Gomme.
but the observant reader." ! A fairly long list of such jests in college journalism could be made. The love of jesting is universal and this was undoubtedly the spirit behind the Figaro that led it one morning apparently
about 1869 to come out “ in perfect facsimile of the official
journal, containing a number of governmental decrees in ortho dox style, and in the exact typography of the genuine Moniteur, appointing some of the bitterest enemies of the régime to port folios.” The jest was “ so successful that the editor ofGalignani's Messenger positively handed slips of it for translation to his
colleagues,” but Paris soon “ broke into one huge Homeric ex plosion of laughter." 10 And the love of jesting has been perennial. It was in May , 1787, that one number of the London Gazette was forged , but “ no police acuteness was acute enough to lay hand on the inimitable rogue who played that perilous joke.” 11
“ A clumsy modern forgery," the object of which has not as yet been shown , is found in The Commonwealth Mercury, pur
porting to have been printed in 1658.12 That it is a forgery has been shown conclusively by J. B . Williams13 who states that its true date must be one later than 1852, since it contains an account of Cromwell's funeral but is not quoted by Carlyle whose Oliver Cromwell appeared in that year. That it is a ficti
tious paper is indicated by its title, since the Commonwealth was not in favor in 1658, while Mercury , as a term for a peri odical was then almost unknown, - it was applied to women hawkers of newsbooks, the form Mercurius being invariably
applied to periodicals. Moreover, a short title or catchword was not then in use , the front page has a black border which was never used at that time, a part of the title is printed in Gothic type while Roman type was then always used , while
periodicals appeared twice a week and were given two titles ' L . G . Price, “ American Undergraduate Journalism ,” Bookman , March , 1903, 17: 69 –82.
10 J. A . O 'Shea , Leaves from the Lifeof a Special Correspondent, I,259– 260 . 11 j. C . Francis, John Francis, II, 239.
12 TheNew York Public Library has a copy of this “ Mercury ” and even to a casual observer its origin is mid -Victorian .
13 “ The Commonwealth Mercury,” Notes and Queries, June 1, 1912, IIS, 5 : 432.
