AN EDITOR'S DECALOGUE.

Tuapeka Times, Volume XVII, Issue 1027, 26 March 1884, Page 6

AN EDITOR'S DECALOGUE.

The following version of the " Contributor's Ten Commandments " is taken from a Swedish paper. It would be interesting to collate it with any similar decalogue existing in other countries : — " 1. If you wish to send a communication to a paper, do it at once. "What is new at this moment is no longer so to-morrow. 2. Be concise in your statement, for thereby you save your own time and that of "the reader. Explanations, not words ; facts, but not reflections on them. 3. Be simple, write distinctly, do not talk about to-day or yesterday, but give the name of the day or the date. 4. Begin frequently a new line, which gladdens the compositor. "Write short sentences, for the benefit of the reader. Use many stops and commas,and do not forget to put them in. 5. Do not correct single letters or numbers, but cross the whole word out when a correction is wanted. 6. First and foremoßt, write only on one side of the paper. A hundred lines on one side can be cut into ten pieces, and set up by several compositors in ten minutes. If written on both sides, only one compositor can arrange it, which will take some hours. 7..AMS. paper which will take some hours in getting into type is in danger of not being printed thefirstday,andofbeingpassed over till another day. 8. What is kept till the next day is no longer new. 9. Pat your name and address on the back of your copy. 10. Above all speak the truth, and nothing but the truth. If you speak about yourself use the third person, say what you have to say without false modesty, but also without conceit." Admirable rules these, and if they are obeyed how happy must be the life of an editor in Sweden.

Old hoaxes are like old fashions and j bad pennies — they keep turning up again and again in a highly interesting manner. Quite lately some newspapers have been giving currency to the ao-called text of a document containing what purports to be a written description of the personal appearance of Christ, written by Publiua Lentulus to the Roman Senate. Concerning this description a contemporary observes that "the same document, accompanied by a photograph of Christ, which it was alleged was a true copy of his likenes, as taken from an engraving on an emerald which', it was alleged, was known to be of fabulous antiquity, was sold in all the stationers' shops in England nearly thirty years ago, and was generally regarded at the time as a hoax, and was afterwards, if we remember rightly, proved to be such." »: