CHAPTER VIII.

THE TRIBUNE-HISTORY-EDITORS AND CORRESPONDENTS.

Early Successes of The Tribune-Contest with The Sun - Henry J. Raymond, First Assistant Editor-Establishment of The Weekly TribuneIts Remarkable Success- The Era of Newspaper Expresses - Foreign News and Correspondence - Distinguished Correspondents, at this Time and Afterwards, of The Tribune - Bayard Taylor; Margaret Fuller: Thomas Hughes; Emilio Castelar; M. D. Conway; G. W. Smalley; Kane O'Donnell-Notable Associate Editors of The TribuneCharles A. Dana; George Ripley; Solon Robinson; William H. Fry; George M. Snow; and Others - Hearty Accord of All with Mr. Greeley's General Views - A Journal Earnestly Devoted to the Welfare of the People The Fenimore Cooper Libel Suits.

THE TRIBUNE Succeeded in commanding the general respect and in constantly gaining substantial friends, from its first number. Two things it is necessary for a positive, progressive man to have, in order that he may be stirred to achieve the best success. These are first-rate friends; and first-rate enemies. In effect, such a man's first-rate enemies are his most efficient friends; and it really requires very little grace for a genuinely great man to love his enemies. It is often but the prompting of common gratitude.

Mr. Greeley had only fairly got The Tribune going, succeeding, however, in beating his rivals in some matters of important intelligence, when the conductors of The Sun made an attempt to put him down by main force and street brawls. The Evening Signal, then edited by Mr. Park Benjamin, told how The Sun undertook not to outshine, but to crush The Tribune:

The publisher of The Sun has, during the past few days, got up a conspiracy to crush The New-York Tribune. The Tribune was, from its inception, very successful, and, in many instances, persons in the habit of taking The Sun, stopped that paper-wisely preferring a sheet which gives twice the amount of reading matter, and always contains the latest

intelligence. This fact afforded sufficient evidence to Beach, as it did to all others who were cognizant of the circumstances, that The Tribune would, before the lapse of many weeks, supplant The Sun. To prevent this, and, if possible, to destroy the circulation of The Tribune altogether, an attempt was made to bribe the carriers to give up their routes; for tunately this succeeded only in the cases of two men who were likewise carriers of The Sun. In the next place, all the newsmen were threatened with being deprived of The Sun, if, in any instance, they were found selling The Tribune. But these efforts were not enough to gratify Beach. He instigated boys in his office, or others, to whip the boys engaged in selling The Tribune. No sooner was this fact ascertained at the office of The Tribune, than young men were sent to defend the sale of that paper. They had not been on their station long, before a boy from The Sun office approached and began to flog the lad with The Tribune: retributory measures were instantly resorted to; but before a just chastisement was inflicted, Beach himself, and a man in his employ, came out to sustain their youthful emissary. The whole matter will, we understand, be submitted to the proper magistrates."

The proper magistrates in this case were the public, who took sides with The Tribune in large numbers, swelling the list of regular subscribers in the city from three to four hundred a day. This was the magnificent act of friendship the first great enemy of The Tribune did for that journal before it was a month old. Without the enemy, all its friends could not have done so much. It need hardly be said that The Tribune gave back the blows of The Sun, but not in streetbrawl fashion. It used some vigourous English in expressing its opinion of that journal, and published the best news first.

If in those days The Tribune were a little boastful in its triumphs over an enemy who had descended to bullyism, let it be remembered that Horace Greeley was only thirty years old. He had not become the Philosopher of later years. But he went on, working hard, and succeeding in making a better and better paper every day. The early success of The Tribune cannot be better shown than by the statement that the increase of its sales per week was about five hundred copies until they reached ten thousand, which, with Mr. McElrath in the office, fairly placed the journal on its feet.

Mr. Greeley's first assistant-editor on The Tribune was Henry J. Raymond, afterwards the distinguished editor of The Daily Times, one of America's most noted politicians, one of

