For Instance, German Newspapers Are Much
Addicted To Printing Their More Important News Stories In Cipher
Form.
The German treatment of a suspected crime for which no
arrests have yet been made, reminds one of the
Jokes which used
to appear, a few years ago, in the back part of Harper's Magazine,
where a good story was always being related of Bishop X, residing
in the town of Y, who, calling one afternoon upon Judge Z, said
to Master Egbert, the pet of the household, age four, and so on.
A German newspaper will daringly state that Banker - - , president
of the Bank of - - at - - who is suspected of sequestering the
funds of that institution to his own uses is reported to have
departed by stealth for the city of - - , taking with him the wife
of Herr - - .
And such is the high personal honor of the average Parisian news
gatherer that one Paris morning paper, which specializes in actual
news as counterdistinguished from the other Paris papers which
rely upon political screeds to fill their columns, locks its doors
and disconnects its telephones at 8 o'clock in the evening, so
that reporters coming in after that hour must stay in till press
time lest some of them - such is the fear - will peddle all the
exclusive stories off to less enterprising contemporaries.
English newspapers, though printed in a language resembling American
in many rudimentary respects, seem to our conceptions weird
propositions, too. It is interesting to find at the tail end of
an article a footnote by the editor stating that he has stopped
the presses to announce in connection with the foregoing that
nothing has occurred in connection with the foregoing which would
justify him in stopping the presses to announce it; or words to
that effect. The news stories are frequently set forth in a
puzzling fashion, and the jokes also. That's the principal fault
with an English newspaper joke - it loses so in translation into
our own tongue.
Still, when all is said and done, the returning tourist, if he be
at all fair-minded, is bound to confess to himself that, no matter
where his steps or his round trip ticket have carried him, he has
seen in every country institutions and customs his countrymen might
copy to their benefit, immediate or ultimate. Having beheld these
things with his own eyes, he knows that from the Germans we might
learn some much-needed lessons about municipal control and
conservation of resources; and from the French and the Austrians
about rational observance of days of rest and simple enjoyment of
simple outdoor pleasures and respect for great traditions and great
memories; and from the Italians, about the blessed facility of
keeping in a good humor; and from the English, about minding one's
own business and the sane rearing of children and obedience to the
law and suppression of unnecessary noises. Whenever I think of
this last God-given attribute of the British race, I shall recall
a Sunday we spent at Brighton, the favorite seaside resort of
middle-class London.
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