The New York Herald Newspaper, January 22, 1874, Page 6

NEW YORK HERALD, THURSDAY, JANUARY 22, 1874.—TRIPLE SHEET. eae NEW YORK HERALD Soleaadinyiliigenetaia BROADWAY aD ANN STREET. JAMES GORDON BENNETT, PROPRIBTOR, Al) business or news letters and telegraphic despatches must be addressed New Youx Henan. Letters and packages should be properly sealed. Rejected communications will not be re- turned. LONDON OFFICE OF THE NEW YORK HERALD—NO. 46 FLEET STREET. Subscriptions and Advertisements will be received and forwarded on the same terms as in New York. Volume XXXIX.....;. AMUSEMENTS T EVENING. eS ae eee Woops MUSEUM ‘Thirtieth street JACK ROBINSON'S NOSREY? oP atz i closes at 4:30 P. M. Aaeons © HE ONTINENT, at 8P.'M.; closes at 11 2, M. 0, D. Byron. em pg ays HOUSE, third t.—HUMPTY bowery AnhoAD, at Tas Bo Me clones at Wao Pe Me FIFTH AVENUE THEATRE, rms ighth street and Broadway. SARATOGA at 8 weapeene st 10:50 FM. Mr. Harkins, Miss Fanny WALLACK'S THEATRE, Broadwa; ay and Thagteentn street. —MONEY, at 8 P. M.; Py at 11:20 P. Mr. Lester Wallack, iiss Jeffreys BOOTH’'S THEATRE, Sixth avenue and Twenty-third sirect LA FEMME DE UW, at 7:45 P. M.; closes at 10:30 P. M. Mrs. J. B, Booth, OLYMPIC THEATRE, Bro; ween Houston und Bleecker streets. — | DE VLLE and {NOVELTY ENTERTAINMENT, at 5 ¥ Me closes at LP. M. BROOKLYN PARK THEATRE, opposite City Hall, Brookiva.—XIT; OR, THE Ankay | SAS TRAVELLER, at 5 P. M ; closes at 10:4 P. Ml, Chantrau. BOWERY THEATR' Bowery.—SCOUTS OF THE SIE RAS; at9P. M.; closes eb P M. Mr, 1. Frank Pa} GERMANIA THEATRE, Fourteenth street. -LUMPACIVAGABUNDUS, at 8 P. M.; closes at Li :15 P.M. METROPOLITAN THEATRE, No, 585 Broadway —V tal ENTERTAINMENT, at 745 P.M. ; closes at 10:30 F. NIBLO’S GARDEN, Broaaay, between Prince and lous! L— ROMEO JAFVIER JENKINS, at 8 P. M.; THE BELLES OF THE KITCHEN, ‘at 9 P: M.; closes at 10:30 P.M. Yokes Family, Mr. Leffingwell. ACADEMY OF MUSIC, Fourteenth street, corner of Irving piace. —KELLOGG | KNGLISH OPEBA—MARTHA, at8 P. M.; closes at LU P. M. Miss Kellogg, Mr. Hablemann. THFATRE COMIQUE, oy | Broadway.—KERN'S BENEFIT. VARINGT, at 2P. ; closes at 4:30 P. M. TONY PASTOR'S OPERA HOUSE, No, M1 Bowery.—VARIETY ENTERTAINMENT, at 8 P. ‘M. ; closes at Il P. M. BRYANT'S OPERA HOUSE, Twenty-third street, corner of Sixth avenue.—CINDER- ELLA IN BLAGR. HEGHO MINSTRELSY, éc., at 8P. | M1. ; closes at 10 ROBINSON HALL, } Se street.—THE PiccANiNNiEs, at SP. M. and BAIN HALL, Great Jones street and Laiayette cate —PILGRIM’s | PROGRESS, at 5 P. M. ; closes at 9 P. M. i COLOSSEUM, ez caress © of Thirty-fifth street —CYCLORAMA ap to BY DAY, at 12 M.; PABIS BY ioedad at7 P.M; clo TRIPLE. SHEET. New York, Thursday, January 22, 1874, THE NEWS OF YESTERDAY. To-Day’s Contents of the Herald. “THE CITY POOR AND THE AGITATORS! CITY CHARITIES’—LEADING ARTICLE—SixTH Pag. CARING FOR THE DESTITUTE! THE GRANDLY BENEFICEN? WORK OF THE REGULARLY ORGANIZED CHARITABLE BODIES IN NEW YORK—Fovrtn Pace. EPIDEMIC AMONG THE BRITISH TROOPS ON THE GOLD VOAST! SHARP AND FATAL RESULTS—SEVENTH Pace. SERRANO’S WAR UPON THE CARLISTS! DOMIN- GUEZ MOVING IN FORCE IN VALENCIA! SANTANDER IN IMMINENT PERIL FROM THE CARLISTS! BRITISH NEUTRALITY— SEVENTH PAGE. FRANCE AND THE PRESS! AN TION FROM THE LEFT! DUEL—SgVENTH PaGE. TRE ENTENTE CORDIALE BETWEEN FRANCE AND ITALY—THE PRUSSIAN REICHSTAG CONVOKED—SEVENTH PaGB. ANOTHER TICHBORNE CASE COMPLICATION! AN M. P. CHARGED WITH CONTEMPT OF COURT! MR, GLADSTONE’S HEALTH— SEVENTH Pace. EUROPE’S GRAND MATRIMONIAL SENSATION! PERSONAL SKETCHES OF THE ROYAL BETHUTHED! THE PRINCELY SAILOR LOVER WOUNDED ONCE BY A FENIAN AND AGAIN BY CUPID—Tump Pacs, SARATOGA LAKE SELECTED FOK THE COL- LEGES’ REGATTA! ITS ADVANTAGES DIS- INTERPELLA- PROSPECTIVE | CUSSED IN THE ROWING CONVENTION— | SEVENTH PacE. THE SUPREME JUDICIAL SEAT FILLED AT LAST! THE PRESIDENT’S FOURTH CHOICE UNANIMOUSLY CONFIRMED IN SEORET SESSION—SEVENTH Pace. CONGRESSIONAL SOLONS SEARCHING FOR THE NEAREST WAY TO SPECIE PAYMENTS! INFLATION FIRST—TeNTH PaoR. A WAGES WAR IN THE COAL MINING DiIs- TRICTS OF PENNSYLVANIA! MASS MEET- ING AND INTENSE AGITATION! CAUSES OF THE DISPUTE—Sgvenra Pags. QUICK TRANSIT IN THE LEGISLATURE! PROB- ABLE SHORT SESSION—TurRD Pace. A POLITICAL “GOUD TIME” COME IN ST. DO. | MINGO — EX-PRESIDENT BAEZ UN THE WAY TO NEW YORK—S&VENTH Pace. HAYTI QUIETED! DOMINGUEZ FOR PRESIDENT! GENERAL LUPERON OFF TO EUROPE- THE HAVANA LABOR TROUBLES—Smvents | Paar. HERALD ENTERPRISE COMMENDED BY THE HAVANA PRESS! WHOLESALE COUNTER- FEITING STOPPED! HEAVY SPANISH LOSSES IN BATTLE—ELEVENTHE PAGE, INFLATION V8. RESUMPTION! THB COMBAT DEEPENS! A NORTH CAROLINA SEN+ . ATOR/S VIEWS! HEATED DEBATE ON CONGRESSIONAL AID 10 THE