, having offices whence they despatched packets of News to per sons of consideration in the country who were rich enough to afford such a luxury. Though printing presses had been at work in England for a hundred and fifty years,* and though the Reformation had allowed them greater freedom than was known where the Roman faith still flourished, the invention of Gut- tenberg had not been employed for the systematic dis
semination of intelligence relative to passing events. Stray pamphlets told now and then how a great flood had devastated the western counties, or how a witch had been burned, or how Gustavus had fought a great battle ; but the punctual record of the history of the passing time, week by week, was a thing unattempt- ed till the News-wroVer, Nathaniel Butter, became a News-printer.
Like many projectors, both before and since, it would seem that Butter gained more notoriety than profit by his invention. The wits laughed at the News-writer, and the public barely supported his paper. In proof of which we have Ben Jonson's Comedy, "The Staple of News,"
* Caxton left Cologne in 1471 to set up his press in Westminster Abbey ; and his first book, the Game of Chess, was completed in 1474.
12 THE FOURTH ESTATE.
;md
jokes were made, since they live in the pages of " rare Ben, " and afford us a picture not only of the News-writer's office, but of the temper in which his productions were popularly regarded. The poet's sketch is evidently faithful in its main features, and valuable as our chief record of a class and calling long since superseded by the progress of education and of the press.
It was after an absence of fourteen years fr om the stage that Ben Jonson again resumed his pen to write for the people. He had, during that long period,
been chiefly occupied in the preparation of Masques to amuse the court; and, when he again sought a subject for the humbler audience of the Globe Theatre, he chose one which gave him an opportunity of exciting the mirth of the play-goers at the expense of a no ticeable novelty of the day ; —something tolerably new and sufficiently strange, and therefore suited to his purpose. The quick eye of the dramatist saw at a glance some of the absurdities attending the mode then in full play for the publication of News. Hence we have the News office seized as a peg to hang a plot upon, and taken, moreover, as a likely title for a new
a file in the British Museum
indifferently the first Newspaper throve. Yet, how ever much the journalist may have winced under the jests of the poet laureate, it is fortunate the
showing how
comedy.
Jonson's Staple of News * was first acted
* The Staple op News was first acted by " His Majesty's Servants" in 1625, and entered soon after in the Stationers' Books, though no ear lier copy of it is known than that of the old folio, which bears date in 1631. — Gifford's Edition of Ben Jonson.
BEN JONSON'S COMEDY. 13
in 1625, and diverted the audience at the expense of the then active business of the News-writer.
Upon opening the play, we find, in the Induction, Gossip Tattle repeating what was no doubt a common
remark of the days when News travelled slowly :—
Gossip Tattle. Look your news be new and fresh, Master Prologue, and untainted. I shall find them else, if they be stale or fly-blown, quickly.
But a little further on, in his Prologue for the King and Court, Ben Jonson explains :—
Although our title, sir, be News,
We get adventures here to tell you none, But show you common follies, and so known,
That though they are not truths, the innocent muse Hath made so like, as phant'sy could them state, Or Poetry, without scandal, imitate.
The News office was, if we are to believe the dra matist, one of the " common follies" of the day, sketched
not truly but
so like, as phant'sy could them state.
The portrait of the earliest journalist is certainly much more amusing than complimentary, and the poet has not hesitated to write down to his audience; and that there might be no misapprehension as to his intention of giving them a caricature of Nathaniel Butter, he does not hesitate, as will be seen, to intro
duce the name of the News-writer into the dialogue. It may be premised that the poet lays the scene of his play in London, and, amongst the persons of his drama, we find a spendthrift heir, young Pennyboy, who has an uncle an usurer, and a father who is described as ' ' the canter. " The author of the first Newspaper figures as Cymbal, "master of the Staple (of news), and prime
1 1 THE FOURTH ESTATE.
jeerer," whilst his emissaries, or reporters, are Fitton, Court emissary — the first court circular, and great original of all subsequent collectors of fashionable
news; and Picklock, man o' law and emissary, Westmin ster, a kind of legal and general reporter. We have also Madrigal, a poetaster; Almanac, a doctor of physic; and Lickfinger, a cook and "parcel poet. " In the opening scenes, young Pennyboy exults in his newly acquired liberty and wealth, and delights his tailor, his barber, and all others who approach him by a most hilarious liberality. Thomas the barber enters to dress his beard, whilst Fashioner the tailor stands by, and the News-office is introduced: —
Pennyboy. Set thy things upon the board, And spread thy cloths, lay all forth, in procinatu, And tell's what News ?
