The New York Herald Newspaper, September 18, 1859, Page 4

4 NEW YORK HERALD, SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 18, 1859. NEW YORK HERALD. JAMES GORDON BENNETT, EDITOR AND PROPRIETOR, OFFick N. W. CORNER OF TULTON AND NASSAU STS. mail will be TERMS, cush in advance, | Monry sent by mail will be rik of (he sender, Postage stamps not re money. iE DAILY MERALD, too conte THE WEERLY HERALD, every Brturke fei cents per , or $3 per annum; the European Batitie. a Welicebay SPL cbs ennai Ne clay erty dre or $5 toany part of the Continent, both to inelute postape: Hie Guigyornia Blition om the Gh and Bh of each month at six conte Pome UST HERALD on Wednesday, at four cents per copy Man. ‘ WLONFAKY CORRESPOND ENC i, containing yimporian pasate from any gw" cht Conntavonoeny ate PARTICULARLY RxQuestey TO Seal ALL LETTERS AND T’40K- AON NOTICE taken of anonymous correspondence, We do not fected! communications ENTS. rene ry day; advertisements in- IISEMENTS renewed every day » and in the $7 per annum. ADVI serted in the Weenty Hxwatn, Faaicy aor ne ad Aopen ial wth, neatncas, cheapness an de- epatch. Volume XX) ACADEMY OF MUSIC, Fourteenth street,—ItaLian Orena—Pouwro, GARDEN, Broadway are Pus. |, ROWERY THEATRE, Bowery.—Oun Muss—Mure Srr— Gueex Moxster. WALLACK'S THEATRE, Broadway.—Rowia Passton— ‘Tickiisu Times. WINTER GARDEN, Broad: Dot—Bostait ann Wactat. SCHOOLMASTER—Tuersi- opposite Bond street — LAURA KEENE'S THEATRE, 624 Broadway.—Worto AnD Stack. NEW LOWERY THEATRE, Bowery.—Vinocg—Scu0ot MASTER—LiguTuOUsE Fix M MUSEUM, Broadway.—Afier De yUM'S MERICA BARNUM'S AM |AN--HAUNTHD CitAME, noon aud Evening—Firing WOOD'S MINSTREL'S, y.—Eruior1an Sones, Dances, &¢.—BEDouln AKARS. BRYANTS' MINSTRELS, Burzesaurs, Sones, Dac Owing to the great increase of our advertising business, we are compelled to ask our advertising friends to como to our aid and help us to get our paper to press. This they car accomplish by sending in their advertisemonts at as carly an hour in the day and evening as possible. All advertisements should be handed in before nine o'clock at night. Those handed im after that hour will have to,take their chance as regards classification. The News. The equinoctial gale burst upon us on Friday | night, and continued with considerable violence throughout yesterday and last night. As usual, trees and awnings suffered no little damage, and the northwest wall of a new building in Duane | street, near Broadway, was blown down. A por- tion of the wall in its descent fell on the roof of an adjoining house, owned by Sarah Lozier and occupied by eight families. The roofand upper sto- ries were demolished, together with the contents of the rooms, and Augustus Vanderhill, segar maker, | had his leg broke. We have heard of no serious casualty in the city. The tide in the rivers was un- usually high, and the cellars of many buildings on the East river side were overflowed, causing con- Biderable damage. Several accidents happened to vessels in the harbor, the particulars of which are given in another column. Owing to the severity of the storm none of the outward bound steamers went to sea yesterday. They will | leave as soon as the weather moderates sufficiently to enable them todoso. The mail steamer Arago, bound for Southampton and Havre, is among the | vessels detained. We shall, consequently, through | the courtesy of Captain Lines and the attention of the purser of the Arago,be enabled to forward files of the Haxap of this morning, containing the very latest news, to our own correspondents and to all the commercial centres of Europe. The Arago takes out 195 passengers and $019,999 In specie. The laborers at the Bergen tunnel works all day yesterday and throughout last night kept up the blockade of the Erie Railroad at that point, and no trains were permitted to pass. They were visited | during the day by several of the magistrates and by Father Vazetta, a Roman Catholic priest, who ex. horted the workmen to desist from their unlawful proceedings; but their pacificatory efforts appa- rently made no impression upon the Jaborers. Quite a formidable body of military were under arms yesterday, but the inclement weather deterred | them from attempting any operations against the workmen. It isstated, however, that at an early hour this morning the soldiery will disperse the mob and demolish the obstructions placed upon the railroad track. A meeting of the Democratic General Committee was held at Tammany Hall last night. It was se- eret, but the following Dusiness transpired:—A committee, consisting of one from each ward, was appointed for the purpose of selecting three per- sons in each election district to act as regis- ters at the election. The committee will meet on Monday next, between 11 A. M. and 3 P. M., to make the selection. A special committee was also appointed to submit the names of those thus selected to the Board of Supervisors, which meets on Monday night. There was an unsuccessful attempt made yester. fterday alternoon to obtain a quorum of Councilmen in order to adopt an amended report of a joint spe- cial committee appointed to draft an ordinance di- viding the city into election districts. The Presi- dent issued the call early in the