CENTEN- NIAL! OTHER POWERS TO JOLN IN—FouRTH Pace. Asanponzp—The proposed workingmen’s demonstration to-day. Although the artful and unscrupulous Communists are zealously at work to cajole and inveigle honest working- men into their mischievous schemes, the latter as o mass are too sensible to be seduced by their allurementa. | personal ‘The City Charities. Incendiary speeches are freely made at pub- lic gatherings in this city, where the unem- ployed poor are excited by the agitators of dangerous theories. Agitation of this sort is effective in proportion as the field is prepared for it by real aud widespread distress among the people, So long as the intelligent mo- chanics and industrious laborers of every sort in our midst have regular occupation and duly receive earnings that will support their families with more or less comfort they pay little attention to theorists and spouters, They have paid habitually far less attention to spouters than that class of creatures has re- ceived in other great cities. Workingmen’s clubs for the purpose of hearing a weekly dribble of incendiary balderdash such ag are common in all the great cities of France, and are well known in Ger- many, have never flourished here, though some of our imported jail birds brought the seed. Neither do the more practical discus- sions over beer and pipes that are common at many great industrial centres in England find this soil congenial, And the reasons are ob- vious. Our workingman has always a few superfluous coppers, and he buys a paper, He is well nigh the only daily laborer in the world to whom a few coppers every day do not make all the difference between bread and no bread. He buysa paper and reads it, and does not need to go to the gathering of the work- ingmen for the news, and does not care to go for anything else, as, thanks to his paper, he is generally sufficiently well informed to be intolerant of arrant nonsense, which is what the spouters usually deal in. So the club, if it is started, dies from want of attendance, and the workingman thrives in the cultivation of a contented mind and in- dustrious habits. But the loss of employment, the failure of the little stream of ready money that kept up the regular supply of the homely board around which the comely wife and bright-faced little ones gathered, may change all that. For the loss of the sense of his independence, the sentiment of wounded pride that goes with the conscious- ness of inability to perform the simplest human duty of getting bread for his little ones, the actual sight of the little ones in want or beg- ging, the feeling of hunger itself—all this shakes the most sturdy and upright spirit. Anéin the condition of mind that comes with such distress, in the loss of ‘morale that is the first result of misery, he is ready to | listen to any voice that pretends to point | a way out of his troubles. Then it is that the agitator becomes truly dangerous; for the workingman ig ready to believe then with any theorist who denounces the restraints that keep the baker’s window sacred from the hungry passer-by; he has returned for the time to the primitive condition and is disposed to recognize only force as a reason why he should respect the rights of those who have plenty when he has nothing. He is ready for | any wild theory or any wild act; for no event | can aggravate his condition. What are the provisions made in this city to meet such possibilities in the condition of the workingman as may throw him into the camp of the enemies of society? For with a | large number of unemployed workingmen in our midst, with the worst of the winter com- ing and with ‘citizen’ orators who urge that a great city may be fired with salutary results and that they are fools who are penniless in the midst of plun- der, it should be -publicly known what is the condition of the people with regard to public assistance and what are the exact re- sources of our charities and benevolent as- sociations and various organizations that gather money all the year round to dispense to the necessitous. Half the population of this city lives in rather less than one-third of the houses, and these are the so-called ‘‘tene- ments; but there is a considerable vagrant population without any domi- cile whatever. One hundred and forty thousand persons havingno homes were lodged in the station houses during the year 1873 ; twenty-two thousand persons were granted outdoor relief by the Board of Publie Chari- ties; our asylums, hospitals and prisons are regularly occupied by about eight thousand persons, and it is estimated that ten thousand children wander in the streets. But the return of persons relieved is a very inade- | quate indication