The news in the French newspapers was usually very belated and often quite
unreliable, though now and again telegrams from London were published,
giving information which was as near to the truth as the many English war
correspondents on both sides could ascertain. After the war, both
Frenchmen and Germans admitted to me that of all the newspaper
intelligence of the period there was nothing approaching in accuracy
that which was imparted by our British correspondents. I am convinced,
from all I heard in Paris, in Berlin, in Vienna, and elsewhere, during
the two or three years which followed the war, that the reputation of the
British Press was greatly enhanced on the Continent by the news it gave
during the Franco-German campaign. Many a time in the course of the next
few years did I hear foreigners inquire: "What do the London papers say?"
or remark: "If an English paper says it, it must be true." I do not wish
to blow the trumpet too loudly on behalf of the profession to which I
belonged for many years, but what I have here mentioned is strictly true;
and now that my days of travel are over, I should be glad to know that
foreigners still hold the British Press in the same high esteem.
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