The result the next morning is the anticipated result. The average
newspaper reader gathers that an extremely brilliant young man or woman
has held converse with a very commonplace stranger who, being confused
in his or her presence, committed a number of absurdities which offered
a strong and painful contrast to the cleverness and wisdom of the
brilliant youth. This result apparently satisfies the average newspaper
reader, but it does not satisfy the expert. Immediately after my first
bout with interviewers I was seated at a table in the dining-saloon of
the ship with my particular friend and three or four friendly, quiet,
modest, rather diffident human beings whom I afterward discovered to be
among the best and most experienced newspaper men in New York--not
interviewers.

Said one of them:

"Not every interviewer in New York knows how to _write_--how to put a
sentence together decently. And there are perhaps a few who don't
accurately know the difference between impudence and wit."

A caustic remark, perhaps. But I have noticed that when the variety of
interviewing upon which I have just animadverted becomes the topic,
quiet, reasonable Americans are apt to drop into causticity.

Said another:

"I was a reporter for twelve years, but I was cured of personalities at
an early stage--and by a nigger, too! I had been interviewing a nigger
prize-fighter, and I'd made some remarks about the facial
characteristics of niggers in general. Some other nigger wrote me a long
letter of protest, and it ended like this: 'I've never seen you. But