Note 6 — Chapter IV · THE NEWSPAPER AS AN ORGAN OF OPINION

For fear that any one should imagine that I am labouring this point or exaggerating an exceptional condition of things I think I am free to state here what would otherwise never be known. The fact is entirely to the honour of the proprietor and not at all to the discredit of the paper concerned. To my certain knowledge the late Mr. John Edward Taylor refused to consider an offer of a million sterling for the Manchester Guardian, at a time when such a sum would have very favourably represented the value of the paper. He wrote to me briefly, asking me not to send on to him communications of that kind again. I have known four or five other proprietors of great papers, who would have been capable of doing the same thing.

As an instance of the generous and courteous consideration shown by a famous proprietor to a deserving servant I refer the reader to a letter written by Mr. John Walter of the Times, dated Oct. 30, 1854, to his correspondent, Mr. William Howard Russell, as he then was, acting for his paper in the Crimea. The letter is given in full in Mr. J. B. Atkins’ “Life of Russell,” and contains very much more than an acknowledgment of an obligation or the conferring of a favour.