Life — January 21, 1909 — page 11: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

“LIFE: 99 DESIGNED EXPRESSLY FOR JERSEY COMMUTERS Modern Magazine Muse O peaceful sleep I never lost a wink On prosody. One stands as poor a chance To learn the Muses’ art this way, I thin As studying skeletons to lee: > to dance! A Fearless Newspaper OER teaders may be interested in this article from the January number of The Bookman, published by Messrs. Dodd, Mead and Company : York Sun for Novem- ned the following inter- The editorial page of the N ber 18th cor esting paragrap “$151 a Week" We have instructed our attorney to commence an action for libel at once against Life Publishing Company—of which J. A. Mitchell is president—claiming punitive damages for the publication in yesterday's Lire of a certain libellous article signed “ Met- caife.”” We advise all our readers to get a copy of Lire for the week ending November 21st and read the so-called “ libel- lous article” which has had so remarkable an effect upon the Sun. It will not be easy to buy a copy; because within six hours after the Sun appeared, the news-stands were swept clean by people who were anxious to see what Lire had said so poignant and so galling as to make the Sun run whimpering to the law courts. The New York Sun— just think of it—the New York Sun, the Sun of Charles ‘A. Dana! For forty years that sheet has recked with every form of bitter personality, It has been a sort of Bull of. Bashan among American journals, snorting up. and down with iron lungs and front of brass, bellowing, jcer- ing and trampling with its hoofs upon ‘everything and everybody, There is hardly a public man whom it has not tried to gore. It declared President Grant to be tyrant and a drunkard. It printed a woodcut of President Hi. with the word “Fraud” upon his forehead. It squirted venom over President Cleveland for ten years, and only after his death discovered that he had been a statesman of high character. It ridiculed McKinley as it is now roaring at Roosevelt. It has scattered nicknames and emitted streams of ridicule upon almost every one who is well enough known to make the ridicule generally intelligible. It printed a_ picture of Speaker Cannon's mouth and described Mr. Cannon as “ Cannon of the Dirty Mouth,” A_ qui f not judicious, instructor in the Uni- versity of Chicago lost his position there because of the Sun's gibes and jeers. And all this time the Sun went on its way unblushing, unashamed, and apparently imper ous to attack. But now, all of a sudden, Mr. Metcalfe in a single page has got in under the Sun's fifth rib and has compelled this journalistic bully to whine and whimper and ask to be protected, like a baby running to its mamma's apron strings. Goliath of Gath smitten by young David's pebble and tumbling in a weltering heap was an unimpres- sive figure compared with the Sun after Mr. Metcalfe shot his arrow. We must confess that we are rather sorry; since the Sun was unique in its own way and per- fect in its own kind. Now it has fallen; and however loudly it may roar hereafter, every one will know that it is vulnerable. If you only hit it hard enough, it will begin to yelp. And this blind paragraph on its editorial page seems to be all the reply that the Sun can make to The Bookman's scathing arraignment : What. can be the matter with Dodd, Mead and Com- pany? Such a respectable house, too! Music I" you find in your newspaper an article which appears, on examination, to be A tour de force in esoterics, A farrago of phrases designed to split the ears of the groundlings, Verbosity veiling vacuity, The chances are that there has been a Musical Performance of Some Importance, to which a Competent Critic has ad- dressed himself. comicbooks.com