authority, that we owe the prototype of the leading article, a Letter
Introductory, as it became the fashion to call it, written on some
subject of general interest and placed at the commencement of each
number. The writer of this Letter Introductory was known as the "author"
of the paper.

Another feature in journalism which Defoe greatly helped to develop, if
he did not actually invent, was the Journal of Society. In the _Review_
he had provided for the amusement of his readers by the device of a
Scandal Club, whose transactions he professed to report. But political
excitement was intense throughout the whole of Queen Anne's reign; Defoe
could afford but small space for scandal, and his Club was often
occupied with fighting his minor political battles. When, however, the
Hanoverian succession was secured, and the land had rest from the hot
strife of parties, light gossip was more in request. Newspapers became
less political, and their circulation extended from the coffee-houses,
inns, and ale-houses to a new class of readers. "They have of late," a
writer in _Applebee's Journal_ says in 1725, "been taken in much by the
women, especially the political ladies, to assist at the tea-table."
Defoe seems to have taken an active part in making _Mist's Journal_ and
_Applebee's Journal_, both Tory organs, suitable for this more frivolous
section of the public. This fell in with his purpose of diminishing the
political weight of these journals, and at the same time increased their
sale. He converted them from rabid party agencies into registers of
domestic news and vehicles of social disquisitions, sometimes grave,
sometimes gay in subject, but uniformly bright and spirited in tone.

The raw materials of several of Defoe's elaborate tales, such as _Moll
Flanders_ and _Colonel Jack_, are to be found in the columns of _Mist's_
and _Applebee's_. In connexion with _Applebee's_ more particularly,