morning, but at five o'clock there were only six members present, all the republicans having purposely absented them- selves. On the evening of Thursday Jast the barn and outbuildings of Mr. Wm. Layton, at Throgg’s Neck, ‘Westchester county, were set on fire and consumed, together with their valuable contents, consisting of five horses, six carriages, four sleighs, forty-four tons of hay, a quantity of farming utensils, buffalo robes, &c. The total loss is estimated at $9,000; insured for $2,000, mostly in New York offices. Mr. Layton haa offered a reward of $500 for the appre- hension of the incendiaries. The annexed table ahows the temperature of the atmosphere in this city during the Past week, the range of the barometer and thermometer, the variation of wind currents and the state of the, weather, at three periods during each day, viz: at 9 A. M., and 3 and 9 o’clock P. M.:— 94M. UF \E HE Bi: es FS Ww. 7 163] 04 . We . Ss 4 8 . W. W150} .06 x 4 ow. fat) i * vB + i |88} 80 a i Ml SR REMARKB. Sanday —Morning, overcast, with 1 ; afternoon Mendy ond euy; aight, 195 vorehode: thundic aera! ‘Poesday—Morning cio eerste p’olook, licavy sh; Clete; efternoon, cloudy; night 43, ‘Wednesday. oo Seanorning, clear; blowing fresh all day; ’ Mfbiratay— orang ‘nd afternoon, clear; night, moon. r—Morning, overcast and cold; afternoon, light Es and heavy rain, The mortality report of the City - wpector shows that the deaths tor the wietant ing on Saturday last numbered 431, a Aecreasg of 77 as compared with the mortality of the week previous. Of the deaths last week 81 were men, £3 women, 156 boys and 161 girls, As compared with the corresponding week last year there is a decrease ia the number of deaths of 32. OF the whole number of deaths last week 268 were of ten years of age aud under, being 41 less than the week previous. The report in- forms us that there were 146 deaths of diseases of the stomach, bowels and other digestive organs, 92 of diseases of the brain and nerves, 109 of disease ofthe lungs and throat, 24 of skin and eruptive Giveaves, 38 stillborn and premature births, 50 of general fevers, 3 of old age, 2 of diseases of the generative and urinary organs, and 3 of the bones, joints, kc. Twenty-six deaths arose from vivlont caures. The nativity table shows that 358 were natives of the United States, 82 of Ireland, 19 of Germany, 6 of England, 6 of Scotland, 1 each of Austria, British America, France, Italy, Prussia, Wales and the West Indies, and the balance of different foreign countries.” Yesterday was the 229th anniversary of the set- tlement of Boston, and the day was to have been celebrated in that city by the firiog of cannon, the ringing of bells, a balloon ascension, a grand civic aud military procession, a prayer and an oration, and numberless addreases by some of the first men of the old Bay State, togcther with the inauguration of Hiram Powers’ statue of Daniel Webster. Owing to the equinoctial gale, however, the city celebra- tion was postponed, but the statue was duly inau- gurated at Music Hall, and Edward Everett de- livered a speech on the occasion. The equinoctiat blow, with the heavy fall of rain expe- ed yesterday, tended to interfere with outdoor busi- ness and to check transactions in some branches of com- merce. Fears were expressed that should the recent cold weather and the storm of yesterday have extended over the cotton regions of the South that their effects would prove quite unfavorable. The autumn weather of last year was remarkably fine and late, and no such con- dition of it as the present was experienced here so carly in the season, Not only the yield of cotton, but also that of tobacco, are Hable to be affected by early frost and storms, and a good deal of anxiety exists with persons in the trade to learmthe effects of the late change of tempe- rature and ofthe storm of yesterday upon the growing crops, which, owing to a late spring, are said in many sectior to be quite backward. The sales of cotton yesterday embraced about 2,000 bales, 1,600 of which consisted of New Orleans strict middling at 124¢c. We, however, have no change to notice in our regular quotations, at which the market closed firm. Owing to the storm the sales of flour were limited, and common grades of State and Western were casier, while extra brands were unchanged. Southern flour was with- out alteration in prices, while sales were moderate. Wheat was inactive and prices without change of moment. Corn was scarce and held above the views of buyers. Pork was steady, with sales of mess at $15 123, and primo at $10 56 a $10 6247. The prevailing storm interrupted transactions in sugars. The market was firm, however, while sales were confined to about 150 hhds. Cuba musco- vado and seven hhds. Porto Rico. Coffee was guiet; no pf moment transpired. Freights were firm, while engagements were ligh\. The New Dispute with England—The Mission of General Scott to the Pacific. General Scott arrived in this city from Wash- | ington yesterday, and immediately proceeded | to West Point, where he intends remaining with jghis daughter, Mrs. Col. Scott, until Monday, | when he will return to this city, and on Tues- | day embark on board the steamship North Star | for California and