Thomas. O, Sir, a Staple of News ! Or the New Staple, which you please.
Pennyboy. What's that?
Fashioner. An Office, sir, a brave young Office set up : I had forgot to tell your worship.
For what ?
To enter all the News, sir, of the time.
And vent it as occasion serves : a place of huge commerce it will be !
Pennyboy. Thomas. Fashioner.
Pennyboy. Pray thee, peace ;
I cannot abide a talking tailor : let Tom
(He is a barber) by his peace relate it. What is't an Office, Tom ?
Thomas. Newly erected,
Here in the house, almost on the same floor, Where all the news of all sorts shall be brought, And there be examined, and then register'd, And so be issued under the seal of the office,
As Staple News ; no other news be current.
THF NEWS-WRITER. 15
Pennyboy. ' Fore me, thou speak'st of a brave business, Tom . The tailor puts in a word here, anxious to help the
description by saying something about Butter : — Fashioner. Nay, if you knew the brave that hatch'd it.
But the heir stops him with a jest at the expense of tailors in general, and bids the barber proceed : —
Thomas. He tells you true, sir ; master Cymbal Is master of the office ; he projected
He lies here, in the house and the great rooms
He has taken for the office, and set up
His desks and classes, tables and his shelves.
But Fashioner, the tailor, will have his word, and glories in the fact that he makes clothes for wit and an inventor, who has reporters in his pay —
Fashioner. He my customer, and wit, sir, too But he has brave wits under him.
Thomas. Yes, four emissaries.
Pennyboy. Emissaries? Stay, there's fine new word, Tom.
Pray God signify anything What are emissaries Thomas. Men employed outward, that are sent abroad
To fetch in the commodity. Fashioner. From all regions,
Where the best news are made.
The tailor will not be restrained when his customer
—
being described
Thomas. Fashioner. Pennyboy. Fashioner. Pennyboy.
Or vented forth.
By way of exchange, or trade.
Nay, thou wilt speak—
My share, sir, there's enough for both. Go on then,
Speak all thou canst methinks the ordinaries Should help them much.
Fashioner. Sir, they have ordinaries,
And extraordinaries, as many changes,
And variations, as there are points in the compass.
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THE FOURTH ESTATE.
But the four cardinal quarters. Ay, those, Tom —
Here we have the four points named where News was current in London before Newspapers collected it from all parts of the globe. The Court, which at this time, and for long afterwards, was a great centre for gossip, ranks first ; whilst old St. Paul's — the gothic predecessor of the present building —was the second spot where people of different conditions met to talk over affairs. The citizens paced the aisle of the church to give and receive intelligence; to chat over events; to speculate on the future ; and to make bargains in their trade. The Exchange stood third, and doubtless afforded the City News of how the Lord Mayor felt affected towards the Court; for Lord Mayors were then not such mere empty formalities as now. * Lastly we have, Westminster Hall, another sheltered spot where men might congregate to learn not only the law's decisions, but the progress of events. To these locali ties we find our News-writer, Mr. Butter, is supposed to despatch his emissaries. But the heir, having learned all these particulars about the new office,
wishes to know who is the head and front of the novel undertaking :—
Pennyboy. Who is the chief? Which hath precedency ?
* One of these civic sovereigns had a dispute with James the First because the merchants declined to increase their loans to the King. " If I were to move the court to York your city would be ruined," hinted the monarch. "Your Majesty, it is true, might deprive us of your august presence," replied the Mayor, "but we shall still have the Thames. "
16
ster Hall.
Thomas.
