News from a distance was less full and regular than before; yet when great events happened, reports spread over the country with great rapidity, through messengers in the service of patriotic organizations. The quality of reporting was still imperfect. "The Salem Gazette" printed a full but colored account of the battle of Lexington, giving details of the burning, pillage, and barbarities charged to the British, and praising the militia who were filled with "higher sentiments of humanity." The Declaration of Independence was published by Congress, July 6, 1776, in the "Philadelphia Evening Post", from which it was copied by most of the newspapers in the new nation; but some of them did not mention it until two weeks later, and even then found room for only a synopsis. When they were permitted to do so, they printed fairly full accounts of the proceedings of provincial assemblies and of Congress, which were copied widely, as were all official reports and proclamations. On the whole, however, a relatively small proportion of such material and an inadequate account of the progress of the war is found in the contemporaneous newspapers.