Oregon. The General will | be accompanied to the Pacific by Colonel L. | Thomas, Assistant Adjutant General, and Colonel G. W. Lay, a8 military private secre- \ tary. No doubt a large concourse of citizens will greet the gallant veteran on his departure | from our eastern shores to look after affairs on | the western slope of our continent. | The occupation of San Juan islands by the armed forces of the United: States under the } command of General Harney, the presence in | the Straits of a reconnoitering British naval | force, and the sudden departure of General | Scott to the scene of action, in view of possible AiMoatttos aninine ut ul cue vecupation, give temporary, possibly they may give permanent | importance, to the islands of San Juan. | Let us see how the matter stands. The dispute with regard to the northera | boundary of Oregon was settled by adopting | the forty-ninth parallel of latitude, and the act | of Parliament defining the Territory of New Columbia, or Caledonia, presented the follow- | ing outlines of that colony. It was to comprise | “all such territories within the dominion of | her Majeaty as were bounded to the south by | the frontier of the United States of America, | to the east by the watershed between the | streams which flow into the Atlantic and Icy | Oceans, to the north by the fifty-fifth parallel of | north latitude, and to the west by the Pacific Ocean, and shall include Queen Charlotte’s islands, and all other islands adjacent, excepting Vancouver's island.” Now, Queen Charlotte’s islands are to the north of Vancouver's island, the lower point of the three, Graham, Moresby and Prevost, being at 52 degrees north latitude. Vancouver's island, at its northern extremity, does not reach beyond 51 degrees, and is di- vided from the main land by the Gulf of Geor- gia and Queen'Chariotte’s Sound. The islands of San Juan are at the southern extremity of Vancouver's island, and in no way adjacent to Queen Charlotte’s islands. On the contrary, they lie fortymiles westward of Vic- toria, and are separated from the territory of the United States by only about half that distance. Thus, the new colony excluded in terms the islands of San Juan. Now, according to all precedent, they belong to the nearest main land, and not being adja- cent to Queen Charlotte’s islands, but several hundred miles south, are, by the express act of Parliament alluded to, excluded from the new British colony of Columbia, or Caledonia. It is evident, therefore, that England did not claim it, and, geographically, thus excluded by act of Parliament from its territory, belong to the United States. Politically, the possession of the San Juan islands would give the pre- ponderance of territory in Vancouver’s Straits to the English, and in a military point of view the command of them. In an English map now before us we perceive they are claimed as British property. This is nothing new. We have seen such maps before. As far a8 we can fairly judge from the docu- ments before us, our claim is a rightful one, and will be insisted on. General Scott is no doubt fortified with the proper evidence, and will be able to make a correct “deduction of title.” Iurorts Decuusine av Last.—We are glad to see that the imports of foreign goods are at lastdeclining. For many months we have cau- tioned the dry goods importers against the con- sequences of the policy they were pursuing; we have warned them that glutted markets involved sacrificed goods, and that they were most obviously glutting the market. The ane- tion sales which are now taking place, and the disfavor with which certain dry-goods paper begins to be regarded, prove how well-founded our warnings were, Now, however, it seems, wo have turned the gorner, and the imports have beg tg degline, The following is a comparative statement of the imports of foreign dry goods and general merchandise at New York for the week and since January 1, For the week :— 857. 1858. Dry goods...eeee0 $1,367,939 0,825 General merchandise 2455,269 2,047,590 ‘Total $3,006,915 Previou 102,527,901 Since Jan. 1 7,096,751 $105,634,816 $185, The amount of importations is large, $185,- 943,681—say eight millions more than 1857. The question whether the country can consume so much more is a very nice one, On the one hand, population and production have in- creased since 1857, and people, having lived more economically, have the more means now. But, on the other hand, business has been dull, profits have been small, and the desire to buy freely of objects of luxury is less general than it was in 1857; farmers’ daughters don’t want so many fine dresses, housekeepers don't need so much sugar or such costly tea as they did then. Our readers can decide between the two views. Meanwhile, if the importations fall off from this out, the spring trade will doubtless be lively and profitable. The Jewish Sabbath and the Christian Sunday. The Sunday question continues to excite great interest both among the people and the press. It is a question in which the whole community is concerned, and therefore com- mands universal attention, The meeting in the Bowery on Tuesday last has put the fanatical papers in hysterics, and set the hypocritical Pharisaical journals to the publication