Читать книгу Life of Sir Henry Parkes - Charles E. Lyne - Страница 7
ОглавлениеESTABLISHMENT OF THE "EMPIRE".
Sir Henry Parkes was always a man of strong political opinions, in close sympathy with the people, and an earnest and active worker in all matters for the progress and development of the country.
The hard lot of the working population of England which, as a very young man, he had to share, and the longing for that improvement which would make the enjoyments of life less unequally distributed amongst the people, will be found depicted in his earlier poems; and coming to New South Wales at a time when the social as well as the political condition of the colony was in some respects worse than anything of the kind in the parent land, it was natural that his early impressions should deepen, and that he should set himself to reflect how things might be altered for the better. With the wrongs in his native land, which the Chartists were struggling against just before his departure as a penniless emigrant, fresh in his memory, a consciousness that the evils which he had left need not under wise government be allowed to exist in this newly peopled country, and the mental and physical vigour requisite for the work of reform and progress, he wanted only the means through which he might do useful public service; and almost from his arrival in Sydney he seems to have seen those means in a well conducted liberal newspaper press.
Arriving in New South Wales friendless and without money, it was not to be expected that he should be able to at once engage in this high occupation. It was necessary that he should first establish himself in the community and make himself generally known. This he very quickly did. The respect and confidence, which the list of subscribers to the book of poems published in 1842 shows he had won since his landing in Sydney, were not long in extending. Gradually these feelings towards him became more pronounced and widespread, and though at this early period of his life he was not without enemies, he made some warm friends. As opportunity offered he took part in public movements, and he wrote occasional articles for the press, his contributions appearing in the Atlas, or in the People's Advocate. All this attracted attention. He became known as a clever public speaker and a capable writer. Public meetings offered facilities for the exercise and display of his oratorical powers; in journalism he saw the way to literary success. Friends with the means which were necessary to establish a newspaper did not hesitate to come to his assistance, and in December, 1849, in premises adjoining the shop in Hunter-street, on the south side of the street, the Empire was first published.
A year before this he was a prominent figure in the proceedings connected with an election of members to the Legislative Council. Mr. Robert Lowe, afterwards Lord Sherbrooke, was a candidate for the City of Sydney, and Henry Parkes, attaching himself to Mr. Lowe's committee, became one of the joint secretaries. Subsequently he interested himself in the agitations which were taking place for the discontinuance of transportation to the colony, and for the introduction of self-government.
At an open-air meeting, known afterwards as "The Great Protest Meeting", attended by 4,000 persons, and held on vacant land near the Circular Quay, and in front of the old Colonial Secretary's Office, Henry Parkes was one of the principal speakers. Transportation, which for a time had ceased, had been resumed in a modified form, and the arrival of the first convict vessel under the new system was the cause of the meeting. This vessel—the Hashemy—entered the Heads on June 8th, 1849, and on the following day, in consequence of the arrival about the same date of several vessels with free immigrants on board, there was to be seen the singular and exasperating spectacle of a shipload of convicts in the midst of 1,400 or 1,500 newly-arrived free people. Popular feeling was deeply stirred, and a vigorously worded protest was adopted at the great public meeting. That protest, which, while expressing due loyalty to the British Crown, set forth in unmistakably plain terms the grievance of the colonists, was written by Mr. Parkes.
He was very earnest in the part he took in this anti-transportation movement. Regarding the will of the majority of the colonists in the matter as entitled to the highest respect and consideration of the British Secretary of State, he denounced the indifference manifested by the resumption of transportation as a deep insult to the free community of New South Wales, and a serious obstacle to the progress of the country. "We wanted", he said in one of his speeches, in allusion to the qualifications necessary in a Government dealing with this colony, "men practically acquainted with every impulse, every transition and phase of our existence as a people", not those who were simply "raised to power or precipitated from office by the cumulative force of a series of accidents."
In the midst of this great movement for the total cessation of transportation to the colony, and for the right of the people to govern themselves through "Ministers chosen from and responsible to the colonists", this second demand springing naturally from the injustice which had prompted the other, the first number of the Empire appeared.
There were some who had not hesitated to charge Mr. Parkes and the others who were prominent in denouncing the indifference of the British Cabinet to the interests of the colony with disloyalty, and with endeavouring to bring about a "reign of terror". The same charge, for the circumstances were unaltered, might have been made in the early days of the Empire. But no foundation existed for it in either case. "I will yield to no man in feelings of loyalty to the British Crown," Mr. Parkes declared in a speech delivered at one of the anti-transportation meetings in 1849; "but my loyalty does not teach me to shut my eyes to the faults of Government. It rather constrains me—and the stronger it grows the more it constrains me—to seek a reform of public abuses, that the Government may be established firmly and permanently in the affections of a free people."
