The function of a great newspaper, in connexion with the positions of armies and the events of siege and battle, is as different from the function of the journalist of fifty years ago, as the rapid firing of the soldier of the Alma with his Minié rifle contrasts with the slow evolutions of the old hand-gunner. In the war with Russia the presence of the newspaper reporter gives a new feature, strikingly characteristic of our times and our country. It is necessary to have the earliest and the most detailed accounts of this eventful contest; for the people, one and all, understand that they are deeply interested in its issue, and that, if their country fails to assert the superiority of freedom and intelligence over slavery and barbarism, the material prosperity of that country can be of no long duration. Wisely, therefore, did the London daily papers each send their active, fearless, and eloquent correspondents, to endure some of the hardships of the march and the bivouac--to observe the battle-field, not secure from its dangers--to write of victories, surrounded by the dead and dying--to be the historians of a day, and thus to furnish the best materials for all future historians. The life of a London reporter, although a life of constant labour, is generally accompanied by much ease and comfort. The senate does not acknowledge his presence; but it provides the "stranger" with the best seat. He takes his place at the public dinner as an honoured guest--one whose absence would be more regretted than that of the city's mayor or the borough's patron. But in a campaign, where his duties are new, he must fight his way through every difficulty. His function is recognised in an age when it would be useless to suppress intelligence, even if it were possible. He finds a ready mess in every tent where a scanty meal is set out; he stands by the side of the commander, and gazes with him upon "the currents of the heady fight." How he wears after two months of unusual service we have some slight notion, when we read, in a letter to '_The Times_' of November 30, that the writer had seen an officer who had lately parted from the special correspondent. "The chances of war had deprived him of nearly all his garments; and when last seen he was walking about in a rifleman's jacket, much too small for his portly person; and his nether garments had been converted into breeches by a constant scrambling amongst rocks and briers." Let us not forget our obligations to the men who, in peril and suffering, have made heroic action more familiar to us; and have contributed no mean part in giving a moral impulse to our country, as essential to future safety and honour as the material wealth which has made us a people amongst the foremost of the earth. [Illustration: Carrier-pigeon.]