at the laying of the foundation stone of a new town building and
at the banquet that followed . The banquet was prolonged and boisterous. The proprietor of the newspaper who had asked Holyoake to come from London went over the toast list with him .
Holyoake inquired concerning the characteristics of the speakers, manner of mind , peculiarities of expression , antecedents and fam
ily , public service and other particulars. “ By eleven o'clock I had sent out speeches for them all, and by midnight their orations
were all in type, and the paper was out in the early morning.” 46 Parliamentary reporters have themselves, however, pointed out the curious circumstance that the verbatim report may, at least in spirit, be less accurate than other forms. G . J. Holyoake found that the stenographic , literal, verbatim reporters often
lacked the faculty of bringing into focus the genius of a speech and that often the summary reporter was better " able to measure the mind and discern the purpose of the speaker.”' 47 Reporters
learn that speakers often repudiate their own words, — " they make all sorts of muddles and then stand aghast to see them selves in black and white .” Sometimes reporters " doctor” the speeches of very inferior speakers until little is left of the original, but they are praised by the speakers for the " accuracy ” of the report, - commendation that once led to the caustic comment, 46 Sixty Years of an Agitator 's Life, II, 157-158. J . D . Symon gives an account of a speech in praise of the Irish potato purporting to have been made by Mr. Wilberforce during a nap taken by
an Irish reporter. A friend had promised to take notes for him and dictated
this speech which was reported in every newspaper of note, except the Morning Chronicle to which the jesting friend was attached . - The Press
and Its Story, pp. 80 -81. 47 Sixty Years of an Agitator's Life, II, p . 156. “ Every day the Parliamentary reports of speeches present them in a more effective form than the hearer was sensible of during the delivery.
When The Times sought to destroy the popularity of Orator Hunt of a former day, it reported his speeches verbatim . There are many speakers in Parliament who would suffer in public estimation if their repetitions and
eccentricities of expression were recorded . On one memorable occasion the Morning Star reported a passage from
a speech of Mr. Disraeli's , with all
its bibulous aspirates set forth , which few forgot who read it. ” - Id ., II , 159.
“ If a reporter has a grudge against a Town Councillor, a Poor Law Guardian , or a Borough Magistrate , and if he is really vindictive, the most effective course of vengeance that he can adopt is to record verbatim all
that his enemy utters in public . . . 'Oh that mine enemy were reported verbatim ' would assuredly be the modern equivalent of the bitter cry of the patriarch.” — F . F . Moore , A Journalist's Note -Book, p . 179.
