The New York Herald Newspaper, January 19, 1874, Page 4

NEW YORK HERALD BROADWAY AND ANN STREET. JAMES GORDON BENNETT, PROPRIETOR. —— Wolume XXXIX........:.ceeeereee seve MO. 19 — = AMUSEMENTS THIS EVENING, —-——_ METROPOLITAN THEATRE, No, $85 Broadway —VAKIETY ENTERTAINMENT, at 7:45 P, M. ; closes at 10:90 P. M. NIBLO'S GARDEN, Broadway, bet Prince and Houston streets — ROMEO VAPSIER JENKINS at8 P.M; THE BELLES OF THE KITCHEN, at 9 P: M.; closes at 1030 P.M. Vokes Family, Mr. Lefingwell. WOOD'S MUSEUM, Broadway, corner Thirtieth street—JACK ROBINSON'S: MONKEY? ac? ?. M.; closes at480 P.M. ACROSS THE CONTINENT, at 5P. M.; closes at 2. M. “0, D, Byron. semana GRAND OPERA HOUSE, third street—HUMPTY Fifth avenue and et: DUMPTY ABROAD, at745 P. M.; closes at 10:45 P.M, Mr. G. L. Fox. FIFTH AVENUE THEATRE, ‘Twenty-sighth street and Broadway.—MAN AND WIFE, Ly ‘M.; closes at 10:30 P.M. Mr, Harkins, MissAda WALLAOK'S THEATRE, Broadway aud Thirteenth street.—MONEY, at 8 P. M.; loves at 1120 P. M. Mr, Lester Wallack, Muss Jeffreys BOOTHS THEATRE, Sixth avenue and Twenty-third street.—LA FEMME DB WEU, ot 7:45 P.M. ; closes atl P. M. Mrs. J. B, Booth, OLYMPIC THEATRE, Broadway. between Houston and Bleecker streets. — AUDEVILLE and NOVELTY ENTERTAINMENT, at P.M. ; closes at 11 P. M. BROOKLYN PARK THEATRE, . qrpoaiis Oy, Hall, Brooklyn.—KIT; OR, THE ARKAN- es TRAVELLER, at 8 P. M.; closes at 1045 P.M. FL S, Shantrau. BOWERY THEATRE, Bowery.—SCOUTS OF THE SIERRAS, at8 P. M.; closes atuP.M, Mr. L Prank Pay! GERMANIA THEATRE, Fourteenth street.—DIE JOURNALISTEN, at 8 P. M.; Cloges at 11:15 P.M, TONY PASTOR'S OPERA HOUSE, No. 01 Bowery.—VARIETY ENTERTAINMENT, at 8 P, ‘BM. ; closes acl P.M. BRYANT’S OPERA HOUSE, Twenty-third street, corner of Sixth avenue.—CINDER- ALLA IN BLACK, NEGKO MINSIKELSY, &c., at 8 P, | Closes at 10 P.M. ROBINSON HALA, Sixteenth street.—THE Pi SINNIES, at 3P. M. and ato P. M. : BAIN BALL, Great Jones street and Latayette place.—PILGRIM'S PROGRESS, at3 P.M; closes at 9 P.M. WITH SUPPLEMENT. Bew York, Monday, January 19, 1874. THE NEWS OF YESTERDAY. 'To-Day’s Contents of the Herald. “THE CHIEF JUSTICESHIP! PROBABLE AP POINTMENT OF SENATOR CONKLING’— LEADING ARTICLE—FourtH PacE. THE CAPTOR OF CARTAGENA GIVEN COMMAND OF THE ARMY OPERATING AGAINST THE CARLISTS! NEWSPAPERS SUS- PENDED! THIRTY-FIVE MEN KILLED BY THE FALL OF A RAILWAY VIADUCT—Firra Pace. SNSULTING THE CONQUERED! THE RECENT PRUSSIAN PRESS WARNING TO FRANOE CAUSING MUCH EXCITEMENT IN PARIS AND ROME—Firra PaGe. GERMAN SUNDAY ENTERTAINMENTS CONTIN- UED YESTERDAY! THE LAW NOT EN- FORCED! WILL IT BE? TEUTONIC AGITA- TION OVER THE QUESTIUN—NEWARK QUIET—TexTH Pace. THE BRITISH CAMPAIGN IN WEST AFRICA! PROMISE OF ANOTHER MAGDALA, IN ASHANTEE! A UNIQUE AND HUMILIAT- ING NATIVE DESPATCH! ELMINA AND ITS POPULACE—TuImD Pace. UNEARNED-SALARY GRABBERS! THE EXPEN- DITURES OF THE WASHINGTON DEPART- MENTS! A WAY TO REDUCE NATIONAL EXPENSES—Firtu Pack. RETRENCH! THE FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES OF PUBLIC AND PRIVATE BUSINESS! THE IRUN BANDS OF ‘THE NATIONAL BODY! FINANCIAL RESUME OF LAST WEEK— NINTH PAGE. sADDRESS TO THE MINERS AND THEIR FELLOW WORKMEN ON THE LABOR SITUATION! THE STATUS OF THE STRIKE—STEALING FROM ERIE—NAVAL MOVEMENTS—TentTH Pacer, W®UBLIC WORSHIP! THE SERMONS DELIVERED BY THE PROMINENT DIVINES YESTER- DAY! CONVERSION, MODERN IDEAS OF GOD AND SENSUOUS AND SPIRITUAL RE- LIGION THE SALIENT TOPICS—EicuTa Pace. {PERU AND CUBA LIBRE—THE SEIZURE OF THE FILIBUSTER STEAMER GENERAL SHER- MAN—ROLLING MILL STRIKE—NINTH PaGE. ‘THE PRESENT NAVAL RENDEZVOUS AT KEY WEST! THE CUBAN QUESTION! A WRETCHED TOWN—TuHIRD Pace. M0AL PROSPECTS! MANCEUVRING FOR A “CORNER!” “AT COST” IN THE SPRING, AND AN ADVANCE OF TEN CENTS PER MONTH—TurRp Pace. ‘REALTY AS AFFECTED BY FINANCIAL OPERA- TIONS AND VALUE FLUCTUATIONS! UP- TOWN IMPROVEMENTS! THE PROPOSED PARADE GROUND—SixTH PaGE. DULNESS OF THE SHIPBUILDING TRADE ON LONG ISLAND—FOREIGN ART NOTES— Turn Pac. SUMBLING A WOULD-BE CHESTERFIELD, OF THE BRITISH ARISTOCRACY! A DIS- GRACEFUL STORY—SixtTH Page. Wau He Vero tae Bux?