of sub-
scriptions. The following advertisement of the post-rider from Providence to Connecticut is taken from The Gazette of the former place for April 2, 1803 :
PAY THE POST, THAT HE MAY PAY THE PRINTER
I who have been TWO YEARS at most
(Strange as 't may seem) a RIDING POST
And worn my poor old DOBBIN'S shoes out
With riding hard, to bring the news out,
And made wry faces at the storm,
While yet the news was moist and warm,
That you might read, before the fire,
Of battles fought, and sieges dire,
What politician now is vest,
Who's dead, and who is married next,
And such like entertaining story,
Which I have always laid before ye,
Solicit, my friends, the amount
Of what is due ON OLD ACCOUNT.
ALBE STONE.
COMBINATION OF PUBLISHERS TO RAISE PRICES In 1803 several papers in New York City made an attempt to get together to fix prices. The New York Evening Post, in its issue for December 1 of that year, told of this attempt as fol- lows:
At a meeting of the Publishers of the following Daily Newspapers printed in the City of New- York, viz. Daily Advertiser, Mercantile Advertiser, Daily Gazette, American Citizen, Commercial Advertiser, and Evening Post held at Lovett's Hotel on Saturday 5th November, 1803 it was unanimously Resolved:
That the sum of eight dollars per annum, at present paid as the price on Subscription for a Daily Paper, is inadequate to the expences of Paper, Printing, and Publication: and that the same be increased to Ten Dollars from and after the first day of January next.
That the price of those papers which are issued twice a week for the country, shall, from and after the first day of January, be Four Dollars per annum.
In a note to the public The Evening Post gave some of the reasons, which were found in the "rise which labor and every article employed in the printing shop had experienced since the terms of the subscriptions were last fixed." Printers' wa
