THE "EVENING MOON" INDULGES IN A BOMBASTIC RETROSPECT,
IN WHICH SOME VERY TALL AND VERY FINE WRITING WILL BE
DETECTED BY THE OBSERVANT READER.
"In pursuance of the policy which we inaugurated some four years since
by the romance known as 'Great Porter Square,' we now present our
readers with a story of to-day, which we with confidence declare to be
as strange and exciting as that thrilling mystery, which may be
regarded as the starting-point of a new and captivating description of
journalism for the people. We use the term 'romance' advisedly, and
are prepared to justify it, although the incidents which we set before
hundreds of thousands of readers were true in every particular, and
occurred in a locality with which every Londoner is familiar. We
recall with pride the extraordinary variety of opinions which our
publication of that story of real life, and the means we pursued to
get at the heart of it, elicited. By many we were inordinately
praised, by some we were mercilessly condemned. There were critics who
declared that it was derogatory to the legitimate functions of a
newspaper to present any matter of public interest in the garb in
which we clothed it; there were others who, with a juster sense of the
altered conditions of society by which we are ruled, and to which we
are compelled to submit, declared that the new departure we made in
the Great Porter Square Mystery was, to the general mass of readers,
as wholesome as it was entertaining. Judging by results, these latter
critics were most certainly in the right. The public read with eager
avidity the details of that remarkable case as we published them, in
our own original fashion, from day to day. The demand for copies of
our several editions was so great that we were absolutely unable to
satisfy it, and we are afraid that thousands of newspaper readers were
compelled to pay exorbitant prices to the ragamuffins who vend the
daily journals in the public streets. We made strong endeavors to put
a stop to this extortion, but our efforts were vain, chiefly because
the people themselves were content to pay three and four times the
established price of the _Evening Moon_ rather than be deprived of the
pleasure of reading the tempting morsels with which its columns were
filled. Letters of congratulation poured in upon us from all quarters,
written by persons occupying the highest positions in society, as well
as by others moving in the lowest stations, and from that time the
success of the _Evening Moon_, as a journal which had firmly fixed
itself in the affections of the people, was assured. If any excuse is
needed for the system of journalism of which we were the first bold
exponents, we might find it in the trite axiom that the ends justify
the means, but we deny that any excuse whatever is required. It was no
sentimental experiment that we were trying; we had carefully watched
the currents of public opinion, and we started on our crusade to
satisfy a need. The present state of society is such that the public
insist upon their right to be made acquainted with the innermost
details of cases which are brought before the tribunals; the moment
these cases come before the public they are public property. There was
a time when seemly and closed doors were the rule, and under the cloak
of that pernicious system the most flagrant wrongs were committed; it
is not so in the present day, and it is right that it should not be
so. Public matters belong to the people, and so long as a proper and
necessary measure of decency is observed, so long as private
characters are not defamed, so long as homes and those who occupy them
are not made wretched by infamous innuendoes, so long as the pen of
the literary journalist is not employed for the purpose of scandal and
blackmail--too often, we regret to say, convertible terms--the
people's rights in this respect must be observed.
"We point with justifiable pride to the manner in which our example
has been followed. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, and,
we may add, also of approval, and the columns of numberless newspapers
with which we have no connection testify to the approval which our new
system of journalism has won. We mention no names, and have no
intention of complaining because the credit of initiating the new
system has been withheld from us; we accept the compliment which has
been paid to us, and we wish our contemporaries good luck. At the same
time we point out to our hundreds of thousands of readers that no
journal has, up to this day, succeeded in presenting public news in as
tempting a manner as we are enabled to do. The reason for this lies in
the extraordinary intelligence of our staff. Our writers are picked
men, who could earn celebrity in other channels than those of
newspaper columns, but who are content to serve us because they are
paid as capable journalists ought to be paid, with a liberality which
other newspaper proprietors would deem excessive, but which we do not.