—The South. ern members of Congress, it appears, enter- jtain a hope that the President may veto the ‘bill repealing the increased salary and back pay act of the last Congress, because the re- peal is a cut direct at the members of his Cab- inet, whose compensation, they say, was little enough even with the late increase from eight to ten thousand a year. But as the repeal of this fncreased salary bill is in accordance with the will of the people, and as the President thas said that he has no policy to enforce in conflict with the will of the people, we ‘‘cal- eulate’’ that he will sign the repeal. Tae Coxruct Betweex Law AnD Laces, Bone axp Statute, has not yet opened with any vigor between the Germans and the Sab- datarians. Yesterday evening the children of Germania avoided the more flagrant breaches of the Sunday law, but were festive, vocal, in. strumental and saltatory to their hearts’ con. tent, Some kind of truce appears to have ‘been arranged between the police and the Germans by which the law is to be tested ‘without appealing to unpleasant methods, The matter will go to the courts, it is believed, and we shall probably in the end have an opinion from the Supreme Court on the con- stitationality of the Sunday law itself, NEW YORK HERALD, MONDAY, JANUARY 19, 1874.—WITH SUPPLEMENT. The Chief JustiGeship—Probable Ap- poimtment of Senator Conkling. No judicial office in the world is of equal dignity with that of Chief Justice of the United States. No other sovereign Power but the American people has ever consented thatthe relations between authority and those ‘subject to it shall be determined finally by a rational application of the principles of a writ- ten law. Judges in all other countries, in the ‘highest Courts even, have principally to determine and define the relations of indi- viduals of the community one with another, and where they have to declare the relation of any portion of the people with the goyern- ment it is because of some violation of the criminal law. They assign the punishments of the people as they are themselves part of the machinery of authority; but they generalize vaguely ‘when the occasion calls for any lim- itation in the exercise of the authority in whose shadow they stand. None of the older systems of government has recognized that its power may be justly scrutintized by those subject to them; for they are ‘all founded “is again asserted wherever substantial reason: for authority seems to fail. Althoygh the original notion that the judge asserted the ‘king's will and that the king’s-will was the rule of right -is presumably replaced in the freer countries of the Old World by the-nvtion"| that the judge interprets a law that is above the king’s will and independent of it, the trath is that the judge’s character as an ad- junct of the anthority of the individual sover- eign is unchanged, and if the law-as ho finds’| it is not agreeable with the impulses of that sovereign will, he makes on the bench a law that is agreeable with it. But the function of the Judges of the. United States Supreme Court is altogether‘of ampler scope, for those Judges do not stand in the shadow of author- | ity and simply assign its exercise, but author- ity ratherwaits upon their decision to know its own limit, and the head of a court with this power, that is virtually the custodian of the liberties of forty millions of people, whose dictum on given cases practically restricts the operations of authority to those limits within which the framers of the constitution deemed it wise to confine it, is, in virtue of the moral dignity of his duties, the most exalted legal fanctionary of our times. From the very character of this office the man to properly fill it would scarcely be sought in the ranker atmosphere of political life. It requires some faith in the possibilities of metamorphosis to believe thata successful far more than average talent, and, theréfore, we trust that Senator Conkling may be nominated and confirmed immediately. Cracking the Nut. Mr. Stanley, writing from Elmina, gives an account of the innovations of the English which isnot very flattering to British tact. They have not succeeded, it seems, in win- ning the tender regard of thelr newly acquired Subjects, who still have a strong affection for the colonial Dutchman. It isa very natural feeling, wo presume, fhat a race of semi- civilized barbarians, who have learned té re- spect what Mr. Stanley in substance describes in the Herawp this mqrning as the mild rule of commerce, should wince and grow restless under domination whose ultimatam is mili- tary conscription—an obligation which com- pels them to fight against their former friends sand allies. But the most interesting feature of the detter is “thecomposition” of one Eckra to whom was assignud:¢the rather Ministry. Eckra did his:dutyyas he declares, | anfl presented the despatch to General Amon- quatiah, a renowned Ashantee chieftain. Amongqnatiah was requested¢o eetire “‘behind the.Pra,"’ andthe letter permitted him two eeks “in which to execute this important movemtnt, If he complied Her Generous "Majesty the Queen, who had a noble heart, would pay the expenses of the war and all ‘would. be well. Parley followed. The ‘‘big: oath” was sworn; but the patriotic Amon- quatiah was obdurate. There could be no peace for the Ashantee, for had he not regis- tered a vow to drive the white man away? Quanim ventured to suggest that ‘conciliation would be an opportune measure; but the chief frowned and said, “Will you be silence?” ‘Thereafterthe ambassador was silence on pain of decapitation. Bush fighting supervened, and Quanim, who had a flourishing pair of legs, put them to their proper use and finally cast anchor in the hollow of a friendly tree. His diplomatic ability saved him from cer- tein death, and he returned to E!