of the number in want. It was late in the year before the financial trouble was seriously felt by the people here, and even when the pressure came it did not immediately throw the unemployed and their families upon public assistance. Many had little stores laid by and many were kept up awhile by rela- tives more fortunate than Thus the statistics of charity bestowed for 1873 represent perhaps not much more than the regular resident wretchedness. For the thirty thousand relieved in and out of the asylums it would be safe to count the number much nearer to a hundred thonsand, while of those who get food in one way or another during the day and appeal for lodging at the stations the number constantly exceeds very greatly the capacity of that branch of the pub- lic service. Our statistics given in an article in another column show thst two and a half million dol- lars were collected in the name of the poor in the past year by the various charitable societies of this city. We give a list of forty- two of these societies, with the sums set oppo- site the names of each that they had gathered trom the charitable public or had received by appropriations from the city or State, and we give an estimate for the sums of the large number of societies an account of whose | activities it was impossible to obtain. It will be seen that some of the greatest of our charities, like the endowed hospitals or hos- pitals supported by voluntary. contributions, are not in the list; but we have en- deavored to make it more complete in regard to those charities that aid the needy who are not sick. We have omitted also the greater number of such mutual aid societies as the Freemasons and Odd Fellows, whose resources are, perhaps, severely taxed at this moment. Not less than one hundred organizations, then, including the forty in our first list and the fifty-eight reported os having received appropriated money from the Board of Apportionment and Estimate, are engaged at this moment in gathering money from the public to be used in succor- ing the distressed poor of this city. In charity thus digpensed there is, | themselves. | } ensne, has generally been found to be the defect of this method of relieving the poor. Great abuses grow up. At the time of the breaking out of the French Revolution one-third of the wealth of France was held in endowments nominally made for charitable purposes, yet the people were in a state of indescribable misery, and the custodians of that enormous charity fund lived in pampered splendor. That is the extreme result of the system. In the case of our hundred city socie- ties we note only that the subtraction from the fand that must be made for keeping up a hundred different organizations, paying renta and salaries, would make » considerable reduction of the aggregate; but we believe that is the whole reduction. We have no doubt that the money collected is honestly and judiciously spent, and we have especial faith in those societies that are in the hands of women, for the pecu- lating instincts of the man of the period might not respect even the pittance of the poor; but we cannot believe that women would divert a cent of such money. It will be seen that the charitable ma- chinery in actual operation among us is ex- tensive and effective; for the collection and disbursement of two millions and a half of dollars in a year, only a few months of which involved extraordinary demands, indicates not only that the people give freely, but that they are urged actively. Every one of these societies, with such reasons for ita ap- peal as are now patent everywhere, can do twice as much ag it ever did before, and it ought to be understood by the managers that their organizations are now on trial before public opinion ; that this is the period for their most earnest activity ; that it is according to what they may do now that people will judge whether in giving to them one really helps the poor, or whether the organizations are, in fact, a means of robbing the poor by diverting to the support of useless societies with pretty names that which is intended to get bread for the hungry, Union of the Romeanoffs and Guelphs. Elsewhere we publish this morning a highly interesting sketch of the life and character of the Duke of Edinburgh and an account of the graces and accom- plishments of the Princess Maria Alexan- drovna, the favorite child of the Ozar of Rus- sia. The prospective union of these youthful representatives of the best imperial stock in Europe has elicited the kindly criticism of all nationalities, as caleylated to secure the happiness of the betrothed themselves and to establish a cordial feeling between two sover- eign houses who are