We think we can recognize the stamp of the disgusting traffic on
their very faces. It is by no means uncommon to hear it said of a sorry
sneak, "He looks like an old-clothes dealer."
But what shall we say of the old-clothes mongers in journalism? By the
very name we have defined, described them, and pointed them out. If only
we could make the name such a badge of disgrace that every member of the
fraternity should forthwith betake him or herself to some sort of honest
labor!
These are they who crowd the columns of our daily newspapers with the
dreary, monotonous, worthless, scandalous tales of what other men and
women did, are doing, or will do, said, say, or will say, wore, wear, or
will wear, thought, think, or will think, ate, eat, or will eat, drank,
drink, or will drink: and if there be any other verb coming under the head
of "to do, to be, to suffer," add that to the list, and the old-clothes
monger will furnish you with something to fill out the phrase.
These are they who patch out their miserable, little, sham "properties"
for mock representations of life, by scraps from private letters, bits of
conversation overheard on piazzas, in parlors, in bedrooms, by odds and
ends of untrustworthy statements picked up at railway-stations,
church-doors, and offices of all sorts, by impudent inferences and
suppositions, and guesses about other people's affairs, by garblings and
partial quotings, and, if need be, by wholesale lyings.
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