CHAPTER VIII

THE EDITOR OF A GREAT NEWSPAPER

Bryant’s life work proved to be, not writing poetry, but editing a great New York daily paper. For many years he went to his office at seven o’clock every morning. He was never strong in body, and he had to take very great care of his health.

Every young reader should learn a useful lesson from him, although it is not easy to follow the rigorous mode of life he laid out for himself and followed to the end of his days. He himself tells in a letter what he did:

“I rise early at this time of the year (March), about half-past five; in summer, half an hour or even an hour earlier. Immediately, with very little encumbrance of clothing, I begin a series of exercises, for the most part designed to expand the chest, and at the same time call into action all the muscles and articulations of the body. These are performed with dumb-bells,—the very lightest, covered with flannel,—with a pole, a horizontal bar, and a light chair swung around my head. After a full hour and sometimes more passed in this manner, I bathe from head to foot. When at my place in the country, I sometimes shorten my exercise in the chamber, and, going out, occupy myself in some work which requires brisk motion. After my bath, if breakfast be not ready, I sit down to my studies till I am called. My breakfast is a simple one—hominy and milk, or, in place of hominy, brown bread, or oatmeal, or wheaten grits, and, in season, baked sweet apples. Buckwheat cakes I do not decline, nor any other article of vegetable food, but animal food I never take at breakfast. Tea and coffee I never touch at any time; sometimes I take a cup of chocolate, which has no narcotic effect, and agrees with me very well. At breakfast I often take fruit, either in its natural state or freshly stewed.

“After breakfast I occupy myself for a while with my studies, and, when in town, I walk down to the office of the _Evening Post_, nearly three miles distant, and after about three hours return, always walking.... In town, where I dine late, I take but two meals a day. Fruit makes a considerable part of my diet. My drink is water.

“That I may rise early, I, of course, go to bed early; in town as early as ten; in the country somewhat earlier.... I abominate drugs and narcotics, and have always carefully avoided anything which spurs nature to exertions which it would not otherwise make. Even with my food I do not take the usual condiments, such as pepper and the like.”

A man who was so conscientious about eating and drinking and going to bed and getting up in the morning, was the kind of man who would be conscientious in editing a newspaper. In Bryant’s early newspaper life a great daily paper was not so much a machine to gather news from every quarter of the globe and serve it up in a sensational style, as a medium for discussing public questions. Nowadays, people often do not even look at the editorial column; but in those days there was so little news they were obliged to read this. It was about the only fresh thing in the paper. Once a week, perhaps, a sailing vessel from Europe would come in with a bundle of European newspapers, from which the editor would clip and reprint a summary of foreign news. It took several days to get news from Washington to New York. Local items were generally sent in by friends of the editor. For years Bryant had but one assistant, and they two did all the reporting, editing, and editorial writing. Reviews of books were sometimes done outside, and the shipping and financial news was furnished by a sort of City Press Association. It was Bryant’s work to write a brilliant editorial or two every morning. Many of these were on politics, others on questions of local public interest. But Bryant tried always to be on the side of right and justice. For years the _Post_ was regarded as the leading paper of the people, standing for the rights of the people. Many a time it fought the battles of the great public, and sometimes it won.

A daily paper lasts but for a day; then it is dead and another takes its place. To know how completely a daily paper dies when its day’s work is done, so to speak, suppose you try to buy a copy three months old, or a year old. You remember three months ago there were hundreds of thousands of copies printed and distributed. You suppose that you can get a copy at the office of the paper, at any rate. But no; all more than three months old have been destroyed.

In New York there was once a little old shop, kept by a queer old mulatto, known as “Back Number Bud,” who charged a dollar and a half for a one cent paper, less than a year old. This shop of “Back Number Bud’s” was, a few years ago, the only place in New York City where back numbers of newspapers could be purchased at any price; and in smaller cities no copies whatever could be obtained, except by chance.

A daily newspaper influences the people to-day, and then dies, and another paper takes its place. But if one man is making that paper every day for fifty years, at the end of fifty years, doing a little every day, he may have succeeded several times in completely revolutionizing public opinion.

Besides Bryant, there were other great newspaper editors in New York. One was Horace Greeley, whose name every child has heard. There were others, too. But none were more faithful than Bryant. For years his newspaper work took so much of his time that he wrote scarcely any poetry at all. But as those numbers of the _Evening Post_ are dead and forgotten, we shall never know how much good he did during those years and years of faithful leadership.