of platitudes about infidelity, im- morality, and the first French Revolution. To all who understand the subject these lucubra- tions are highly amusing for the ignorance they display, and for the violence of passion, real or affected, which runs through every line, and which is an infallible symptom of the weak- ness of their arguments, On another page we publish three interesting articles of a very different character; they are calm, well reasoned and full of facts. The two first, from the Churchman of this city, the or- gan of the Episcopal church, give the Episco- palian view of. the question contrasted with the Puritanical; and the last, from the organ of the Archbishop of Cincinnati, presents the Catholic view of it. With these views our own opinions substantially coincide; and it will be seen that what we have written from time to time on the subject is borne out ina remark- able manner by the articles which we extract from our contemporaries. The positions we established were, that the Jewish Sabbath was abrogated, (and “ it is in- deed abrogated,” says the writer in the Church- man); that there is not only no authority in the New Testament for its continuance, but the contrary; that Sunday is an ordinance of the Catholic church, like her other holidays, and her authority is the only warrant we have for ob- serving it; that the festival has been borrowed from that church by the Puritans in common with otherProtestants, but thatits mode of observance has been changed by the Puritans alone into a dismal, gloomy, Jewish Sabbath, more like a fast than a feast day, and that the Apostles and the early Christians rejected that idea of it. The Protestant Reformers, too, who separated from the Catholic church on other grounds, agreed with it in this. And everywhere else in Christendom but in England, Scotland and the United States, Sunday is held as a joyous festival, like Christmas or our Thanksgiving day. This jo edmittcu VY We ruriren writers (hemselves, Therefore, says Lyman Coleman, in his Ancient Christianity Exemplified, “England, Scotland and America, and they only, of all the nations of Christendom, enjoy a Christian Sabbath.” So that, according to the quadrilateral journal befogged in “the elbows of the Mincio,” and a wet blanket of Wall street whose piety run mad will be the death of it, the Episcopalians and Catholics of the United States, with many other American Christians, a very large majority of the Episcopalians of England (and they are the majority of the people), the Catholics of that country, the Christians of France, Italy, Ger- many and all the rest of Christendom, are infi- dels; and a journal in this country which agrees with them, and nearly the whole Christian world, is accused of infidelity and of an at- tempt to break down the barriers of morality and social order. Every reader of the Heraup knows that it has always denounced infidelity as strongly as it has fanaticism in religion; that it has been ever the consistent advocate of law and order and the rights of property, and the sacred ob- ligation of contracts, in opposition alike to those party journals which have demoralized politics and established a reign of rowdyism and terror on the ruins of law and order; to those journals which call property robbery, and those which, advocating the violation of the compact made between the slave States and the free when the constitution was adopted, proclaim “a higher law’ than the Bible and the fundamental law of the land, and to enforce it invoke an “irrepressible conflict” between the North and the Sonth which will deluge the country with human blood. Of this latter class is the journal which charges the Henan with “boldly arraying itself against all that is sacred in religion and pure in morals, and striking at the very existence ofsocial order and the security of life and property.” One of the social crimes urged by this hypocritical journial against the Heratnis, that itis published not only on the other six days of the week, but also on Sunday. Now it is hardly necessary to tell the reader that the Sunpay Heraup is prepared on Saturday, whereas the Monday iasue of the Wall street journal is prepared on Sun- ‘day, and its editors, reporters and printers all work on that day, in direct violation of the kind of Sunday observance for which it contends. Could the impudence of hypocrisy and the force of cant further go? Our quadrilateral contemporary, on the con- trary, abandons the religious idea of Sunday laws, and contends that they have only a civil aspect, and are for the temporal good of the people. If that be the case, and that the old Puritan leaven is not working in his stomach, why does he object to Sunday recreations and Sunday amusements, which are certainly for the people’s good ?