Memoirs of an editor : fifty years of American journalism / Edward P. Mitchell.

"THE NEWSPAPER MAN'S NEWSPAPER" 139
the indiscutable importancy of our enterprise by taking an
abonnemcnt of six months for trial.
You receive letters in your own language ready to printed.
Mr. Dana's time-saving custom was to condense his
reply of approval, rejection, or criticism into a sententious
phrase of blue pencilled comment. "My! Ain't he mad!"
he wrote across a vitriolic editorial in Mr. Bowles's
Springfield paper denouncing him for his attitude toward
Civil Service reform. "I don't know about this. Perhaps
you do. Use your judgment," on no end of things handed
down for decision. "Not a touch of genius in it-C. A. D."
disposed of many manuscripts. "This won't washC. A. D." was a common form of rejection. "This is
nearly bad enough to be good" put the case precisely.
"Say, what's got the matter with you?" he wrote to a
contributor whose manuscript transcended in some respects the recognized bounds of propriety. These blue
endorsements made him seem very human, very distinctly
personal, to those who received them, whether the words
carried pleasure or disappointment.
In a magazine sketch of Mr. Dana I told once about
an eminent clergyman of sensational proclivities who wrote
suggesting the fashion in which The Sun's editorials ought
to be conceived in order to be effective and yet be like
Csesar's wife. At last Mr. Dana invited the persistent
critic to show us the way by an example from his own
hand. The manuscript came after a week or so of evidently
laborious and conscientious effort to adapt himself to
what he supposed to be the worldly and reckless tone of
Sunday journalism. He got it back endorsed in blue as

usual, "This is too damned wicked!"
III
Under conditions of leadership such as have been noted
in the foregoing it is not surprising that Dana's Sun came