This is one of the secrets of our astonishing and unprecedented
success. Our editors, sub-editors, special correspondents, and
reporters are zealous as no others are because they are devoted to our
cause, because they have regular and tangible proof that our welfare
is theirs, because they share in the profits of our enterprise. Thus
it is that we are now in possession of particulars relating to 'The
Mystery of Monsieur Felix,' which not one of our contemporaries has
been able to obtain, and thus it is that we are in a position to
present to our readers a romance as thrilling as any that has ever
emanated from the printing press. It presents features of novelty and
surprise which can be found in no other _cause célèbre_, and our
readers may rest assured that we shall follow up every clew in our
possession with an intelligence frequently wanting in the officials of
Scotland Yard. And, moreover, we have every right to maintain, and we
shall establish the fact, that what we do is done in the sacred cause
of justice. The wronged shall be righted, and the mystery clearly
brought to light, before we have finished with the case of M. Felix.
"For a long period of time the term 'romance' has been misunderstood.
Romance was supposed to lie outside the regions of the ordinary
occurrences of everyday life. There was a glamour about the word, a
kind of lustre which lifted it above and beyond the commonplace
features of human struggle. It was, as it were, a castle built upon an
eminence, with spires, and turrets, and gables, whose points shone
brightly in the sun; it was, as it were, a species of ideal garden in
which grew only rare flowers and stately trees; or a land of
enchantment peopled by knights in silver armor, and by dainty ladies
flinging kisses to their lords and lovers as they rode forth to the
tournament or the battle. This was the bygone notion of Romance, the
false idea which, thanks in a great measure to our efforts, is now
utterly exploded. It has been found and proved that the truest regions
of romance lie in humble courts and alleys, where the commonest
flowers grow, where the air is not perfumed by odorous blossoms, where
people dwell not in turreted castle or stately palace, but in the
humblest homes and narrowest spaces, where common fustian and dimity,
not glittering armor and silken sheen, are the ordinary wear; where
faces are thin and anxious from the daily cares of toil, where the
battle is not for vast tracts of country worth millions, but for the
daily loaf of bread worth fourpence halfpenny. It has been found and
proved that the police courts are a veritable hot-bed in which romance
is forever springing up. When we contemplate the shattering of old
false idols and ideals, it would almost seem as if we were living in
an age of topsy-turvydom, but the sober fact is that the world is
healthfully setting itself right, and is daily and hourly stripping
off the veneer which lay thick upon what have been ridiculously called
the good old times. We were the first to practically recognize this
truth, and we have done our best to make it popular. It is from lowly
annals that we culled the romance of 'Great Porter Square,' and it is
from somewhat similar annals that we cull the present 'Mystery of M.
Felix.' The story will be found as strange as it is true. All the
passions of human nature are expressed in it, and there is one episode
at least--even up to the point which it has already reached--so
singular and startling as to be absolutely unique.
"We draw special attention to the words in our last sentence, 'even up
to the point which it has already reached,' and we beg our readers to
bear them well in mind. It may be in their remembrance that when we
commenced to unravel the mystery of 'Great Porter Square' we had no
knowledge of its conclusion. We held in our hands certain slight
threads which we followed patiently up, and of which we kept firm
hold, until we had woven them into a strand which villainy and
duplicity could not break. We championed the cause of a man who, upon
no evidence whatever--simply from the officious and mistaken zeal of a
few policemen--was brought up to the police court on the suspicion of
being in some undiscovered way connected with a crime with which all
England was ringing. He was remanded day after day for the production
of evidence which was never forthcoming, and day after day we
protested against the injustice of which it was sought to make him a
victim. The slender threads in our possession we held fast, as we have
said, until at length we were rewarded with a gratifying success,
until at length we brought the guilt home to the guilty parties. We
ourselves were misled by the specious statements of one of the
miscreants, a woman, we regret to say, who was one of the two
principal actors in a plot which was very nearly successful, and
which, indeed, did for a certain time succeed. We are in a similar
position with respect to the 'Mystery of M. Felix.' The information
already in our possession leads us to a point of great interest, and
there strangely breaks off. But we pledge ourselves to pursue the
story to an end, and to unearth what is at present hidden in darkness.
Our agents are at work in this country and elsewhere, and we are
satisfied that they will succeed in removing the veil from a mystery
which is a common topic of conversation and discussion in all classes
of society."