present
trouble, let us not forget the lessons of our recent experience. In
spite of any bugaboo we shall remain a Federal republic and a free
people.

--One accompaniment of the singular result of the election has been
sufficiently ridiculous--the daily reports of "the situation" as they
appeared in the columns and at the doors of the Republican and
Democratic newspapers. The phrase "to lie like a bulletin" has been
justified to the fullest extent. On which side lay the deviation from
truth it was impossible to say; but if one respectable journal's
assertions were true, the others surely were false. It was strange and
laughable to read on one bulletin board, "Republican Victory! Election
of Hayes! South Carolina and Florida ours by large majorities!" and then
to find only a few yards off a no less flaming announcement of
"Democratic Triumph! Tilden elected! South Carolina and Florida give
decided Democratic majorities!" And this was not only ridiculous, but
somewhat incomprehensible. For the newspapers which made these flatly
contradictory announcements at the same time and within short distances,
all equally prided themselves on their reputation as purveyors of
news--news that could be relied upon. Moreover, their means of obtaining
news are pretty well known to the public and quite well to each other.
True the "reliable gentleman," and the "distinguished member of
Congress," figured somewhat largely as the sources of those very
discrepant statements; and those persons are notoriously untrustworthy;
even more so than the "intelligent contraband" of the war times. But
after all it was a puzzle--unless, indeed, upon the assumption that
these newspapers published each of them, not what they knew to be the
fact, but what they thought their readers would like to be told; a
theory not to be entertained for a moment. Nevertheless the facts as
they presented themselves did seem to be worthy of some candid
consideration by the journalistic mind; for to mere outsiders they
seemed to point to the prudence and safety, to say the least, of more
caution and reserve of assertion, with the certainty that the
introduction of these new elements into the news department of
journalism would tend to the elevation of the profession, and would
beget a confidence in that department of our leading journals which it
may perhaps be safely said does not exist in a very high degree at
present. Possibly, however, the question may have presente