Control of the press in England seemed necessary if morale was to be maintained. The turn of the century had seen a revival in radical journalism and the emergence of papers independent of political parties: Cobbett’s Political and Weekly Register had shown what could be done. Leigh Hunt had yet to learn that aggression, so effective and even admirable in journalism, was less effective and admirable in human relations. As a journalist young Leigh Hunt was not entirely untried. In the last year he had shown an enthusiasm for prose, being inspired by a set of the British classics given to him by his father. He had progressed to periodicals, and while he spurned the more celebrated Spectator, required reading during his schooldays, his imagination was caught by the lively pages of the Connoisseur, a magazine of vitality and wit which he discovered with ‘all the transports of first love’.