struggling for empire in the Eastern world, Considered with reference to its political bearing we must be cautious in assuming that the grave question of the rival- ries of England and Russia will be forever settled by this marriage. The destinies of peoples and the fate of nations are no longer disposed of by a sentimental contract, however beautiful it may be as an illustration of personal sympathy and domestic happi- ness. All will remember that’ a marriage be- tween two Anglo-Saxon peoples professing the same religion and having many great aspira- tions in common—the union of the Crown Prince of Prussia with the eldest daughter of Queen Victoria—did not subsequently, during the German war, prevent a feeling of intense bitterness from becoming general in either country. We sincerely hope that the present alliance will not be barren of important. po- litical results, as we feel assured that it will be an auspicious event in the life of the lovely Princess who has consented to accept her sailor lover on other grounds than regal prestige. Marriages like this one are de sirable because they are conspicnous illustra- tions of the sanctity of an institution now assailed by sallow-faced charlatans who trade in ‘‘progressive ideas.’’ It proves that a deep vein of poetic feeling is not in- compatible with the loftiest station, and the fob of a Prince is not so miserable after all. The Duke of Edinburgh is of that profession having great fascinations for the susceptible and emotional woman. He was all but born on the sea, and his life from the earliest days has been spent in the rollicking career of 9 British naval officer, in which character he has neglected few of the precepts tanght by Marryatt, if he has sometimes indulged in those special amusements which make up the life ot the officer ashore. In order that the American public may be supplied with an account of the interesting ceremonies we have arranged to have a special account of the marriage ceremonies by cable from St. Peters- burg, written by the graphic pen of Mr. Edmund Yates, the distinguished English novelist. Tue Satrany Repzat Brix Is a Law or THE Lawn, huving been signed by the President yesterday. The President is not touched, be- cause constitutionally he could not be in his increased pay, which now makes his compen- sation fifty thousand o year; and for the same reason the increased pay to the Supreme Court judges is untouched; but the members of the Cabinet and of the two houses of Gon- gress and the clerks of Congress and of the Executive departments are put down to their pay as it was before the passage of the obnox- ious increased salary and back pay bill This is done to appease an outraged public opinion; but if the ‘back pay grab” was an outrage the repeal of the increased salaries is in many respects a contemptible act of atonement. A Cras my Tae Nuvery-Szconp Srager ‘Tunnet.—Our local news columns contain a report of what'might have been a fearful dis- aster in the Ninety-second street tunnel. It appears that as the twenty minutes past nine A. M. train yesterday from Morrisania passed into the tunnel it was signalled to stop, whichewas done as quickly as possible amid pitchy darkness. after coming to a dead halt the train again commenced moving slowly, when the New Haven express came along at full speed in its rear, the locomotive striking the end car of the Morrisania train and smashing it completely. Fortunately only two or three passengers were injured, one, we regret to say, quite severely; but it is almost a miracle that terrible loss of life did not It is evident that the arrangements to prevent accidents of this kind in this tunnel are not what they should be. Something more must be done, or we fear we shall be obliged to chronicle at no distant day @ fear- ful catastrophe in this dark ond dismal rail- road thoroughfare. City Poor and the Aigitators—| of course, some leakage. Indecd, that | Prestdent Grant's New ‘Departure « Jacksonian Policy—Its Goemeral Ac- ceptability.. General Grant gives notice to Congress and the country thas be will no longer use the strong arm of federal authority to promote a narrow and pernicious policy in the Southern States. If he persists in carrying out his new views, as we cannot doubt he will, the result will be to give him a high place in the list of Ameri- can Presidents, Few soldiers ever gained a more brilliant record for achievements in arms. General Grant has only to add to his military honors the glory of wise civil ad- ministration to retire from the Presidency with a fame equal to that of Washington, and this he can achieve by carrying out his deter- mination to do justice to the South and lop away the dead weight