- mina, where Mr. Stanley obtained the literary curiosity which wo publish as incor- porated in his letter. That this proposition of the English is humiliating, no person who hhas ever dealt with savages can fora moment deny. Treaties, stipulations of any sort, com- promises or concessions are always regarded by barbarians as an evidence of weakness on the part of those who make the tender. But we follower of fortune in the train of authority can make a good Chief Justice. How can the suppose the Peace Society or the Quakers of Exeter Hall had a certain influence over mild fibre proper to the great office bend to that Mr. Gladstone, and that the formality of pursuit? There is a necessary inconsistency. sending Quanim was considered necessary. ‘Suppleness, the perception of opportunity and | Now that this effort ‘‘to avert bloodshed” has the instinct to improve it; some easy indiffer- | failed, nothing remains to the brilliant young ence to the niceties of an exalted morality; British commander but to march on Coomas- the disposition to regard thrift as a foremost sie with his nine thousand strong, reduce the fact; the possession of intellectual dexterity rather than the “large discourse of reason,’’ adroitness rather than science, cunning rather than wisdom, tact rather than simple confi- capital and bring to an end the protracted struggle on the Gold Coasé, which has cost England so many lives and so much national dishonor. What is worth doing at all is worth dence in the truth; these sre the attributes | doing well. that from time immemorial have fitted men to | pespotism in the French Assembly. flourish in the smiles of power, and power seems to us no more worthy in its character or its surroundings to-day than it has been hitherto. But all these attributes make It is quite manifest that the men now in power in France are resolved that in the work of reconstruction which is occupying the attention of the Assembly no opening will up an intellectual and moral quantity | 45 jeff for the return of the Commune. In that is the very antipodes of the sober simplic- ity of thought, the-carnest regard to the right, their excessive dread of the Reds the majority in the Assembly reveal a conservatism which the. rigid indifference to the fluctuations of 5 i we : x verges closely on the despotic. A bill is now opinion, which give-the moral outline of the before the 4 bly providi for the ap- typical Chief Justice, and the great knowledge of the law which should be his one grand in- pointment of mayors by the government. This bill sims a serious blow at the Republic. tellectual qualification. Indirection and craft It seeks to revive the system which prevailed seem the necessary features of one character; absolute rectitude is the one indispensable ele- under the Empire. It is therefore bitterly opposed by all true republicans. On Satur- ment of the other. We do not believe that day an amendment to the bill, requiring that any such political or moral miracles are to happen in these days as will reconcile the con- the mayors should be chosen from among the members of municipal councils, was offered tradictions we have indicated, and therefore first by the Left and then by the Left Contre ; we must necessarily regret the evident proba- but it was voted down in the first bility that we are to have a Chief Justice chosen from the circle of the President’s closer political adherents; for we had imagined that & President who had seen in his own experi- ence some of the dreadful results of the abu- sive judgments given in the Supreme Court was the most likely man to take a lofty, impartial and unselfish view of the qualifications of a Chief Justice. If the man who saw the American people of the North and South scattered dead’ and dying over the whole country, from Fort Henry to Shiloh, Vicksburg and Chatta- nooga, and from the Rappahannock to Appo- mattox, and who could definitely trace all that slaughter to a political judgment given in the ‘| Supreme Court—if such a man could appoint ‘a politician, to be Chief Justice what human lesson can be expected to be impressive? It seems evident, whatever may be said, that we must contemplate as a fact the forth- coming appointment of Senator Conkling. instance by ® majority