The New York Herald Newspaper, April 4, 1874, Page 6

S_—_—_—_—_— ra ‘NEW YORK HERALD BROADWAY AND ANN STREET. JAMES GORDON BENNETT, PROPRIETOR. ‘THE DAILY HERALD, published every day tn the year, Four cents per copy, Annual subscription Trice $12, All business or news letters and telegraphic despatches must be addressed New- York Hunaw. Rejected communications will not be re- ‘turned. KLONDON OFFICE OF THE NEW YORE HERALD—NO. 46 FLEET STREET. Subscriptions and Advertisements will be ‘ yeceived and forwarded on the same terms as in New York. --No. 94 ‘Volume EAE, \ANUSENENTS THIS AFTERNOON AND ) EVENING Met ouyMPic beer Pee b in Houston and Bleec! ia re yng) NOVELTY ENTERTAINMENT, at Proadway, Li ; Closes at 105 P. M. Mates at 2 P.M. wAUDEY @40P. M. ACADEMY OF MUSTO, Fonrteenth street aud I Opera Troupe—LOKEN( jcloses at 4:3) P.M ‘Campanini and Del Puen matinee, at 1 Isson, Miss Cary; pars ae BROOKLYN PARK THEATRE, posite pres, WrRANGE E. T. Stetson. Matinee at 2—-THE | BOWERY aretee SMowery.—THE POLISH JEW, and beta ts ENTER WAINMENT, Begins at8 P. MY : closes at ll METROPOLITAN THEATRE, No. adway.—VARIETY ENTERTAINMENT, at ao uses at 10:30 P.M. Matinee at 2 P. M. NIBLO'S GARDEN, PFroadway, between Prince and Houston streets. —DAVY CROCKEPT. ats P.M closes at 1020, MM. Frank Mayo. Matinee at 150 P. ra on- eur Bo, Begina at & P.M; el b Ste: ame Aimee. aatinee at 1:30 P. WOOD'S MUSEUM, Broadway, corner Thirtieth street —GITTLE RIFLE. BIZ MY closes at 4250, M. Game at P. M.; closes at 0 0 P.M DALY'S FIFTH AV ‘Twenty-eighth street and B: Mu; closes at 10:30 P.M. avenport, Mr. Fisher, Mr. THEATRE, way.—CHARITY, at 8 P. Ada Dyas, Miss Fann: . Matinee at 1:30 P. THEATRE COMIQUE, No, 514 Brosdway.—VARIETY ENTERTAT ¥. M.; closes at 10:30 P.M. Matinee at 1:3) P. GERMANIA THEATRE, Fourteenth street, near Irving place.—LOHENGELB, at AY. M.; closes at li P.M. BOOTH’S THEATRE, Fixth avenue and Twenty-third street.—ZIP at7 45 P. M.; Closes at W457. M. Lotta. Matinee at 1:30 P.M. st THE VETERAN, at 8 M., closes at 1 P. M gad Wallack, Miss ALL, ane and Thies jeflreys Lewis. Matinee at 1:3 MRS. CONWAY'S BROOKLYN THEATRE, Washington street, near Fulton street, Brookiyn.— | ANNE BLAKE, pnd POCAHONTAS, closes at 11 P.M. Mra F. B. Conway. M.—CHARITY. TONY PASTO PERA HOUS o. 201 Bowery. ror A AREREY. NTERTAINM. + closes at L M. Matinee at2 P. M. BRYANT’S OPERA HOUSE, ‘Twenty-third street, near Sixth avenue.—NEGRO MIN. TRELSY, dc.,atSP. M ;closes at lu P.M. Matinee at 2 Begins at 8 1 atinee at NT, at 8 P. ASSOCIATION HALL, Fourth avenue and Twenty-third sireet.—Charitable pogrialument—Readings by Miss F. COLOSSEUM, roadway. corner of Thirty-fitth OONLIGHT. at 1 P. ‘closes at Iv P. M. TRIPLE SHEET. street.—PARIS BY "see. York, Saturday, April 4, 1874. = From our reports this morning the proba S are that the weather to-day will be generally sloudy, with occasional light rain and snow. Napotzon II.—We print elsewhere a card | from the well known author, Blanchard Jerrold, who is now writing the life of Napoleon III., at the request of the imperial family. Mr. Jerrold desires information from those of our citizens who may have known the Emperor during his residence here, forty years ago. Tue Srrvuccre Berorz Bruzao has devel- oped nothing new, except that a radical revolt ‘has taken place in that town, and that the | ‘new crop of insurgents, under General Santes, are to march upon Madrid to cut Serrano’s | communications. We can scarcely regard ‘this as a very alarming development, for the Spaniards can carry on any number of civil wars at a time, and yet nobody ever seems to be very seriously injured. A Stax or Resetiion.