CHAPTER X.
��1905, Nov. 11.
��The Timet denouncesthe repeal of the
compulsory stamp.
��The Saturday Review.
Its first number.
��Its founder,
Beresford
Hope.
��'THE SATURDAY REVIEW' G. j. HOLYOAKE ELIZABETH
BARRETT BROWNING THE POST OFFICE.
THE JUBILEE OP ' THE SATURDAY REVIEW.' (November 3rd, 1905.)
On the 19th of March, 1855, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Sir George Cornewall Lewis, submitted to the House of Commons his resolutions for the repeal of the compulsory stamp on newspapers. The Times on the following morning vigorously denounced these, and characterized them as a measure for restricting the circulation of The Times, raising up an inferior and piratical press, and sacri- ficing a revenue of 200,0002. a year :
" What the London papers have to expect is, that in the metropolis, and still more in the manufacturing districts, there will be published early in the day, and circulated by private hands, a cheap class of papers giving all the news we believe to constitute our principal attraction, and to obtain which we spend immense sums of money."
How groundless were these fears is now a matter of history. On June 15th, 1855, the Bill abolishing the compulsory stamp became law.
The encouragement this freedom gave to new literary ventures was immediately shown. Among the most striking of these was the brilliant Saturday Review, its first number being published on the 3rd of November, 1855. The opening address stated :
" The immediate motive in coming before the public is furnished by the impetus given to periodical literature by the repeal of the Newspaper Stamp Act. The object of that measure is to enable those who assume the responsibility of providing the public with accessible information or instruction, to do so without the cumbrous and expensive machinery hitherto inseparable from a newspaper. . . .The press has, by the late change in the law, acquired freedom rather than cheapness, and of the benefits of the change the writers and proprietors of The Saturday Review desire to avail themselves."
Its founder was Beresford Hope, with John Douglas Cook as editor. Cook had been editor of The Morning Chronicle since 1848, when the paper had been purchased by the Duke of Newcastle and others in the interests of the Peelites. Mr. Fox Bourne, in his
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