of five, and in the second instance by a majority of fourteen. The bill, it may now be taken for granted, will be passed in precisely that form which the government is pleased to give it. As under the Empire, so under what is called the Republic, mayors will not be elected by the people, but ap- pointed by the government. This is centrali- zation in one of its most vicious forms. The Republic has ceased to be a fact. It is now only a name. But throughout France repub- ‘licanism is live and strong; and, notwith- standing this despotism and in spite of the monarchy which the Assembly is bent on re- storing, the Republic will reappear. Despite all apparent reaction the cause is advancing and time is working in its favor. The Caban War—Insurgent Successes. The Cubans lately have been giving proof of considerable energy and skill in their operations. The most important battle fought As we have already said, this is the best name since the beginning of the war took place at that can be drawn from the circle of the Presi- | Limones and resulted in the detent of the pointments might be made while the Execu- the objections would be infinitely graver. General Grant has proposed this appoint- ment because he owes a great deal on the score of political reckoning to Senator Conkling. We should prefer to have the office bestowed, not as a reward of fealty and service in political canvasses, but as a reward for desert of quite another sort, because we cannot concede that General Grant has any right to pay his political debta with what is not his property. Presidents abuse the trust reposed in them when they appoint persons to office for any other reasons | than those that relate to the candidate's fit- ness to perform the duties; but appointment for other reasons has become so universal that it is winked at by the people, and proper dent’s immediate adherents, and perhaps we Spaniards. According to their own account ought to rejoice that the matter does not as- | they lost in killed and wounded over one hun- sume 8 worse shape. Against this appoint- | dred men, Tho battle was long and well con- ment the burden of complaint would be that tested, and in this its chief value consists ag it is political, and we can conceive that ap- showing the growing confidence of the Cubans in themselves and their ability to meet the tive is choosing among his retainers to which Spanish soldiers in the field. Hitherto the charge has been made against the Cubans that they relied wholly on surprise and were never able to make a stand-up fight against their opponents, This year the tables seem to have been completely turned. Although the Cubans, from their want of artillery, are unable to make any impression on the towns or to effect @ permanent lodge- ment, the system of attack on all exposed Places has so distracted the attention of the Spanish generals that they are no longer able to make head in the open field against the despised Mambis. If the same success con- tinue to attend the Guban arms during the winter months, which are the most favorable for Spanish operations, public opinion may be sufficiently strong to force the recogni- appointments are applauded as virtuous ex- ceptions; but this is with regard to the man of minor places, It is still held that the tion of Cuban belligerency, A Lucxy Hir ror Mr. Caarman—The lit- nomination for Chief Justice should be kept | tle circumstance through which Mr. Chapman, on a higher plane than to be used as a value | chief of one of the bureaus of the Internal in the regular political traffic and in the dis- | Revenue Department at Washington, over- charge of political obligations. Inasmuch, | hauled two of the holders in this city of a however, as the President cannot in politics | considerable portion of those seventy-five thou- look beyond the circle of those who gather | sand dollars in Treasury warrants recently directly around him, and as we must have a | stolen from said Washington bureau, Some Chief Justice from within that circle, it is interesting developments are expected in the great deal to have @ person of integrity and of | unravelling of this little affair, ‘}and prosperity. The Great Want of Rapid Transit— Shall We Be Fenny Wise and Pound Foolish? Rapid transit is the first and most pressing want of the city of New York. We might make all other local improvements that could de suggested, and without the means of steam car travel through the city the money expended Upon them would in a great measure be thrown away. Our docks might be rebuilt and extended along both sides of the island; our crampéd streets down town might be widened and-opened; our splendid boulevards up town might be completed; we might grade, pave, lay.sewers and