23



354 STUDIES OF MEN

If these are not traits of a high character, what are?
He may or may not have been a great man, but on his
tombstone might be inscribed the testimony of one who
was intimate with him : " He was the best man I ever
knew." It is an ample eulogy, and one that may well
endear his memory to those who care for loyalty of
nature.
FEANCIS MAGNAED

[LONDON, NOVEMBER, 1894]

M. Feancis Magnaed, who died on Sunday, was, on the
whole, the first journalist of France. He was editor of
the Figaro, which must be called, on the whole, the first
journal of France, though that description of it requires
a world of explanation in order to make it intelligible
abroad and not misleading. The man and the news-
paper have to be considered together. He was a jour-
nalist and nothing else, but he was one of the few jour-
nalists who may be said to contradict the rather cynical
eulogy of Theirs upon journalism : that it was a very
good profession if you got out of it in time. Magnard,
who began life in some small civil service bureau, drift-
ed early into newspaper writing. He was born in 1837.
His connection with the Figaro dates from 1863 ; pre-
ceded, as usual, by experiments on other papers. But
his relations of one kind or another with the journal of
M. de Villemessant were never broken after they had
once begun ; they lasted thirty-one years. Nominally,
he was since 1879 joint editor with M. de Eodays and
M. Perivier, who survive him. Actually, he controlled
the paper. His was the guiding and deciding mind.
