Communication

(The Crimson invites all men in the University to submit signed communications of timely interest. It assumes no responsibility, however, for sentiments expressed under this head and reserves the right to exclude any whose publication would be palpably inappropriate.)

To the Editors of the CRIMSON:

The writer of the editorial in the Harvard Magazine calls for "professional spirit" on the part of the CRIMSON editors. In that phrase one seems to feel the heavy hand of maturity. Perhaps the voice of some graduate student speaks, who has recently come to know the joy of sustained effort in preparation for a profession. It is worthy of note that CRIMSON editors (at least after they have made the board) sometimes attend lectures; that they are undergraduates; and that they have not long here below in this college world. When the CRIMSON editor has worked through the grades of his apprenticeship and reaches the presidency of the paper, he has one short half-year of life and then passes on to make way for a successor; his skill is necessarily gained late. These are reasons why most undergraduate publications have only streaks of success and long waste spaces of desolation and boredom; and conversely, the writing of graduate students and younger members of the instructing staff gives the Harvard Magazine an advantage of which it is unseemly that it should inferentially boast.

The Lampoon is pointed out as a shining example of sustained humor. With heartfelt gratitude for its Transcript number, it may yet be said that all do not agree. There is, too, a certain difference in the task of editing a daily compared with that of publishing a fortnightly or monthly. And it may be noted that a bad joke is only a slight incident in one's mental life, but what one considers a bad editorial leaves a deep irritation. One good joke wipes out the memory of a thousand bad ones, but an

the contrary, one bad editorial wipes out the memory of a thousand good ones. Verily, the penalties for a bad joke are not great; but a bad editorial--beware, and remember what the esteemed new addition to Harvard journalism meted out to Mr. Lodge for a bad speech! As for the comparison made with other dailies, perhaps the Magazine's writer is swept off his feet by the many columns given in those papers to outside news. Would it be wise for the editors of the CRIMSON to compete with Boston papers in this field? The external appearance of the paper would be improved, but would its value to the college community? Then, behold, the New York World and New York Sun are held up to the undergraduate CRIMSON editor as models. But has the vigorous writer in the Harvard Magazine never found a "vapid" editorial in those publications? Strange!

A truth to be remembered in criticizing a college daily is contained in the remark of a member of the Faculty recently that in a large university there are persons of all shades of opinion and feeling. In the outside world an infinitely diversified array of newspapers caters to different sections of the public, whereas in the University there is only one daily--and no university has yet, it is believed, supported two or more. It is impossible that we should all be satisfied, or perhaps that any of us should be satisfied all the time. Even a "loving graduate editor" has been moved to ungentle anger at some of the political sallies of the CRIMSON during the year. But not all persons agree with the criticisms that have been made. Ed. Whitney's story of the translation of a CRIMSON editorial into German by the French authorities and its dispersion over a sector of the German lines deserves to be called to the attention of the critics. Students in the Law School from other colleges have spoken to the present writer with approbation of the CRIMSON's editorials, while condemning certain other features. As for "vapidity," "straddling," let those answer who remember the CRIMSON's pacifist days, or the attacks on crew policy, or the CRIMSON's insist ant demand for war long before it was declared. Some of these editorial stands aroused antagonism which has not yet died out. Before the war, a committee of graduates collected a fund and sent selected men to flying schools to learn aviation. One of the men chosen was a CRIMSON editor, but after he had gone a member of the committee learned that he had been concerned in the attack on the crew system and expressed a strong opinion that the man would never have been selected had this been known. This editor was Robert Hewins Stiles, dead in France.

But in the Harvard Magazine's attack, which called forth the CRIMSON's ill-considered reply, there is a halfpenny worth of bread which should not be cast in vain upon the waters. The news writing in the CRIMSON seems to call for an improvement in style. The short, matter of fact sentences allow little room in which to go wrong, but they also make it impossible to be interesting. More color, more space, more frivolity, more careless handling of the powers that be--a premium in the competitions on sprightliness,--while revolutionary would give the CRIMSON more life. The proposed increase in the size of the page will give opportunity for such work. The CRIMSON must not lapse in its news columns (as it clearly has not in its editorial columns) into a state of innocuous desuetude.  CLOYD LAPORTE 2L