the world's great journalists. When in college, Mr. Raymond had contributed a number of essays to The New-Yorker. He was graduated,—at the University of Vermont,-in the sum mer of 1840, being then about twenty years of age, and returning to his home in the State of New York, entered zealously into the "Tippecanoe" campaign. Mr. Raymond may be said to have been born a politician. He made a number of speeches during the campaign, and entered into joint discussions with experienced debaters, acquitting himself in all with great credit. After the election, he proceeded to New-York, where he was for a time "adrift," turning his hand to what he could find to do: reading a little law, writing a little for The New-Yorker, but unable at first to procure a regular situation. He asked Mr. Greeley for the position of assistant-editor, but it was at the time filled. He did some work daily in the office, however, for which he received very little compensation; just that much more, however, whatsoever the amount, than Mr. Greeley had received for his first essays in journalism. At length Mr. Raymond advertised for a school in the South, and while awaiting replies, did considerable work on The New-Yorker. Speaking of this period of his life he says: "I added up election returns, read the exchanges for news, and discovered a good deal which others had overlooked; made brief notices of new books, read proof, and made myself generally useful. At the end of about three weeks I received the first reply to my advertisement, offering me a school of thirty scholars in North Carolina. I told Mr. Greeley at once that I should leave the city the next morning. He asked me to walk with him to the post-office, whither he always went in person to get his letters and exchanges, and on the way inquired where I was going. I told him to North/ Carolina to teach a school. He asked me how much they would pay me. I said four hundred dollars a year. 'Oh,' said he, stay here I'll give you that.' And this was my first engagement on the Press, and decided the whole course of my life."

When The Tribune was established, Mr. Raymond was made first assistant-editor. He entered upon the duties with great

zeal and discharged them with wonderful efficiency. Mr Greeley says: "I had not much for him to do till The Tribune was started; then I had enough; and I never found another person, barely of age and just from his studies, who evinced so much and so versatile ability in journalism as he did. Abler and stronger men I may have met; a cleverer, readier, more generally efficient journalist I never saw. He remained with me eight years, if my memory serves, and is the only assistant with whom I ever felt required to remonstrate for doing more work than any human brain and frame could be expected long to endure. His salary was of course gradually increased from time to time; but his services were more valuable in proportion to their cost than those of any one else who ever worked on The Tribune."

It appears from Mr. Maverick's Life of Raymond, that Mr. Greeley's memory was at fault in regard to the time Mr. Raymond remained on The Tribune. He left that journal and became connected with The Courier and Enquirer in 1843. But it would have been difficult for Mr. Greeley to overestimate the service rendered him and his journal during its first two years by Mr. Raymond. He appears to have helped in almost every department of the paper and to have infused his dashing, gentlemanly spirit into all. He wrote editorials; "scissorsed" from the exchanges; prepared much literary matter, including notices of books; reported public meetings; and, in fine, made himself a great deal more than "generally useful." He was very particularly useful indeed. His salary was only eight dollars a week at first. That Mr. Greeley did not forthwith more than double it was doubtless due to two facts: First, The Tribune was paying out more money than it was receiving. It was not a good time for raising salaries; and he himself was getting none. Secondly, Mr. Greeley had himself worked for very inadequate salary; it had only been a few years since he would have gladly laboured at his trade "for fifteen dollars a month and board or even less;" it had been a fewer number of years since, not earning so much as Mr. Raymond's first pay on The Tribune, he had nevertheless been able to remit money to his father on the frontier. When,

therefore, Mr. Raymond, who had actually worked himself sick, declared that he would not return for less than twenty dollars a week, so far from Mr. Greeley's momentary surprise and opposition being evidence of his want of appreciation of Mr. Raymond's services, the fact that he at once acceded to the demand conclusively proves the contrary. Twenty dollars a week was then a good deal of money; unquestionably more than the Editor received; daily journals were not started with an immense sinking-fund in bank. Not to consider the difference in circumstances affecting the pay of writers between the time when The Tribune was founded on Horace Greeley's talents, and the time when The Times was established on Henry J. Raymond's talents and money enough to run a bank, is to manifest not only palpable injustice but palpable stupidity as well.

It is hardly possible that Mr. Greeley could have found an assistant so competent greatly to aid him in building up a paper as Mr. Raymond. And this, not only because of that gentleman's great abilities as a journalist: his capacity to write remarkably well and with wonderful rapidity upon a great variety of topics: but because, though several years younger than the chief editor, he had far more varied culture, and was much better acquainted with the opinions, habits, customs, prejudices, of polite society. Mr. Greeley was apt to go ahead in the course which his conscience and judgment pointed out as right. Mr. Raymond considered it the part of wisdom to pay some deference to the opinions of others, right or wrong; and he esteemed as essentially correct some things in established society which Mr. Greeley regarded as essentially vicious. In short, the conservative element lacking in Mr. Greeley was abundant in Mr. Raymond, who gave The Tribune much of its popularity in the city of New-York among the cultivated and fashionable classes. He had great respect for Christianity, as represented by what is commonly called orthodoxy. Mr. Greeley was decidedly heterodox. In the then existing state of journalism, Mr. Raymond was, it will thus be seen, as valuable an adviser to the editor of The Tribune as he could have obtained. It will certainly not be