“The part of this affair, however, which should give us gravest concern is the lazy credulity of the public. They know the recklessness of journalism as clearly as do I, on whom its dirty water has been poured. Yet readers trust, and journal copies journal, as securely as if the authorities were quite above suspicion. Once started by the sensational press, my enormities were taken up with amazing swiftness by the respectable and religious papers, and by many thousands of their readers. It is this easy trust on the part of the public which perpetuates newspaper mendacity. What inducement has a paper to criticise its statements when it knows they will never be criticised by its readers? Nothing in all this curious business has surprised me more than the ease with which the American people can be hoaxed. One would expect decent persons to put two and two together, and not to let a story gain acceptance from them unless it had some relation to the character of him of whom it was told. I please myself with thinking that if a piece of profanity were reported of President Taft I should think no worse of President Taft, but very badly and loudly of that paper. But, perhaps I, too, am an American. Perhaps I, too, might rest satisfied with saying, ‘I saw it in print.’ Only then I should be unreasonable to complain of bad newspapers. “G. H. PALMER.” FOOTNOTES: [7] See page 42. [8] They seem to be international institutions if one is to believe the story of the English lady who, comparing the United States unfavorably with her own country, said to an American: “You have nothing equal to _our_ _Century_, _Harper’s_, and _Scribner’s_.” Those magazines publish English editions. CHAPTER XII THE STUDY OF LITERATURE