gas pipes and clothe the newly annexed territory in the richest of municipal robes, but without a railroad or i to carry the people from the West- chester border to the Battery in half an hour, and to afford'them local accommodations as ample as those afforded to the Londoners by." tho English underground railway, all such im- | provements would fail to supply the-real want of the city or to properly advance its progress To make a_ great ametropolis it is necessary to have, above all other things, the means of rapid locomotion, so that people who live at a distance may pass quickly between their homes and their occupationg and business may be transacted without the annoying delays of Broadway blockades.and crawling horse cars. ‘The business centre of New York is not s cen- tre at all. It is, and always will be, at one end of a long, narrow neck of territory, and ‘thence what is a necessity for all great cities is doubly a necessity for New York. The growth of London ig regarded as mar- vellous. Enormous as the city ia, it stretches out further and further every year on every side, and continues to spread the life and bus- tle of city streets over green fields and coun- try roads in every direction. The reason is obvious. Men can live wherever they may please, or wherever their means will allow them to live, and can reach the business parts of the metropolis from distances of fifteen or twenty miles more quickly than a New Yorker who lives on Twentieth street can reach Wall street. Underground railways and viaduct roads carry their thousands of business men, clerks, mechanics, Jaborers, bankers, brokers, ship- pers and all other callings backwards and forwards, north, south, east and west, so that every man whose living is made in London can live in the city or its suburbs, taking his choice of locality and suiting himself with a residence in accordance with his income. If New York had such accommodations it would very speedily double its present population, andthe beautiful country across the Harlem River would be covered with fine streets and convenient residences. Asvit is, we drive our population from us across the East River, to Staten Island or into another State. Business men make livings in New York and spend their incomes in other places. If steam cars were running every five minutes the whole length of the city, some in through trains and others making stops at short intervals, after the fashion of the London underground road, ‘a much smaller portion of our business men would seek residences outside New York, and certainly very few indeed would live in another State. Rapid transit would enrich the city, increase the valuation of real gstate, decrease the rate of taxation and add to the general prosperity. Why should we be with- out it? The cost of a railroad, even if built through the heart of the city, would be trifling as com- pared with the benefits to be secured by such a work. But taking the estimates of the cost of a viaduct road, already carefully prepared by competent persons, and calculating the amount of travel on the present horse cars, aud it is shown that the receipts would be cer- tain to pay a handsome profit on the invest- ment. We must not, however, forget that the construction of 9 steam railroad from the Westchester border to the Battery would largely increase the present travel, for it would at once take to the upper part of the city thousands who now live across the rivers, and other thousands who are now packed in densely crowded tenement houses and who seldom ride at all. If the city should builda road, making the fare simply enough to pay the running expenses and interest and to pro- vide a small sinking fand, the traffic would be correspondingly increased and the people would derive the full advantages of the investment. But if private capital chooses to undertake and carry out the work there is no reason why it should not do so. Let any honest, practical citizens be granted a franchise, only requiring that trains shall be run at certain intervals and, with a maximum rate of fare specified in their charter, and we have no doubt they will make large fortunes out of the undertaking. If the right sort of persons do not offer to build the road, then it should cer- tainly be built by the city, anda law author- izing it should be passed at the present ses- sion of the Legislature. We have already sunk large sums of money in uptown im- provements. We shall soon be called upon to make considerable expenditure on the new wards. If we desire a return for our invest- ments we must secure rapid transit and thus render the new streets and avenues accessible. It is a penny wise and pound foolish policy, now that we have done so much to