We confess ourselves surprised at the extraordinary pressure of advertisements upon our pages this morning; and disappointed in being compelled to present the _Sun_ to our readers in a different form from that to which they are accustomed. We trust, however, that they will find it no less interesting than usual; and, still more, that they will feel that although the appearance may be somewhat different, it is yet the same friendly and faithful _Sun_. But the Sunday issue of the _Sun_ never went back to four pages, for the eight-page paper had been made so attractive with special stories, reprint, and short fiction that both readers and advertisers were pleased. It was ten years, however, before the week-day _Sun_ increased its size. Even during the Beecher trial (January, 1875) when the _Sun’s_ reporter, Franklin Fyles, found himself unable to condense the day’s proceedings within a page of seven columns, the _Sun_ still gave all the rest of the day’s news. Cummings’s right-hand man in the news department of the _Sun_ was Dr. John B. Wood, the Great American Condenser. All the city copy passed through his hands. He was then nearing fifty, a white-haired man who wore two pairs of glasses with thick lenses, these crowned with a green shade. He had been a printer on several papers and a desk man on the _Tribune_, whence Dana brought him to the _Sun_. Wood’s sense of the value of words was so acute that he could determine, as rapidly as his eye passed along the pages of a story, just what might be stricken out without loss. It might be a word, a sentence, a page; sometimes it would be ninety-eight per cent of the article. Even when his sight so failed that he was unable to read copy continuously, Dr. Wood performed the remarkable feat of condensing through a reader. Willis Holly read copy to him for months, six hours a night. Holly might read three pages without interruption, while Wood sat as silent as if he were asleep. Then---- “Throw out the introduction down to the middle of the second page, begin with ‘John Elliott killed,’ and cut it off at ‘arrested him.’” Joseph C. Hendrix, who became a member of Congress and a bank president, was a _Sun_ cub reporter. One night he was assigned to read copy to Dr. Wood. He picked up a sheet and began: “‘The application of Mrs. Jane Smith for divorce from her husband, John Smith--’” “Cut out ‘her husband,’” said Wood. “‘--who alleges cruelty,’” Hendrix continued, “‘in that he--’” Here the reporter’s writing was blurred, and Hendrix, who could not decipher it, said “Damn!” “Cut out the ‘damn,’” said Dr. Wood.