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      Caper-Sauce: A Volume of Chit-Chat about Men, Women, and Things

      PREFACE

      Excuse me. None this time. There have already been too many big porticos before little buildings.

      EDITORS

      I am not disposed to pity Editors. On the whole, I think they have a very good time. That national sugar-plum for American boys, "Maybe, my son, you will be one day President," might be changed advantageously for "My son, you may live some day to be an Editor." As for the present President, if he can sleep o' nights, he can live through anything! I repeat it, Editors have a good time, no matter what they say to the contrary. In the first place, I know that the position of an editor, if honorably filled, is second to none in this country. He need envy no one his influential power; would that in many cases it were more conscientiously wielded. If an Editor is an ignorant man, it is his own fault, no matter from what small beginnings he may have risen. Coming in contact, as he does, with information every instant, on all the absorbing topics of the day, it is next to impossible he should not be well informed. Read he must, whether he will or not. Think on what he has read he must; tell his subscribers, in words, what he thinks about it, and reflect and decide upon the submitted thoughts of others for his columns, he must. Hence the mind of an Editor is, or may be, a perfect Encyclopedia of information.

      Of course he has his peculiar botherations; it would be a blessing if his subscription list were large enough for him to say just what he pleases right and left, without fear or favor. It would be a blessing if his subscribers would always pay punctually, without dunning. It would be a blessing, when he uses superhuman efforts to please them, if they never would find fault or grumble, for the sake of grumbling. It would be a blessing if they wouldn't stay so long when they come in to see him "just a minute," and he is in a frenzied hurry to say do go, and can't. It would be a blessing (to those who apply) if he could publish and pay for, at the valuation of the writers, all the immortal trash that is offered. It would be a blessing if other editors, "who can see nothing in his paper," wouldn't steal his articles constantly – editorial and contributed – without credit.

      But, on the contrary, how came that beautiful bouquet on his desk? Where that fine engraving on his office wall? How came that beautiful picture and convenient inkstand there? I'd have you to know that the donors have not always an axe they wish to grind in that office. I dare say you will try to make me believe that Editors are human. Now I deny that, for I myself have, in past days, had evidence to the contrary. But never mind that now. You may tell me that Editors are not above the weakness of publicly and slyly slipping in a good word for a good friend, when he needs it, and that they are not above giving a bad "friend" a good, satisfying dig when he needs it, and so would you. If a man is to be overhauled for that, there's got to be a monstrous overturning of matters in other places beside Editors' offices. I confess I sometimes covet the quantities of books he accumulates free gratis for his library, and I should like to be allowed to review some of 'em after a fashion of my own, if nobody knew who did it; and I should like occasionally to dust their horrible desks for the poor creatures, and open those hermetically sealed windows, and advise them not to make themselves prematurely bald by wearing their hats in their offices, week in and week out, as if it were necessary their ideas should be kept warm like chickens in order to hatch.

      Only that I am convinced that everybody must work in his own way, and that if Editors had to work in a clean place, they couldn't work at all. Now if they opened their office windows of a hot day, they might possibly be cooler, and a cool Editor, in times like these, when all the fire and fury we could master would not begin to express our national emotions, you see for yourself the thing wouldn't be tolerated. Beside, some of them ought to be getting used to a hot place, and they might as well begin now.

      I wonder are Editors aware of how much importance is their Poet's corner! I wonder if they know that the most inveterate pursuer of brooms and gridirons that ever kept a good man's house tidy, likes a bit of sentiment, in that shape, in the family paper. I wonder do Editors know, how, when the day's work is done, she likes to pull that paper out from some old tea-caddy, or broken flower-pot – that long ago fell into disuse, and seating herself with a long-drawn breath of relief in the old-fashioned chair, where all her Tommys and Marys have been rocked, give herself up to the quiet enjoyment of its pages. Presently, as she reads, a tear gathers in her eye; she dashes it quickly away with an "ah – me," and laying her head back upon the chair, and closing eyes that were once much bluer than now, she is soon far, far away from the quiet home where her treadmill round of everyday duties has been for many years so faithfully performed, and, perhaps, alas! so thanklessly accepted. The cat comes purring round her feet, and Tray comes scratching at the door, but she does not move, till the sound of a heavy and familiar footstep is heard in the entry or hall; then, starting up, and taking her scissors from the long pocket at her side, she clips the precious verses from the paper and hides them in her bosom. Perhaps you might turn up your critical nose at those verses; never mind, they have touched her heart; and many times, when she is alone, she will read them over; and so long as they hold together, she will keep them in a little needle-case in her work-box, to read when "things go wrong," and a good, safe cry will ease the heart.

      Her good man picks up the mutilated paper, and she says, "It was only a bit of poetry, John." Now, there are more Johns than one in the world, but he don't think of that, as turning to some political article he says, "Oh, you are quite welcome to all that sort of stuff;" nor does he know how much that other John had to do with her crying over those verses, which somebody certainly must have written, who, like herself, had married the wrong John.

      Now, gentlemen Editors, crowd what else you may out of your papers, but don't crowd out the poetry, or think it of small consequence. Take the affidavit of one who has seen the clipped verses from your papers hid away in pocket-books, tucked away in needle-cases, speared upon pin-cushions, pinned up on toilet glasses, and murmured over in the mystic hour of twilight, just before "John comes home to tea;" and always have a bit of poetry in your columns for her who has so potent a voice in the choice of a family paper. I publicly promulgate this bit of wisdom, though I am very well aware that you will pass it off for your own, and neither credit me nor my book for it!

      A word on a practice too common in some newspapers. I refer to the flippant manner in which the misfortunes and misdemeanors of certain classes, brought to the notice of our courts, are reported for the amusement of the community at large. Surely, it is melancholy enough that a drunken mother should be picked up in the gutter with her unconscious babe; or a young girl, scarcely in her teens, be found guilty of theft; or, that a husband and father should beat or murder her whom he had sworn to cherish, without narrating it after this heartless fashion. For instance:

      Or thus:

      Now, I protest against this disgusting, demoralizing, and heartless mention of the sins and follies of poor wretches, the temptations of whose lot are as the sands of the sea-shore for multitude; who, ill-paid, ill-fed, worse-lodged, disheartened, discouraged, fall victims to the snares, in the shape of low groggeries, set for them by the very men who laugh over their well-spread breakfast tables, at this pitiful and revolting recital of their success. Oh, write over against the poor wretch's name, as God does, why he or she fell! or at least cease making it the subject for a jeer. Make it your son, your daughter, and then pen that flippant, heartless paragraph if you can. And yet, it was somebody's son, or daughter, or sister, or husband, unworthy it may be, (who is not?) but alas!

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