Pennyboy-
Thomas. The Court, sir, Paul's, Exchange, and Westmin
news-writer's office. 17
Thomas. The governor of the Staple, Master Cymbal, He is the chief ; and after him the emissaries :
First emissary Court, one Master Fitton,
He is a jeerer too.
What's that ? A wit.
Or half a wit, some of them are half wits, Two to a wit, three are a set of them.
Pennyboy. Fashioner. Thomas.
Then Master Ambler, emissary Paul's.
A fine-paced gentleman as you shall see walk The middle aisle : and then my froy Hans Buz, A Dutchman, he is emissary Exchange.
Fashioner. I had thought master Burst, the merchant, had had it.
Thomas. No,
He has a rupture, he has sprung a leak. Emissary Westminster's indisposed of yet.
This Thomas the barber is ambitious, and would
fain be attached to the News office, and the post of
emissary Westminster stands temptingly open. He goes on to describe the room where the intelligence is
put into shape: —
Then the examiner, register, aud two clerks, They manage all at home, and sort and file, And seal the news, and issue them.
Pennyboy. Tom, dear Tom,
What may my means do for thee ? Ask, and have it.
I'd fain be doing some good : it is my birthday.
And I would do it betimes, I feel a grudging
Of bounty, and I would not long lie fallow.
I pray thee think and speak, or wish for something.
The barber now has the opportunity he hoped for, and he speaks his wishes at once.
Thomas. I would I had but one of the clerk's places In this News office.
VOL. I. C
18 THE FOURTH ESTATE.
Pennyboy. Thou shalt have Tom,
If silver or gold will fetch what's the rate —
At what Thomas.
An 'twere a hundred, Tom, Thou shalt not want it.
This Figaro's calculation of the good-natured liberality of the heir proves correct, and they proceed to negociate the affair at the News office itself, to which we are now introduced.
Enter Register and Nathaniel.
Reg. What, are those desks fit now Set forth the table,
The carpet* and the chair where are the News That were examined last Have you filled them up
Nath. Not yet, had no time.
Reg. Are those News registered That emissary Buz sent in last night,
Of Spinola and his eggs
Yes, sir and filed.
What are you now upon
That our new emissary Westminster gave us, of the golden heir.
Reg Dispatch that's news indeed, and of importance. — Enter Country-woman.
What would you have good woman Woman. would have, sir,
A groat's-worth of any News, care not what, To carry down this Saturday to our vicar.
Pennyboy.
Nath. Reg. Nath.
set in the market Fifty pound, sir.
Reg. you are butter- woman ask Nathaniel, The clerk there.
* —- Set forth the table, The carpet, &c.
" In the very
The embroidered rug with which tables were then covered.
fray one of their spurs engaged into carpet, upon which stood
fair looking-glass, and two noble pieces of porcelain, drew all to the ground, broke the glass," &c. Character England, Harleian Misccl, Vol. X,,p. 189.
of
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NATHANIEL BUTTER.
Nath. Sir, I tell her she must stay Till emissary Exchange, or Paul's send in, And then I'll fit her.
Reg. Do good woman, have patience
It is not now, as when the Captain lived, You'll blast the reputation of the office,
Now in the bud, if you dispatch these groats So soon : let them attend in name of policy.
19
To have served them too quickly, would have seemed as though the News were made instead of being collected ; so thought the Register. On the passage —
O ! you are a butter-woman, &c.
Gifford in his edition of Ben Jonson has a note, which throws some additional light on the character of
the first English Newspaper projector, and upon the career of some other early News-gatherers. Gifford had himself been connected with the Newspaper press, and doubtless felt an interest in the subject.
Fletcher's Fair Maid of the Inn, which appeared a few months after The Staple of News, has a refer ence both to Butter and to his fellow-newsmonger, the Captain;
For. It shall be the ghost of some lying stationer.
A spirit shall look as if butter would not melt in his mouth ; a new Mecurius-Gallo-Belgicus.
Cox. O, there was a Captain was rare at it.
For. Never think of him : though that Captain writ a full hand-gallop, and wasted more harmless paper, than ever did
laxative physic, yet will I make you to out-scribble him. Act IV. , Sc. 2.
