Difficulties began early. I found that it was by no means so easy to collect advertisements, knowing, of course, nothing about it, and I tackled the job badly. Those who took up advertising space stipulated for an actual distribution of ten thousand copies of the _Tissue_ each day, which had to be guaranteed and be carried out before they paid for the advertisements. I could see no other way out of the difficulty than to consent to their terms. Next came how to print the _Tissue_. We had no printing plant of our own, so we had to find what I think they called "a job printer" to pull us through. This was by no means easy, as I was unable to find one who would promise that the paper would actually be printed each day and be ready for issue at the stipulated time. Besides, the price to be charged seemed to me to be nearly ruinous. Yet if our venture was worth trying it was worth paying for at first. The _Turf Tissue_ was to become a genuine daily newspaper. There would be more than ample profits by and by.
The time was near when the first issue was to take place, namely, the Thursday of the week before the day on which the Melbourne Cup was to be run, the first Tuesday in November. We decided that the first issue was to be given free to the newsvendors and sellers by way of advertisement, and notices were put up inviting all such who were willing to sell the _Turf Tissue_ to assemble outside the offices of the paper on the Thursday morning by 10 A.M. That morning came and so did the crowds of would-be sellers to obtain their free issue for which they were to charge 2d. each. In such numbers were they that the traffic was interfered with, and the police took the matter in hand. I found out that a mistake had undoubtedly been made in fixing the main thoroughfare as a place of distribution, and that the mistake was entirely due to my inexperience as an editor and newspaper proprietor. For such I was. In a short time the first ten thousand copies of the first number of the newly-fledged sporting paper were being sold throughout Melbourne town. Looking out of the window of my office I could hear the loud cries of "Buy a _Turf Tissue_," "All the tips," "Latest gallops," "Only twopence." All was going well, and the firm adjourned to Scott's Hotel. A couple of bottles of "bubbly" christened the very first sheet out of the printing press, which I have still.