—and why call those “ infi- dels” who are seeking to remove the Sunday restrictions on the statute book, one of which gives power to the police to close all places of amusement in the city, while another prohibits travelling beyond “a Sabbath day’s journey,” and thus prevents the people quitting the fetid atmosphere of the city and seeking the coun- try to Inbale the pure aiy and ening the greea, fields, and listen to those sermons preached by brooks, and birds, and trees, and flowers, and mountains, far more eloquent and instructive than the lifeless theology of our drowsy pulpits? Experience has proved that the Puritanical Sabbath has been most unfavorable to moral- ity, and has driven thousands to infidelity and irreligion, and into every vice and crime. Its ascetic, gloomy character, keeps the people from Chrisifan worship and sends them to other resorts. The churches do not contain quite half room for the population, and yet they are not on an average half full. Thus one-fourth of the people only go to church. The chief cause is the Puritanical Sabbath ob- servance, which remains a legacy of the folly of our ancestors. The Wonderful Growth of Western Ci- tles=Look at Cincinnati! There is much that is interesting in the study of the rapid growth of the large cities scattered through the West, each forming a kind of se- cond rate metropolis, and boasting of its me- tropolitan resources for amusement and dissi- pation on « small scale. In the Cincinnati Prices Current for the present year is a report of the commerce of that city which occupies nineteen columns of one of the daily papers. We learn some curious statistics from this docu- ment, showing the progress of Cincinnati since its foundation, in 1788, as a village, with the streets cut through the forest and their names marked on the trees, It was many years subsequent to this date, however, that Cincinnati began to make its mark as a city, having been incorporated ag such in the year 1819, just forty years ago. Since then it has been steadily increasing in commerce and general prosperity. We learn from the report referred to that for the year 1858-59 “ the general increase in com- merce is quite remarkable. The increase; in the grocery trade will attract attention. The imports of coffee increased 11 per cent, of su- gar 30 per cent, and of molasses 60 per cent. We imported about one-sixth of all the sugars made in Louisiana, and one-fifth of all the mo- lasses. One-eighth of all the coffee imported into the United States from Brazil came to this market, and notwithstanding these heavy im- portations they were not in excess of the de- mand, which has been large and steady through- out the season.” An abstract of the imports and exports of the city shows that increase is the rule and de- crease the exception. The increase in the fol- lowing articles is quite marked, and tells well for the commercial progress of Cincinnati:— ‘The exports of furniture have increased cighty-nine per cent; of horses, one hundred and forty-one per cent; of molasses, sixty-one per cent; of dried fruits, one hundred and sixty’ per cent. The imports of wool have increased one hundred and fifty-five per cent; of wines, ninety- three per cent; of manufactured tobacco, ninety-six per cent; of potatces, two hundred and sixty-nine per cent; of barrel pork, seventy-three per cent; of horses, ane hun. dred and thirty-four per cent; of dried fruit, one hundred and ninety per cent; and of boots and shoes, one hundred and four per cent, Pork, the great staple of Cincinnati, does not show so prosperous a record, for we are told that, “On the basis of a short crop, a sweeping speculative movement prevailed during the fall of 1858, and extended through the packing sea- son. The pork crop of the West was bought at the highest averagé price ever paid for it in any previous year; and the crop turning out to be ample, the decline was large and the losses extensive and general.” The trade in whiskey, linseed oil, oats and potatoes, showed the same fate in a measure as that in pork. The increase in all branches of manutacture during the last twenty years has ween very considerable, the figures showing that the value of the various departments in 1840, was $17,780,033; in 1850, $54,550,134; and in 1860, $112,254,000; having more than doubled in the last ten years. Asan evidence, not alone of the mercantile but of the intellectual advance of Cincinnati, we refer to the large growth of the book trade:— The whole number of volumes published in this city the past year we estimate at 3,200,000. The educational works alone, published here, supply nearly all the public schools in the entire West. The cause which gives the school books published in Cincinnatti such wide-spread reputation and such a permanent footing, is their superior character. In 1840, the total value of all the books print- ed in Cincinnati annually was $600,000; in 1860 it had reached $1,260,000; now, from reliable data, we place it at $2,600,000. There are now fifty-nine establishments engaged in the book trade in this city, of which seventeen are publishing houses, five or six of them on a most ex- tensive scale. It is a matter of regret that the report is not able to give us any accurate estimate of the dry goods trade. It would be an interesting item at the Kast. The writer, however, under this head throws out a few suggestions which may be valuable to some of our New York merchants who open long credit accounts with Western houses. He says:— _ There is a large number, it is true, who have to go to the East to buy, for the very strong reason that they can- not buy here; and it is a fact, which may seem strange, that there are many