" Both Jonson and Fletcher," says Gifford, " had
in view Nathaniel Butter, who, if we may trust the c2
20 THE FOURTH ESTATE.
present account of him, was bred a stationer, failed in his profession, and betook himself to the compila tion of News from all quarters. It appears, from Mr. Chalmers's inquiries, that he began his labours as early (at least) as 1611; and, if he was not the most success ful, he was undoubtedly the most indefatigable of all the News- writers of his age. I have seen," continues the editor of the Quarterly Review, " pamphlets, for such were most of his publications, whether occasionally or weekly, by him, of the date of 1634, when he had swelled the firm to Butter & Co. , and he probably con tinued to publish much longer. His foreign News, which is extremely jejune, is merely a bald translation from some of the Continental Mercuries; when he ventures to add a remark of his own, it is somewhat in the style of old Tiresias, or Jeffrey Neve — ' What I will either fall out or not,'—so that he was not likely to conciliate much of Jonson's respect. The verse which mentions the Captain, is a parody of one in poor old Jeronimo :—
It is not now as when Andrea lived.
" The Captain, of whom I have nothing certain to say, appears to have rivalled Butter in the dissemina tion of News. In that age the middle aisle of St. Paul's swarmed with disbanded or broken ancients, lieutenants, &c. , who on the strength of having served a few months in the Low Countries, assumed, like Cavaliero Shift, an acquaintance with all the great officers in the field, and amused the idle citizens with pretended intelligence from the armies. One of these (the Captain of Jonson and Fletcher) seems to have turned his inventive faculties to account, and printed
THE FIRST EDITORS ROOM. 21
his imaginary correspondence, instead of detailing it viva voce. *"
To return again to Ben Jonson's comedy, which we left just as he had introduced us to the office of the Staple. Cymbal the proprietor, and Fitton the reporter enter, introducing Pennyboy : —
Pennyboy. In truth they are dainty rooms ; what place is this?
Cymbal. This is the outer room, where my clerks sit, And keep their sides, the register in the midst;
The examiner, he sits private there, within ;
And here I have my several rolls and files
Of News by the alphabet, and all are put up Under their heads.
Pennyboy. But those two subdivided ?
Into authentical and apocryphal —
Or News of doubtful credit, as barber's News —
Cymbal. I have the News of the sea, sir— Fitton. As Vacation News,
Term News, and Christmas News. Cymbal. And News of the faction.
Fitton. As the Reformed News ; Protestant News ;— Cymbal. And Pontificial News ; of all which several,
*In The Great Assizes —a curious poem, mention is made of a Cap tain Rashingham, a great compiler of News, whose occupation was invaded by a swarm of "paper wasters," &c,
Who weekly uttered such a mass of lies,
Under the specious name of novelties,
that the Captain found his trade over-run, and was obliged to betake himself to "plucking tame pigeons," (tricking) for a livelihood. This was written nearly twenty years after The Staple of News ; bully Rashingham, therefore, may be too late for the Captain of the text ; the quotation, however, will serve to show that men of this de scription were engaged in these pursuits. See also the first scene of
Shirley's Love Tricks. — Notes to B. Jonson, edited by Gifford.
Cymbal. Fitton.
And tailors' News, porters' and watermens' News. Fitton. Where to, lee side the Coranti, and Gazetti —
Cymbal.
22 THE FOURTH ESTATE.
The daybooks, characters, precedents are kept, Together with the names of special friends —
Fitton. Cymbal.
Fitton. Cymbal.
And men of correspondence in the Country — Yes, of all ranks, and all religions —
Factors and agents — Siegers, that lie out
Through all the shires of the Kingdom. Pennyboy. This is fine,
And bears a brave relation !