carried by the repub- lican party. In pursuing his expressed determination of letting the: States care for themselves Gen- eral Grant must expect opposition. The more radical part of the press has already begun to denounce even the refusal to do injustice to a sovereign State. In Congress, and especially in the Senate, opposition is slowly organizing for resistance. The refusal to confirm the nomination of Caleb Cushing to be Chief Justice was the first indication of a probable rupture between the leaders of the dominant party in the Senate and the President. But for the finding of the unfortunate letter of introduction to Jeff Davis the rup- ture might have occurred before now. The nomination of Waite instead, while it seems to indicate that the President is ready for any breach that may occur, will at least not have 8 tendency to heal the estrangement that has already taken place. Considered only on grounds of partisan acceptability Waite’s nomination is not acceptable, and his confir- mation even will not make perfect accord be- tween fhe Senate and the Executive. The re- fusal to confirm this latest nomination, on the other hand, would inevitably precipitate a quar- rel, As matters now stand a disagreement is possible atany rate. If it comes it will be anomalous in the history of American politica, for the better sense of the country will be with the President as against the general policy of his party, but against him on the immediate point of difference with the Senate. General Grant occupies the vantage ground bothin his reply to Governor Davis and in his dec- larations to the Congressmen last Friday, and no pretext that can be invented will deprive him of it. Since the war repeated attempts have been made to build up a party in opposition to the republican organization, but always without success, The reason of the failure is plain—the dead weight of democratic tradi- tion was carried into every contest, The dead weights of the republican party must, inevitably, become as fatal. Nearly fifteen years of uninterrupted success and power have left it many legacies of evil fortune, and of these none was more disastrous in itself or will prove more disastrous to the party than the reconstruction policy of Congress. Even after reconstruction was accomplished and the States restored to their original rights under the constitution Congress persisted in Tecognizing usurpations of authority as the governing power in a number of the Gulf States. Of this Louisiana is the most flagrant example. It is no wonder that the President's experience with Governor Kellogg has had the effect to sicken him and to induce him to deny the demands of Gov- ernor Davis, and give notice in advance that Mississippi need not expect any interference from him. It is a new departure, in every way worthy of the great soldier by whom it is made. It is Jacksonian in its scope, and will be Jacksonian in its influence upon political thought. The first attempt at nulli- fication and secession was destroyed by dJackson’s “By the Eternal, the Union must and shall be preserved!” The injustice which followed the failure of the second attempt in tying the States. to the wheels of arbitrary and usurped authority will find its deathblow in Grant's ‘I am tired of this nonsense.” And in other respects talents as strong as Jackson’s will be required in Grant. The inflationists are determined to set aside the policy suggested in the Presi- dent's Message and, if possible, to issue more paper money. Here is a battle for Grant, and it is to be hoped he will fight the new national banks with as much vigor as Jackson fought the old United States Bank nearly half a century ago. The people, as well as the President, are tired of the criminal nonsense which has been so long promoted by the republican majority. All respectable men, not blinded by partisan- ship, feel, with the President, that the recon- struction policy of Congress bas been a nurs- ing of monstrosities; at least minority of the majority in Congress is willing to acknowl- edge it Many excellent republicans are rejoiced at the signs of a rupture between the President and the Senate, in the hope that it may lead to the purification of politics, It is not easy to break up s powerful political organization, honored as the republican party has been honored; but these men hope that it may at least be purified. If disintegration should be the result it would be all the better for the country. Parties are not worthy of being preserved at the expense of the rights of the States and of the people; but whatever may be the result in the conflict that now seems to be impending the President is right in the stand he has taken, and