fatal ignorance of public opinion--Serious handicaps in the past--LEONIDAS
never seen at lunch by Mr. Gossip--ALCIBIADES never stimulated by attacks
in Athens journals--No brainy onlooker at defeat of Armada.

_II.--The Growth of the Press._

The birth of a happier era--The first English newspaper--Rapid development
of the new arm--A nation made articulate--Unfortunate quietistic
tendencies: ADDISON, STEELE, JOHNSON--Foreshadowings of the real
thing--Arrival of the real thing--The Fourth Estate--The Tenth Muse--The
Editor as Dictator--The Millennium.

_III.--The Vigilant Correspondent._

The Council of Ten and the Lion's Mouth--Importance of attending to other
people's affairs--True citizenship the improvement of one's
neighbours--Neglect of one's own character a national virtue--Brief sketch
of Paul Pry--Brief sketch of Meddlesome Matty--Keepers of the public
conscience--Human alarm-clocks--Samples of reforms delayed by absence of
letters to the Press--The circulation of the blood--The law of gravity--The
movement of the solar system--Value of iteration and undauntability.

_IV.--Range of Subject._

Every stick useful in beating dogs--Nothing too trivial to yoke with such
words as "scandal" and "outrage"--Suspicion and mistrust the
letter-writer's life-blood--Necessity for believing everyone in office
negligent or corrupt--Reasons why it is better to write to the papers than
to the individual--The sacredness of publicity--Importance also of victim
seeing the indictment--Value of _Who's Who?_--Postal rates for newspapers.