merchants doing business in various towns in the Western States who can buy as much dry goods in Eastern cities as they please, and yet whose cre- dit at home is in many instances second class, and in not afew absolutely worthless. The ease with which, and upon what a slender basis, a credit of fifty to one hundred thousand dollars con be ‘established in New York, has become proverbial out West, and bears a striking contrast with the care and scrutiny used by our merchants, and the congequence is, the class of customers who buy here is far better than those who “go East. ”? ._ The progress in trade during the past few years may be inferred from tho number of houses engaged in the whole- ealo and retail departments each year, which were as fol- Number of Houses. Wholesote. Retail, lows:— The growth of the “Queen City of the West” is but a type of the growth of all the other large Western cities. They seem to spring up like mushrooms, and their recuperative faculties after great disasters is amazing. For instance, a financial calamity rains half the commercial firms and utterly smashes up a number of banks, but in a year or so affairs go on as smoothly as ever, and’ the city recovers its wonted pros- perity; or, as we have seen occurring on Fri- day last in Chicago, a fire destroys a whole block, by which half a million of dollars is lost; but then, after all, it is only a loss of half a million—the hole is soon filled up, and ina few weeks the demolished block is reared again, looking more handsome and more com- modious than before. Looking at the extraordinary progress of these vast Western cities, people have pre- dicted that New York would lose her su- Premacy; but this is simply an error, for their prosperity only feeds New York and increases ita resources, while the relative positions these cities occupy towards each other, and the vast tracts of country whose products supply the means of prosperity to each, preven} any one of them from acquiring a pti of in- fluence. For our part, we have no objection to see all these great cities increasing. We hope that Cincinnati and Chicago and St. Louis will con- tinne to grow in size and wealth, or even Port- land, which is aspiring to take the trade in monster steamships away from us. We hope she wil reop @ sigh harvest fom the ad vent of the Great Eastern; and she may, provided that the marine monster does not carry off all the products of the State and the back country in her first return voyage, which she might easily do, together with the whole population of Portland. Seriously, we have no small jealousies to indulge in, for we feel quite confident that, however marvellous may be the growth of other cities, East or West, New York, from her location, her mixed population, and the extraordinary enterprise of her people, will maintain to the end the su- premacy which has been accorded to her as the great commercial metropolis of the Ameri- can continent. Cheap Postage and Postal Reforms—How the Post Office May Sustain Itself. Ex-Senator Cooper has been writing a letter on cheap postage, protection and the iron men’s league, which is evidently intended to affect the Pennsylvania election. His remarks in regard to the postal system are worthy of consideration, and we reprint that portion of them elsewhere. The rest of his letter is all leather and prunella, pure electioneering talk, that may suit the Pennsylvanians if they are as ignorant of the truths of political economy as the politicians suppose them to he. There never has been such an over-worked, under-fed and ill-appreciated beast of burden as the United States Post Office Department is. Between the politicians, printers and public generally, the most extraordinary demands are made onit. The first of these load it down with franked documents, franked speeches and franked dirty linen; the second place a still heavier load upon it in the shape of a free edi- tor’s mail, consisting, on an average, of fifty papers daily for each of the five thousand hewspapers, amounting to thousands of tons yearly; and then both join in preaching to the public that the Post Office should be a self- sustaining institution. Ex-Senator Cooper gives up the latter point, and there is where he is wrong. There is no reason why the Post Office should not sustain itself if the work laid upon it be imposed with any degree of common sense. But to insist that three-fourths of the matter that forms the bulk of the mails shall be car- ried for nething because it belongs to politi- cians and editors, and then to abuse the Post- master General because he has a deficit in his accounts at the end of each year, is a pure and simple absurdity. Mr. Holt is doing what he can to improve this state of things and to se- cure the revenue, for which he receives due credit from Mr. Cooper. For this purpose he is now endeavoring to meet the popular desire for cheap postage by every means in his power. He has introduced several economical reforms -in the stamped envelope which are productive of good, and aspires to do still more. We are not certain that he can accomplish this until the government makes its own envelope, and sells it to the people at or very near the cost of postage. Under the present system the