if he main- tains it he will be supported by the people and add a crowning glory to his triumphs in the field by his triumph in civil administration. The Siamese Twins. If the composite Chang and Eng have been buried without a post-mortem examination it is to be regretted from various points of view. Physiological inquiry loses the solution of a problem that was, however, less important than queer, and general rational curiosity is left with a puzzle on its hands forever. Un- less laws and usages at Mount Airoy, N. C., are different from what they are in this part of the world, the burial without an autopsy was clearly illegal. Here, unless o physician can certify to the cause of death, the coroner must come in; and this seems so necessary provision for the safety of life in civilized communities that we can scarcely believe the Old North State to be quite without it, But how could any physician certify to the cause of Eng’s death? In the state of knowledge with regard to the physiological relations of the pair any medical opinion on the subject must have been @ vague guess rather than a iudg- ment on facts, Chang had been treated for some paralytic trouble, and no doubt & diagnosis more or leas clear had been made out in his case, and as the death was probably a consequence of the facts then ascertained the cause of his death could be known; but to say that Eng died of Chang’s paralysis would be flight of fancy, all the less excusable as a very little dissection would have demonstrated whether or no there was any nervous or arte- rial communication between the two. Per- haps the fact of the death of the second follow- ing 80 closely upon the death of the first is worth something ag an evidence that there was between them ® necessary relation of some great vital function; but the story as told seems to account otherwise for the fate of the second defunct. It looks as if Eng was fright- ened to death. Death from fright is of well Imown occurrence, and in no case could it be more likely than in this; for these two igno- rant persons of feeble intellect had always be- lieved that their lives were indissolubly asso- ciated, and neither could have readily com- prehended thatthe death of one might occur without the death of the other. It is to be re- gretted that their lives were passed far away from good medical thinking or surgical skill ; for if immediately upon the demise of Chang 8n operation had been performed to free Eng from his enforced association with the corpse and from the horrible idea that he was part of it, and he had then been properly encour- aged by minds more robust than his own, he might still have been alive, and the operation would have determined the nature of their physical relations. Only one condition could have made it impossible for Eng to survive, and that condition was proved not to exist by his surviving two hours. If there was only one heart befween them—that is to say if the heart that each had was incomplete and was supplemented in the performance of its func- tion by the incomplete heart of the other— then the division would necessarily have been fatal, and no other necessarily fatal condition seems likely to have been present ; but if the supposed condition had existed the time between the two deaths could never have gone into hours. It appears highly probable, therefore, that Eng’s death was simply due to fright and to living in a remote part of North Carolina. The Battle of the Resumptionists and Inflationists. Day after day the debate continues in the Senate on the resolution reported by the Com- mittee on Finance, which declares it to be the duty of Congress to adopt measures to redeem the legal tenders ando furnish a currency of uniform value, always redeemable in gold or its equivalent. In the House of Representa- tives also there is constant skirmishing on the financial and currency questions, and almost numberless resolutions submitted with regard to them, There has hardly ever been a greater diversity of opinion in Congress on any subject. Almost every member has a theory or scheme of his own. Yet there is a broad and well defined line on each side of which parties are arranged. One is for forc- ing a resamption of specie payments by any and all possible means, and the other, indiffer- ent to that, or believing it not practicable under existing circumstances, proposes to ad- just the currency to what are believed to be the exigencies of the country. The division to a great extent is sectional, the members from the West and the South being opposed to a contraction of the currency in order to force specie payments, and, in fact, are generally in favor of increasing the currency, while