improve and beautify the upper part of the island, to hesitate about constructing a railroad which will at once throw that territory open to our busi- neas population and cover it with residences. The Legislature should lose no time in acting on this vital subject. There can be no neces- sity to wait for jobs and propositions from outside parties. The proper committees of the Senate and Assembly should take the matter in hand, and prepare a bill authorizing the city to build o road omronds, creating a first class railroad commission and vesting the power in the commission and certain of the municipal authorities, at their option, to allow private capital to do the work. Such a law would have none of the taint of the lobby about it, and if the names of the com- missioners should be such as they ought to be they would command public confidence and we should not long be without rapid transit, Tae Genman Government Ponicy on the Papal question has excited a feeling of public uneasiness in France and Rome. Considering the cause the consequence is quite natural and reasonable, for the Italian royalty may find itself very seriously agitated should the French and the Teutons commence to quarrel over the claims of tha Vatican, ——a A Would-Be Chesterfield Srough't to Grief. One of the most fruitful themes for the vagrant pen of the British periodical philoso- pher is the libellous character of the Amer- ican press. We have been told again and again by this supernal personage that the | teputation of the purest and most immaculate is dragged before the vulgar mob and demol- ished with the same ease that one would blow over a house of cards. Our average journalist is represented as listening at the keyholes of ‘drawing rooms, or concealed beneath pa table, around which are gathered diplo- matists for secret deliberation, or as boldly plunging into the circle of domestic grief in order to lay bare the darkest sorrows of a household. We are aware that there isa hive of pot-house vagabonds who are per- mitted, trom some inscrutable reason, to cast | their slime on our respectable journalism ; bat they are rapidly drifting into the Slum literature where they belong. Beyond this there is a general hesitation in America, either by innuendo or malignant slander, to sonage who has not committed some flagrant public wrong. This is as it should:be, and ‘we are gratified to note that healthy criticism is deepening and broadening. But how is it in England? As the reader will discover, in an article.on a modern Chesterfield, published in the Saturday Review, from the aristocracy itself is recruited @ most dangerous and ignoble species of the defamer. Lord Desart, envious of the fame of the soi-disant arbiter of English manners and morality, contributed a series of letters'to London Society. In them he taught the coarsest philosophy, if phi- losophy can be called dishonor and brutality, and then superadded to his weary rubbish a string of cunning imsinuations directed against the private characters of people of quality. This form of vicious writing is peculiar to England. The cowardly instinct thdt makes a man deliberately choose a victim for social ruin teaches him the art of saying, ‘the Duke of H——’” or “the Duchess of I——’’ ‘are dreading an earthquake of truth, which shall shake be- fore the public gaze all the skeletons of the family.’’ Lord Desart was, however, exposed and made to sign the most abject and humili- ating apology we remember ever to have seen in print. Ready enough to employ his pen in concocting his loathsome letters, he cer- tainly displayed most astonishing haste in eating his own words, and apparently without any of the evil effects which generally follow sudden’ and involuntary deglutition. He is, however, but one of a class who are constantly active in English society. They do not always write books or contribute to the periodicals, but are oftener the purveyors of club slang and coffee house colloquy. Here in America, whatever may be the vices of our journalism, we do not generally encourage attack by innuendo, nor slander by insinuation. The French newspapers, Quixotic and volatile as they are said to be, are comparatively free from the base habit we have mentioned; and we commend the stinging rebuke of the Saturday Review in its effort to banish it from England. We might say more in the common cause of all classes of publications, and indulge the hope that the journalism of the world is entering upon a loftier sphere of inquiry and usefulness, suppressing all that panders to morbid craving, idle curiosity and vicious gratification. The Cavalry Controversy. The claim for superiority put forward by Colonel Brackett in favor of American over British cavalry is