The American Mercury

Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. (publishers of "Borzoi" books), announced the publication of a new magazine, The American Mercury. Its editors will be H. L. Mencken and George Jean Nathan. Its appearance will be monthly, beginning about the first of next year. Those who are acquainted with The London Mercury, so ably conducted by the poet and parodist, J. C. Squire, will hardly expect the new Mercury to be a prototype of the old. The American Mercury plans to offer "a comprehensive picture, critically presented, of the entire American scene "--fine arts, politics, industrial and social relations, science. And it will strive to maintain the point of view of the "civilized minority." For several years Messrs. Nathan and Mencken have been conducting a magazine known as Smart Set, one of a group aimed more or less at the "uncivilized majority." Snappy Stories, Saucy Stories, Detective Tales, Breezy Stories, The Black Mask, 'Young's Magazine, have been among Smart Set's comrades in arms.

Cairo

A journalistic allegory on the banks of the Nile is Cairo. At Cairo are published 105 papers, daily and weekly. With a population of 790,000 it supports 24 dailies: twelve in Arabic, four in French, two in Italian, four in Greek, one in English, and one in Armenian.

By comparison, Greater New York with a population of 5,620,000 has only 29 dailies, and Chicago with a population of 2,700,000 has only seven.

The combined circulation of Cairo's newspapers is, however, probably not over 180,000 at maximum. No less than seven New York papers and four Chicago papers have each more circulation than the entire newspaper sales of the bejournalized city of the Nile.

Courtesy

The rivalry of great newspapers can at times give way to courtesy. In the press room of The New York World, a spark from a dynamo flew into a pile of papers and started a fire that damaged two presses and stopped the remainder. The General Manager of The New York Herald (Munsey), rival morning paper, on hearing of the fire, at once offered the World the use of his presses.