TROUBLES OF A COUNTRY EDITOR

Tuapeka Times, Volume VI, Issue 321, 14 January 1874, Page 3

TROUBLES OF A COUNTRY EDITOR

At a banquet given at Curcoar, N.S.W., in honor of the visit of the Premier, Mr. Parkes, Mr. Thatcher, editor o2o 2 the " Western Independent," replied to the toast of the Press at some length, and defended the Provincial papers against the different charges brought agaiust them. In the course of his remarks he said: — " The country press is called personal ; people cry out, ' Whycan't you attack principles and not persons?' but that is scarcely possible in sparsely populated districts ; because by attacking principles you must as a necessary consequence attack the, comparatively speaking, few persons holding them. To the charge of lacking force and vigor, I reply, we cannot always act as we wish. How could the American editor who doubled his subscription list by getting a fresh subscriber, afford to be vigorous and forcible ? No, gentlemen; like the man who got into the big fight, we must temporise and use stratagem. I think the pressmen of the colony deserve well of it. Considering the qualifications and duties demanded from them, they are very poorly and inadequately paid ; and we especially, who have to wrfte for small communities, are often, if we are conscientious, obliged to say hard things of people we esteem and generally like. The journal which it is my labor of love to conduct cannot in fairness be accused of being lukewarm or reticent ; it has been published but thirteen short months' yet dui'ing that time it has' been threatened with nine actions for libel, denounced byfourteen contemporaries, and forced to make two ample apologies, while the editor has received notice of numberless cane hidings, which fortunately are notfjet to hand."