not likely to be acquiesced in by our transatlantic cousins. Indeed, al- ready a skirmish line of Britishers has dashed at the Colonel in gallant ‘style, without wait- ing for supports, and unless the champion of | American horsemanship fixes himself well in his saddle he is likely to come to grief. It is always a dangerous thing to attempt to deal with a wide question in a paragraph, and Colonel Brackett bas fallen into the grave error, for a scientific writer, of generalizing on insufficient information. We will not accuse the Colonel of being unacquainted with the history of the British army, but his information on the special subject of British cavalry seems to be drawn solely from Nolan’s work on that arm. Men ac- quainted with military literature know that while Great Britain has produced some good cavalrymen, Mitchell and Nolan stand almost alone as writers on cavalry subjects, Both officers wrote at a period when the army through lengthened peace had deteriorated, and the cavalry that swept like an iron torrent over the fields of the Peninsula and closed a gallant series of services at Waterloo had degenerated into mere parade troops, The scathing atte¢ks of Nolan were directed against a system of organization and arma- ment which has in great part been altered in accordance with his suggestions, which were based on common sense. But though all this is admitted, and even though all the de- fects denounced by Captain Nolan still con- tinued, they would not furnish sufficient ground for the sweeping statement put forward by Colonel Brackett. The su- periority of one body of cavalry over another does not rest on any single advantage of organization, but must depend on a concurrence of advantages which leave a decided superiority after a general balance has been struck. The ques- tion of horses, arms, officers and the greater or less skill with which troops are used must greatly influence the value of cavalry. It is even possible that the same corps may differ widely in value under the leadership of differ- ent men. It is, therefore, evidently unsound reasoning on the part of Colonel Brackett to say that, because our cavalry ride better than the British, therefore it is in every respect superior. Suppose some Britisher were to say that because the Indians of the Pampas ride better than the United States soldiers therefore they were better cavalry! Such a deduction would be evidently illogical, and would certainly not be well received by Ameri- cans. Besides, it is not at all clear that the charge of bad horsemanship brought against the British is well founded, Had Colonel Brackett ever ridden across country with an Trish pack or tried the stone fences of Leices- tershire perhaps his estimate of British horse- manship would be modified. The British havo the reputation, well earned, of being the boldest horsemen in Europe. Had Colonel Brackett confined himself to the statement that the gystem of balance ridjna practised on weaken the social status of any person or per- | the Plains was better adapted for military par poses than the British system his views would be accepted by all military men os sound, English soldiers, taken from all grades and exnditions of life, cannot be made to ride as welljn afew months as men who have spent all thelr lives in the saddle; but they can be turned into cavalry capable of whipping the Sikhs, who in the matter of mere florseman- cowardly race. In physique they are the equal, if not the superior, of the Europegn, with all the advantages of climate in their favor. It is notorious that individually tho Sikhs are better horsemen and better swords- men than any Europeans, and yet these horsemen were beaten over and again by British cavalry made up of Irish peasants and Glasgow or Manchester weavers. What, then, becomes of the horsemanship theory of Colonel Brackett? Sermons Wise and Otherwise, Ritualism and superstition received another shot yesterday from Bishop Cummins. While he admitted and declared that man must have a religion, and that religion has been tho weightiest force and factor in human history, yet blazing altars, delicious perfumes, the exhalations of incense, operatic music and other sensual ceremonies constitute a clever counterfeit presentment of the religion of Jesus Christ. How beautiful is such a ritual, he asked? But is it true? That is the main question. The Bishap does not want to “see altars in churches the exact counterparts of those in pagan temples, ‘There is no true altar but the Cross of Christ.’