But enough of The Staple of News, now that we have gleaned from it an idea of the forerunner of the modern Newspaper office. In Collins's Memorials of State we have on record, a News-writer and his patron, the latter being Sir Robert Sydney, the former a Mr Whyte, a postmaster, " a notable busy man, who constantly wrote over to Flushing to his patron. "* When the civil wars were raging, News-agents, and News-letter writers and
* " Sir Robert Sydney, the younger brother, copied after the shining character (of Sir Philip Sydney), and by his virtues and services ob tained the title and honours of Earl of Leicester. As he was curious in laying out for intelligence of the remarkable events of the time, he kept a correspondence with Rowland White the postmaster, a notable busy man, who constantly writ over to him at Flushing (when he was resident there as governor) the News and intrigues of the court ; and, being employed by him in commissions to his noble relations the ministers, was entrusted by them with several secret passages for the information of his patron. To give one instance out of many, I shall only add, that in Mr. White's letters are contained several particulars, hitherto passed over in silence by the historians, of the Earl of Essex's favour, troubles, and fall. " —Preface to Collins' Memorials of State.
" This gentleman (Rowland Whyte) was employed by Sir Robert Sydney to solicit his affairs at Court, and to relate to him what passed there, for which he allowed him a salary, and his integrity and indus try fully appears in the course of his letters, some of which are in the first volume, but these that follow discover several particulars in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, unobserved by our historians. " —Collins's Memorials of State, Note Vol. II. p. 4.
CROMWELL AND THE NEWS-BEARER. 23
pamphleteers, were all in full occupation. They were employed by Cromwell and against him, and these written pages were circulated in various secret ways. From hand to hand they were dispatched under the wings of birds, and sewn into the saddle-flaps of unconscious riders. We find on record a notable instance of this last mode of sending information, in the case of Charles the First, who adopted it unsuccess fully, when he tried to send secret news to France of his intentions respecting Cromwell and the puritans. The document in this case was rather a private dispatch than a News-letter, but the story of its discovery is illustrative of the contrivances resorted to at that time for communicating intelligence from one place to another. Guizot has put the incident into graphic shape, and we may quote it from the translation by Mr. Hazlitt, — himself by the way a journalist: —
From day to day the King's intentions became more and
I shall play my game as well as I can," said Charles to Ireton, who pressed him to join them openly ; * and lords Lauderdale and Lanark, still assiduous in their attendance,
promised him the support of a Scottish army if he would accept of their alliance. Already, it was said, the preliminaries of a treaty were agreed upon ; it was even added that in Scotland, where Hamilton's credit prevailed over that of Argyle, troops were marching towards the borders. \ On their side, the Eng lish cavaliers, Capel, Langdale, and Musgrave were secretly getting up an insurrection. "Be assured," the King had said to Capel, "the two nations will soon be at war; the Scotch promise themselves the co-operation of all the presbyterians in England ; let our friends, then, hold themselves ready and in arms ; for otherwise, whichever party is victorious, we shall get
* Hutchinson, 277. t Rushworth, ii. 4, 786—810.
more suspected : "
THE FOURTH ESTATE.
very little by it. *" Meantime, the situation of the army quartered near London became critical ; the city paid no attention to the demands made for money to pay the men, and the officers knew not how to govern troops whom they could not pay. t In all directions the most daring pamphlets were circulated; some setting forth the designs of the soldiers against the King, others the king's negociations with the generals. In vain had Fairfax demanded and obtained, readily enough so far, the establishment of a rigorous censorship ; J in vain had Cromwell himself repre sented to the city the necessities of the army ; in vain had he displayed all the resources of reason and craft, to persuade the fanatics that they must restrain their fanaticism if they thought to be paid by the moderate, the moderate that, to keep the fan atics in check, they must pay them ; || in vain had he succeeded
in getting some of his confidants elected among the new agents of the soldiers. His efforts were without result ; even his very prudence turned against him ; he had kept up a correspondence, had secured, as he imagined, means of action with all parties ; and now everywhere a wild, indomitable excitement threatened to countervail his schemes, to ruin his influence. The end of so much ability, so much exertion, had only been to burden his situation with greater difficulty and danger.