This declaration might have formed a statement of the principles of the new journal, for it accurately describes the paper's policy. It may even be regarded as a declaration of the policy of the speaker's whole life, for loyalty to the Throne and an earnest ever-present desire to benefit the people were the chief characteristics of Sir Henry Parkes' career throughout the long period of his public services.
At first the Empire was published as a broad-sheet weekly. Very soon it began to appear as a daily; not of large size, but containing a fair quantity of news and with it a couple of vigorously-written leading articles. The leading articles very quickly became the great feature of the paper. Regardless of whom it might offend, so long as the complaint or censure were merited, abuse, wherever it existed, or by whomsoever it might be committed, was unsparingly exposed, and the perpetrator scarified by an able and caustic pen. Independence, honesty, and the public interest were the journal's watchwords. "Clearly impressed with our duty," the editor announced, "we shall never allow our minds to waver in its performance. It will be no part of our business to study who may be gratified or who displeased by our line of conduct. Persons or parties may disown or assent to our opinions; we shall maintain them with the same boldness and singleness of purpose, so long as we believe them to be correct." At once the paper attracted attention, and won public favour.
The field for its operations was very wide. Political affairs at the time were conducted in a manner of little benefit to the colony; social matters were in a condition far from satisfactory. The Governor, Sir Charles Fitzroy, who, in those days, virtually ruled the politics of the country, as well as filled the position of leader of society, was, by a large proportion of the colonists, neither liked nor respected. Complaints, censure, ridicule, condemnation, even insult, directed at Government House, were, in some of the public journals of the period, almost as common as news. The Empire was an uncompromising opponent of Sir Charles Fitzroy, and never lost an opportunity to criticise or condemn his conduct or that of some of those by whom he was surrounded in the administration of government. Many of its contemporaries were prompt and warm in its praise. "The Empire promises to become a highly useful paper; in fact it appears to be just the sort of paper which has long been required", said one. "We are glad to be able to admire the tone and spirit of its arguments", said another. "Its numerous leading articles are well and vigorously written", was the opinion of a third; and others were equally complimentary.
While the Empire was passing through the first few months of its career, gold was discovered in New South Wales, and the impetus which this immediately gave to business was not without its effect upon the fortunes of the new journal. Six months after its first issue it was enlarged to a double-demy broadsheet, the size of the Sydney Morning Herald, and its circulation and influence progressed rapidly.
Mr. Parkes became a man of considerable importance. The guiding spirit of a great newspaper necessarily occupies a high position in a British community, and Mr. Parkes as proprietor and editor of the Empire speedily became a prominent and well recognised figure. The journalistic instinct he possessed in a marked degree, and while he made his paper interesting he took care that its opinions should be felt. News, at that time, was not so available as it became some years later, but what there was to be had the Empire columns obtained; and the strength and independence of the leading articles, combined with the fact that they were written in the public interest, caused the paper not only to be read but to be talked about.
Many stories are told of the editor's industry and smartness at this period of his life. At that time the greatest effort of the newspapers was to obtain at the earliest moment possible the latest news from England, which was brought by sailing vessel, the voyage occupying three or four months. The electric telegraph not being in existence it was necessary to meet the ship having the news on board, immediately she arrived within convenient distance of Sydney, and to do this the leading papers, the Herald and the Empire, were each obliged to have at hand a fast sea-going boat, like a whale-boat, with a competent crew. There was no working together, no mutual assistance, on the part of the two boats. Competition was the order of the day with them as it was with the papers, and every effort was made by each to be the first to secure the all important information. For miles outside Sydney Heads the boats would go at racing speed, each eager to be the first to reach the approaching vessel. Often the chief in the office of the Empire, determined to perform his share of the duty of giving the public the earliest intelligence, would remain at the office all night, awake and on the alert, for the "copy", which, if too late for the ordinary morning issue of the paper, would be most attractive matter for a second edition published towards the middle of the day. No labour was too arduous, no effort too great, so long as there was a prospect of the news columns being more, than ordinarily interesting.
Naturally this close attention to his duties in the Empire office occupied the whole of his time, but his admirers believing him to be as well fitted for the Legislative Chamber as for the editor's chair, urged him to enter Parliament, to add the active life of the politician to the never-ceasing labours of the journalist, and ill-matched as the duties of the two positions seemed to be, eventually he consented.