* The Bishop is opposed also to paid choristers in white robes and a congregation praising God by proxy. He much prefers congrega- tional singing. A lovelier sight than all the glories of marble or canvas is the soul reflect- ing its beauteousness in devout worship. Whatever ritual leaves the heart of the votary unmoved, ynmarked by any self-sacrifice, is superstition, and not the worship of God in spirit and in truth. Mr. Beecher illustrated various conceptions of God. ~ In the Old Testament God is revealed more forcibly under the representa- tion of a regnant power as God over all nature and’ God over the nations—a God of adaptation to want. In the New Testament He is revealed as the God of goodness, gentle- ness, sweetness, patience and long suffering tenderness. Mr. Beecher believes in Her- bert Spencer, John Stuart Mill and men of that class as workers with God and for God. The Rev. Henry Powers had something to say in favor of mental and moral culture and their relations to the life of a man. While he would not pretend to say that » man could not be a Christian unless he is educated, yot the advantages of knowledge and culture are very great in helping a man to bear the ills and misfortunes of life. It is not a good sign fora man to be long and doubtfally engaged with the ordinary temptations of life. Tho true Christian ought,to feel after a time that he is not only equal to these or- dinary trials ond temptations but su- perior to them. The good man’s resources of moral power, like’his mental stores, aro cultivable and may be made so strong that a man shall in time feel no necessity for any vigorous or even conscious conflict with tho world of sin. This is true in part. But the power that can overcome sin when the spirit- ual life begins in a man is the same that must always keep it down. That power is the grace of God. Culture may help wisdom and godliness, and hope may help, but grace alone can save; and without it all our cul- ture will not keep us out of perdition. Dr. Duryea drew from the inquiry of the ruler to Jesus, ‘‘Good master, what shall I do to obtain eternal life,” not the interpretation that sceptics give to it, that Christ disclaimed any idea or right to be considered as divine, but rather the very opposite, that: He was Himself God. Jesus did not reprove the man for calling Him “‘good;” He did not disclaim being good, but He sought rather in this way to reveal Himself to the ruler whom He after- wards exhorted to sell all that he had and fol- low Him. The rmler, in his recital of the commandments that he had kept from his youth, ‘omitted the first, and Jesus, by His answer, forbade him to have any other God beside Himself. Jesus knew that while this man retained his riches and trusted in them he could never save his soul. |: He therefore advised him to dispose of them. This man was a type of many in our day, who would be far richer if they sold all their earthly possessions and followed Jesus instead of the world. But, like him, they hold on with one hand as it were to the world and with the other try to catch the hand of Christ, and the result is a miserable failure. Father Bjerring yesterday set forth some of the doctrines of the Greek Church. He does not show himself as well posted in the Scrip- tures as a public teacher of those writings should be. As one of the highly exalting characteristics of the Virgin Mary he names virginity, which he says was despised among Jewish women, but which her pure soul re- solved to embrace, when it is asserted by the Evangelists that she was betrothed to Joseph at the time of the Saviour’s birth,and by whom she subsequently had children, so that virginity did not enter into her life’s calculations. That the Greek Church believes as the good Father declares is simply saying that she does not believe the sacred record on this point. Prayer to the Virgin and to the saints is an- other of the doctrines of the Church. But Christ, in His model ond inimitable prayer, gives no intimation that our petitions should be addressed to them. Nay, rather He declares that whosoever docth tho will of His Father in heaven the same is His mother and sister and brother, Father Bjerring claims that his Church has preserved the faith in its ‘original purity ; and yet, while it agrees in doctrine substantially with the Roman Charch, in doctrine the Greek Church in some respects considers its Latin neighbor as heretical as any Protestant sect can be. Mr. Frothingham talked about ‘Public Amusements’’ yesterday. He thinks we ought to have amusements, and because the Church thought so in the centuries gone by the Church founded the theatre. ‘Amusement is that which lets in through the gates of joy 4 flood of pleasure.” Mr. Frothingham thinks the theatre is not what it ought to be, chiefly for the reason that it is not native; and yet, to his mind, the opéra bouffe should be, with ita ballet, its songs, ity scenic effects andi —