those from the East and North, for the most part, either urge contraction or some other measure for placing the country on ® specie basis, There are, however, excep- tions. Mr. Sherman, of Ohio, for example, isa hard money man, and is, perhaps, tho ablest opponent of the inflationists, In the debate yesterday a Southern Senator, top— Mr. Merrimon, of North Carolina—argued that it was idle and criminal for Congress to under- take to bring greenbacks up to the standard of gold, and that we must put ourselves on a level with the commercial nations of the earth, and to do this we must have a gold and silver currency. He advocated an immediate re- sumption of specie payments. But-Mr. Gor- don, of Georgia, who made an able-speech on Tuesday on the other side, and Mr. Brownlow, of Tennessee, the same day, are, no doubt, better representatives of the South on this qnestion. Then there are some members from the East and North against the resump- tionists and in favor of a moderate expansion of the currency. If we may judge from present indications there will certainly not be any contraction of the currency. Indeed, it is probable there will be an expansion to the extent, at least, of the legal tender reserve, The government, from necessity, has already circulated the greater part of that. The report comes from ‘Washington that the Committee of Ways and Means has agreed to report a bill authorizing the issue of the whole forty-four millions, and thus making the volume of legal tenders afloat four hundred millions.’ Supposing this to be the case and that Congress will pass the bill, it will remain to be seen if the Western and Southern members can be satisfied with such a limited expansion. The whole question is involved in much difficulty. Wehave opposed the issue of more currency to relieve the Treasury, just as we have an increase of tars- tion, and have demanded retrenchment to the full extent of meeting the present income of the government. If the country is to get back to specie payments expansion of the cur- rency, from whatever motive, would certainly place o barrier im the way. It would be on indefinite postpone- ment of specie payments. Contraction should be avoided on one hand, for that would disturb values and paralyze business, and expansion on the other, because that takes away the prospect of returning to a specie basis, Let the volume of currency remain as it is end the country would grow up—through the increase of population, wealth and trade— to a specie standard. Admitting that the West and South have not currency enough, and the South, perhaps, is worst off in that respect, a remedy might be found in a more equal distribution of the currency. The East and North have the largest and an unequal share in proportion to population and other conditions, ‘The national bank system is the greatest obstacle to a redistribution; for those who have the privileges and ptofita conferred by that gystem would ba maak unwilling to give them up, If we had a uniform legal tena der currency, and no other, and that limited beyond any chance of expansion, all parts of the country would share alike in it and we should approximate to specie payments grada- ally and as insensibly as the dew falls on the ground. The growth of the country and business would accomplish that, and no shock either of contraction or inflation would be experienced. - A Chief Justice at Last—Morrison Be Waite Confirmed. The President, with his third nomination for the office, has carried his Chief Justice through the Senate with flying colors, in the confirmation of Morrison R. Waite by that body. Had the nomination tor this, ‘the highest judicial office in the govern- ment,”’ been left to a republican or a demo- cratic caucus of the Senate Mr. Waite would not have been chosen, There has been nothing in his record as a partisan, nor in his comparatively quiet professional career, cal- calated to attrapt the attention of the lawyers or the politicians on either side of the Senate, They would have preferred, and doubtless expected, after the failure of Cushing, a Chief Justice from their own ranks, and if the name had been sent in of Conkling, Edmunds, Morton or Frelinghuysen there would have been, as in the case of Chase, a confirmation without a reference. Judge Waite was chosen by the President, as Williams was and as Cushing was, without seeking in advance the ‘‘advice” of the Senate. In other words, General Grant, in this unop- posed confirmation of his third nominee for Chief Justice, is still recognized by the Senate as master of the political field. The new Chief Justice may not possess the conspicuous party recommendations of Attorney General Williams, nor the