old stamps are re-used and probably counterfeit- ed, and the stamped envelope costs four cents instead of three, unless parties buy twenty-five envelopes, when they get them at the price the law directs, that is, the postage and the prime cest of the envelope. But the great reforms that Mr. Holt should endeavor to achieve are these:—First, the abo- lition of the franking privilege; second, the cutting off of the present incubus of free ex- changes between newspapers ; third, throwing tho carriage uf N¢wspapers and printed matter open to the comman carriers, at the option of the senders. The first of these reforms would take a great load off the overworked depart- ment, and the second would relieve it from a still heavier burthen. Politicians and editors might cry out against it, but the great mass of the people would approve the act. Thereis no more reason why an editor should receive his papers free than a merchant, or a mechanic, or afarmer. The third step has been partially taken, in the permission granted to contraetors to carry newspapers for regular dealers out of the mails. But why a dealer should have any advantage over a subscriber we could never conceive. If the sending of newspapers through the mail was optional with the sender or re- ceiver, and every paper that was carried had to pay postage, the mails would go a great deal lighter, would trayel with more certainty, and the revenue would be increased. Will Mr. Holt, in the annual report he is about to pre- pare on his department, give us some sensible views on this subject and recommend these re- forms? If they are adopted the Post Office will soon become a self-sustaining institution. Tue SreaKersuip or THE Nex Hovse or REPRreseNtatives.—The question of the organi- zation of the next House of Representatives is beginning to attract the attention of the news- papers all through the country. The discus- sion hinges particularly on the adoption or non-adoption of the plurality rule in the elec- tion of Speaker. It seems to us, however, that the matter is not fully understood, and it cer- tainly is not cleavly stated, in the country pa- pers. As it is of the highest importance that there should be no mistake about this matter, we desire to present it in the clearest light. It appears to be conceded on every side that the political parties will stand in the next House of Representatives in the following pro- portions:— Republicans ,, 113 Democrats 02 Anti-Lecomy lk Southern opposit 21 Ina full vote of the body it would therefore require one hundred and nineteen to consti tute a majority. Can either of the two great parties caleulate upon having such a majority? Certainty not, except in two contingencies. The one is, that enough votes may be got from one or both of the two factions, the anti-Le- comptonites and the Southern opposition, to give a preponderance to cither the democrats or the republicans. The other is, that either through negligence or design the House may not be full on the opening of the session, and the republicans, who are well whipped in, may thus have a clear majority. But unless either of these things occur we are sure to have a most exciting and protracted contest for the Speak- ership of the next House, just as we had two Congresses since, when Banks was elected Speaker: Now, as then, the plurality rule will be ten- dered as the only solution to the difficulty. Under it it will not be necessary for any candi- date to have an absolute majority of all the votes cast, but a simple plurality. With three candidates in the field, that would inevitably result now, as it did then, in the triumph of the sepubligaus, Therg is ne ignoring that palpa ble fact. We take it for granted that the demo- crats proper will, to a man, vote steadily and persistently against such a oourse, although in 1855-6 the proposition came from a demoorat (Smith, of Tennessee), and was supported by several others of the same party. At that time, however, there was but a single faction in the House holding the balance of power. That was the American faction, which, contrary to expectation, obstinately and pertinaciously con- tinued to vote for their own candidate, despite the knowledge that their doing sa would give the organization of the House to the republi- cans. Now there are two factions jointly and severally holding the balance of power between the parties. If the anti-Lecomptonites, for in- stance, should throw their weight into the re- publican scale, it would turn the balance im favor of the latter; or if both anti-Lecomp- tonistf and Southern oppositionists should throw their united weight into the democratic scale, the organization of the next House would be effected on a national democratic basis. The two cliques or factions will, therefore, have devolved upon them an immense respon- sibility. By obstinately setting up special candidates of their own and pertinaciously voting for them they will prevent the organi- zation of the House and prejudice the publio interests.. By voting for a plurality rule, or resorting to any other subterfuge to evade di- rect responsibility, they will as surely effect the ‘election of an abolitionist Speaker as if they had boldly cast their votes for him. But by coming forward