English journalist, born at Crosby near Liverpool on the 5th of December 1845. Educated in Liverpool, he began life in a Liverpool merchant’s office, but soon became a reporter for a Shrewsbury periodical. In 1870 he joined the staff of the Pall Mall Gazette, London, and in 1873 became Parliamentary reporter to the Daily News, with which paper he had a long connection in various capacities. In 1881 he also joined the staff of Punch as contributor of its Parliamentary sketch over the signature of “Toby M.P.” He was knighted in 1909 and retired from Parliamentary work in 1916. He published his autobiography, Sixty Years in the Wilderness, in 1909, and The Diary of a Journalist in 1920. See also Diary of Two Parliaments.