Amid this perplexity, one of the spies he had at Hampton Court, in the very chamber of the king, sent him word that on that day, a letter addressed to the queen would be dispatched from the castle, containing Charles's real designs towards the army and its leaders. The letter, sewn up in a saddle, carried
on his head by a man, not in the secret, would reach, about ten o'clock that night, the Blue Boar in Holborn ; a horse was rea dy waiting there to take the bearer to Dover, whence the packet would sail for France. Cromwell and Ireton at once formed their resolution. Disguised as private soldiers, and followed by a single trooper, they left Windsor to go to the appointed place. On their arrival, they placed their attendant on the watch at
* Clarendon, iii. 106. t Rushworth, ii. 4, 804, &c.
X By an ordinance of September 30, 1647 ; Pari. Hist. iii. 779—781 ;
Rushworth, ii. 4, 799. || Rushworth, ii. 4, 883, 884.
THE NEWS-LETTERS. 25
the door, and entering the tavern, sat down at a table and had some beer. Towards ten, the messenger appeared, the saddle on his head : receiving immediate notice of this, they went out, sword in hand, seized the saddle under the pretext that they had orders to search everything, carried it into the inn, ripped it open, found the letter, carefully closed up the saddle again, and then returned it to the terrified messenger, saying, with an air of good humour, that he was an honest fellow, and might con tinue his journey.
Their informant had not deceived them: Charles, indeed, wrote to the queen that he was courted alike by both factions, that he should join the one whose conditions should be most for his advantage, and that he thought he should rather treat with the Scottish presbyterians than with the army : "For the rest," he added, "I alone understand my position ; be quite easy as to the concessions which I may grant; when the time comes, I shall very well know how to treat these rogues, and instead of a silken garter, I will fit them with a hempen halter. " The two generals looked at each other, and all their suspicions thus confirmed, returned to Windsor, hence forward as free from un certainty respecting their designs upon the king as respecting his towards them. *
It is said the cavaliers when taken prisoners, had been known to eat the News-letters, which must other wise have been discovered by their captors. Some of Prince Eupert's letters, still in existence, were, it is said,
from hand to hand, and were endorsed by each suc cessive reader, who when he had perused the contents
" intercepted,
and bear dark red stains, that show how faithfully they were defended. " Many of them passed
sent them on, in obedience to the " haste, haste, post haste. "t
superscription,
* This occurred in the course of October ; Clarendon, State Papers, ii. Appendix, xxxviii.
t Memoirs of Prince Eupert and the Cavaliers, including their corres-
26 THE FOURTH ESTATE.
Several collections of News-letters have found their way into type, and the British Museum contains a store of the original MS. S. ,* as well as copies of such as have been printed. Sir Walter Scott is said to have
pondences by Eliot Warburton. This writer, when speaking of the ori ginal MS. used in the preparation of his work says " I do not presume to canvass my reader's sympathies for either Puritan or Cavalier, I leave them to plead their own cause in their own letters :— him
I invite
listen to their own long silent voices, speaking once more—eagerly, earnestly —as when armed men with desperate speed bore these, their
blotted, and often blood-stained pages, from leagured city or roving camp —from faltering diplomatist, or resolute warrior, at whose beck men died. Every letter will possess some interest for the thoughtful reader, and shed some light for him on the heart of the bygone times. He will find them still animated by the passions that were then throb bing in every breast. At first the earnest, rather than angry, spirit of our memorable English war is apparent in them; but they gradually become more intense in their expression, as if they were the work of a single man ; the same note of triumph or tone of despair is perceptible in all. Human nature, and the nature of each writer, is transparent in them all: the reader is the confidant of Kings, Princes, States men, Generals, patriots, traitors; he is the confessor of the noblest minds and the most villainous natures, he sees the very conscience of the war. "
* Harleian MS. , 7015, consists of a volume of public papers and letters, containing among others MS. Gazettes in French, dated from the Hague, in the years 1620 —1623, relating to public transactions in all parts of Europe during these times. Some of them are directed to Sir Thomas Pickering, and some are in English ; two are directed to him at Warwick.
Sloane Collection, 3328, has various letters of News— 1685, 1687.
No 3925. , of the additional MS. S. in the collection of the British Museum is a thick folio volume thus described, " copies and translations of letters from various parts of the world, 1690. 1691.