comprehensive legal attain- ments and experience of Mr. Cushing; but it seems to be understood that as a politician he is sound upon the record of the thirteenth, fourteenth and fifteenth amendments of the constitution; that as a lawyer his qualifica- tions, from his education and his successful practice of many years, are satisfactory, while, in view of his high character as a citizen, he is eminently acceptable to all parties, If we have in Judge Waite a Chief Justice who enters upon the duties of this great office com- paratively unknown, he is still known suffi- ciently to justify the general impression that he will meet his high responsibilities to the satisfaction of the country. He has achieved success in life; let him now deserve it. Professer Proctor’s Lectures—Popular- izing Astronomy. The delicate and difficult. work of popular~ izing the science of the stars has never re- ceived so great an impulse as from the present lectures of the British astronomer in our midst. It is an exclamation of Carlyle’s, “Why did not somebody teach me the con- stellations and make me at home in the starry heavens, which I don’t half know to this day?” But the pathetic lament of a grave defect in his education could not have es- caped the great. literary critic had he sat under Mr. Proctor’s teaching, There is, per- haps, no greater need nor one more felt in science than to have its simple processes of research and its beautiful results laid bare to the world. One might suppose that next to the joy of discovery would be that of making known the secrets of nature and putting the solid knowledge of her mysterious machinery within the power of many minds. Last year the American public were honored with the lectures of Professor Tyndall, who gave them, in the lectare room, the very steps of investi- gation which had led him to some of the greatest scientific discoveries. Cicero's oft- quoted words, ‘‘He that knows how to find knowledge is next to him who possesses it,’ may well illustrate the value of such lecturers. Their permanent value is not only in impart- ing the results of research, but in teaching our young men and women to think and investi- gate for themselves. The office of the scien- entific lecturer and teacher is not to lord it over his hearers by the overshadowing prestige of his own learning and genius, but to lead the hearer, by experiment and successive rea- soning, to make the discovery for himself, as if no one had ever before made it. This Professor Tyndall has done and we are glad to say Professor Proctor is doing, and we may anticipate great good to the genoral cause of science from their popularizations. The special field of discussion taken up by Mr. Proctor is one that has occupied the human mind, some think unduly, but cer” tainly as much as any other branch of science, from the early days of Greek and Phonician navigation, when ‘on the sea the wakeful sailor to Orion’s star and Helice turned heed- ful.’? The task Mr. Proctor has ventured to take up is one of the most excessively delicate and difficult that he could have selected. It is comparatively easy for astronomers to teach each other; but to bring the celestial mech- anism within the mind’s eye of a popular audience, and necessarily with but little aid of apparatus, must tax the richest intellect and most fertile imagination. But the lecturer may take heart, tor he will find, as Professor Tyndall found, that his sudiences will gladly follow him, whatever demand he may have to make on their patience and toil. There are many intensely interesting phases in this work of popularizing the work of the observa- tory and the laboratory, some of which we shall shortly notice. Ssatcume a Fearrot Jor.—Miss Dyas, the actress, had her pocketbook snatched from her in the street by ® young man, who isa student of constitutional law, and who had just made an appointment to meet his brother at the rooms of the Young Men’s Christian Association—an appointment probably made in the consciousness that he needed a moral example. Ho had previously called at a doctor’s office and stolen o case of instru ments—a piece of horrible but common de pravity. He had endeavored to conspire with a bank messenger to rob the said messenger in the street, and he had stolen an overcoat and had escaped from Blackwell's Island by swimming to ‘Hunter's Point. He is now sentenced to State Prison for five years, and will have ample time to reflect on the great mistake he made in the selection of his last victim. LIBRARY TO BE OPENED ON SUNDAY. —e PHILADELPHIA, Jan. 21, 1874. At the annual meeting of the Franklin Institate, held to-day, it was decided by a vote that the library heréaftar aball ha open op 31