James Parton, The life of Horace Greeley

[199] dead in many a telling article. In behalf of Protection to American Industry, the editor wrote columns upon columns. In a word, the Tribune was equal to its opportunity; it lived up to its privileges. In every department it steadily and strikingly improved throughout the year. It began its second year with twelve thousand subscribers, and a daily average of thirteen columns of advertisements. The Tribune was a Fixed Fact.

The history of a daily paper is the history of the world. It is obviously impossible in the compass of a work like this to give anything like a complete history of the Tribune. For that purpose ten octavo volumes would be required, and most interesting volumes they would be. All that I can do is to select the leading events of its history which were most intimately connected with the history of its editor, and dwell with some minuteness upon them, connecting them together only by a slender thread of narrative, and omitting even to mention many things of real interest. It will be convenient, too, to group together in separate chapters events similar in their nature, but far removed from one another in the time of their occurrence. Indeed, I am overwhelmed with the mass of materials, and must struggle out as best I can. A great book is a great evil, says the Greek Reader. This book was fore-ordained to be a small one.