in a spirit of patriotism, discarding their petty jealousies and ridiculous quibbles about nothing, and casting their votes for the democratic candidate, they will solve the difficulty in a way that will be promotive of their own and the country’s interests. If the democrats will have the good sense to no- minate one who is not personally repugnant to the factions this will probably be the course pursued. But we wish to have it impressed on the minds of members, and of the public at large, that voting for the adoption of the plu- rality rule in the election is equivalent to vot- ing for the republican candidate. It will en- sure an abolitionist organization of the House of Representatives, and may, if the Presiden- tial election should be thrown into that body, eventuate in fastening on the country an abo- litionist administration. If the Douglas demo- crats choose thus to sacrifice their own politi- cal leader, let them do so. Their act would destroy his last chance before the Charleston Convention. If the Southern oppositionists favor the plurality rule, let them do so, and expose themselves to the execrations of the people-of their own section. But let there be no misunderstanding of the inevitable effect of the adoption of this rule. The State of Europe—Progress of the Na- poleonic Ideas and the Fears of the Dynasties. Affairs in Europe are settling down into a quiet acceptance of the Napoleonic ideas, as modified by Louis Napoleon, though not with- out a constant effort on the part of the oppos- ing oligarchic and theocratic interests to re- awaken the old opposition to them that was so effectually aroused half a century ago. The peace of Villafranca and the moderation of the French Emperor took everybody by surprise, and from that time to this the class- supported press of Europe has been prognos- ticating its early rupture, and preaching the necessity of a general distrust of the policy and designs of France. Yet in the face of all these outgivings of the organs of the panic stricken dynasties, the Zurich Conference holds its silent course, Queen Victoria and her Court go off to the highlands of Scotland, Louis Napo- leon retires to the baths of St. Sauveur, and affairs in western Europe at least drop into their usual dull round of red-tapeism. In central and southern Europe the operation of the Napoleonic ideas is producing quite a dif- ferent effect. The dissatisfied nationality of Italy is be- ginning to comprehend that Louis Napo- leon was true to the highest require- ments of freedom in staying the tide of war at Villafranca. The heavy hand of Austria was removed from Lombardy and the Duchies, and then the power that effected this great work was itself withdrawn. Those States were left to begin, untrammelled, the organization of Italian nationality. A body of troops, it is true, was left in a part of Lombardy; but events have proved that their presence was for the purpose of securing the free action of the constructive portion of the nation in their work, without coercion from the red revolutionists and des- tructives, whose sole idea of reform is to pull down everything that exists. While these troops have preserved society from sudden violence in Lombardy and the Duchies, they haye left the true reformers free to act. These have proclaimed the union of Piedmont and Lombardy, the destitution of the Hapsburg- Lorraine dynasty, the formation of the Central Italian League, with Garibaldi at the head ofits army, and the adoption of a policy of progres- sivo reform, combined with the preservation of ihe material interests of society. This is the only way that [taly can become a self-constitu- ted and permanent nationality. Such a politi- cal existence contains the clements of life and growth, while a system imposed by an extraneous power, however friendly that might be, would be always a self-reproach to Italy, would carry with it the seeds of its own decay, and would fall when- ever that friendly hand should be withdrawn. Now, Louis Napoleon restrains not only Aus- tria, but himself too, from interference in Ital- jan affairs. He will neither coerce the Duchies to restore their discarded rulers, nor will he permit Austria to do it, while at the same time he advises them to take back their chastened sovereigns rather than to incur the risks of too rapid reforms. The Duchies feel themselves free to follow their own listings, and exhibit sufficient confidence in their own self-control to refuse to do so. This example of a satisfied nationality in Italy is working in Germany like leayen in a mass of unleavened dough. Teutonism is again rife there. The aspiration for. German unity is rising, and not a few of the forty dukes that di- vide its territary see the danger they are in of having to follow the road of their fellows of Tuscany and Modena. The Napoleonic idea of satisfied nationalities is taking wonderfully with the people, though the press, bound to the interests of the aristocratic classes, is endea- voring to stifle it, and to rouse a feeling of dis- trust against Louis Napoleon and a readinoss to take up arms against him. But the clase interests cannot to-day do what they did so successfully fifty years ago. Men and things have vastly chapged sige