WOMAN'S WORLD.

Press, Volume LXV, Issue 13378, 20 March 1909, Page 7

WOMAN'S WORLD.

THE LADY RErORTEB LN AMERICA. LADY AUCKLAND'S EXPERIENCES. (By Fua.vcf.s i.v "T.l'.'s Weekly.") Surely nothing more extraordinary has over beeu grafted on to journalism than the lady journalist—or, rather, lady reportei—as she it» understanded of the big New York newspaper! The impression*. _ 1 havo gathered together about her were drawn from a lecture delivered by Lady Auckland at a meeting of the Society of Women Journalists, in which she recounted somo ot the surprises in store for a visitor to New York who is considered likely to give copy to the American Press. It may be romcmbere>d that when tho Prince ele Sagan returned to Paris after his visit, to America as the fiancee of the Comtesse de Castollane his whole interview with a French newspaper correspondent who asked him what ho thought of the American Press consisted in rapidly walking up and.dpwn, his room, throwing his hands in th© air, and exclaiming, "Mon Dicul Mon Dieu !" A humorous paper gave a column of marks of exclamation as the expression of tho Prince's opinions. I should think Lady Auckland must have felt tho beauty of expanding' into a column of exclamations as soon as sho left New York.

For, as I understood from Lady Auckland's description, tho lady .reporter is a sort of permanent guest at tho hi- New York hotels. Sho gets two or three hundred dollars a month— that is, ten or fifteen pounds a week— with board and lodging. The moment you arrive, if you have been marked down by her newspaper as a quarry, she begins her attack. You aro straightway asked for information about your ago, your mother, your grandmother, your complexion-wash, your opinion of "Teddy" Roosevelt, and I your impressions as to tho' beauty of tho American man. However- pieagre tho details you way give on ihe'sofand kindred topics, you may bo sure next day to see them expanded . into the most extravagant statements with sensational headings. But tho statements you make, or which are attributed to you, aro as .nothing to what tho ingenuity 'of the lady reporter, tries to find out about -you. The -word "privacy" has no meaning for her; sho seems to have forgotten even that the word "spy" has an ugly significance in the English language. Do you want a maid, the trim person who prepares your bath may bo a lady journalist who wishes to make a list,of your underclothing for her newspaper. Do you w__t a manicurist or /& hairdresser, the deftfingered assistant may be a lady journalist who wants to learn just how you act in private life, and whether you wear a wig. ' Should you by any chance be brought a letter while under her ministrations, sho will try, if possible, to read it over your shoulder; or, if sheis not successful in that, she will make an effort to abstract it later on. _ The more important and tho more confidential such a communication is, tho more certain you may be of seeing its # contents in" all the glory of largo print a few hours after. It sounds exaggeration, but we wero assured that any-de-scription fell short of the truth. One enterprising lady proposed that sbe should act as Lady Auckland's_maid to visit a dressmaker who might tell some news of Miss Elkins's trousseau for her marriage to an Italian prince. Those intrusions on your most absolute privacy are not, however, so aanoviwr, as the lady reporter's, qualit-f of'ubiquity. Onco you know the ropes you can at least lock your bedroom door i and prevent anyone from ontomng; but in a public room you aro never «rfe. This wonderful product of up-to-date journalism seems to havo gained possession of Fortunatus's cap. No hole is too small for her to creep through* no article of furniture so fragile that it will not hide her. She floems ©yon to havo acquired tho animal's and insect'adaptibility to surroundings. If she were in a room upholstered, in red brocade, anel there wore no article of furniture which would form a hidingplace, fiho would oe ablo to look as if robed in red brocade and fit in invisibly with the furniture. At any rate, khe would oomo to .you and say, "Mind, I heard every word of your" conversation with So-and-so. It will make some saucy copy for my naper." And co it would, no matter how trivial or' uninteresting it was. The whole thing seems like a huge nightmare.

But may not yellow journalism altogether be called the nightmare of tho twentieth century? At any rate, this description of the American lady, reporter did not lack corroboration. A lady who has a well-known brother told that he wp.s married in New York, and as he and his wife were starting on their honeymoon a lady journalist boarded their car and started to interview the young wife as to her feelings and opinions in re_ard to the man she had just married. As the husband waa present, the report of his wife's conversation did not cause a matrimonial rupture. Another lady told how she had seen a young woman taking possession of a well-known actress's, luggage and refusing to be separated from it. No wonder that these revelations closed - with the startling statement, mad*, by a woman who had -visited the States, that the lady journalist who comes, invited or otherwise, to a social function in New York, is put sitting severely alone in a special corner or at a spr_ial table—needless to say, completely ostracised by all tho other guests. This article merely applies to tho yellow journals'' news-gatherers, but even this limitation makes it sufficiently appalling.