—Mr. Henry Fawcett, one of the most eloquent and distinguished members of the late House of Commons, in a | recent speech made the following reference to | the proposal that Mr. Gladstone should retire | from the leadership of the liberal party :—‘<If | a liberal leader should ever be selected, not for his statesmanship, not for his political | capacity, but for his wealth and rank, then the liberal party would be righteously pun- ished if it had to beara more humiliating | defeat than it had suffered in the recent elec- tion.” The meaning of this is that Mr. Fawcett and those who act with him desire | some other leader when Mr, Gladstone retires than the Marquis of Hartington, whose prin- cipal qualifications are that he is the son of a duke and the heir of the ancient whig House of Devonshire. Waat Mopzrx Wan Costs.—A recent re- turn to Parliament gives us an idea of what the English will be called upon to pay for ronquering the King of the Ashantees and burning Coomassie. asked is $4,500,000. Of this $1,285,000 is | needed for the army, $1,805,000 for the navy, and $1,620,000 for contingencies. visions and forage, $500,000 was required, and $150,000 for clothing. Ashantce is a cheaper job than Abyssinia and seems to | have been a more brilliant exploit. iace.—Strakoseh Ttalian | 30 P 1 Brooklyn —THE ROBBDES, at 8 P. | H, Churehill, at 3 | M.; closes at5P.M. Same at7 P. | The whole amount | For pro- | — NEW YORK HERALD, SATURDAY, APRIL 4, 1874.-TRIPLE SHEET. The Report of the Commissioners of | deception are not practised in a financial | Speliation of the People by Act of | Congressional finance means the spoliation of Accounts—A Dangerous Precedent. We publish to-day what purports to bea statement in detail of the city and county debt on the Slst day ot December, 1873, made by the Commissioners of Accounts after an examination of the vouchers and accounts of the Comptroller and Chamberlain. This report has been in the possession of Mayor Havemeyer for more than a week, and it isa matter of notoriety that during that time it has been subjected to the examination and criticism of the very officers of whose accounts it isan investigation, and that the delay in its publication has been occasioned by the efforts of the Mayor to secure an alteration of the original figures. The report will show upon its face how far those efforts have been successful. The detailed statement of the debt made by the Commissioners in the report they placed in the hands of the Mayor showed the total amount of the city and county debt on the last day of December to have been $131,869,571, or $665,000 more than the total amount stated by the Mayor in his annual Message to the Common Council. The explanation of the difference is that warrants to the amount of $665,000 were drawn by the Comptroller, prior to. December 31, in payment of revenue bonds due in De- cember, which warrants were still ‘‘outstand- ing’ on the last day of the month. These warrants, the Comptroller claimed, should be deducted from the amount of the debt, while the Commissioners of Accounts contended that until the warrants were paid the bonds still outstanding were part of the city debt. The demands made upon the Commissioners of Accounts were three—first, that they should set forth on the face of their report that these warrants to the amount of $600,000 on city account and $65,000 on county account had been drawn and were outstanding on December 31, 1873; second, that they | should strike out of their list of outstanding | revenue and transfer funded debt, bonds $8,975,398 the amount to the | and, third, that they should deduct the $665,000 from the footings in the “recapitulation,” and thus make their total amount of outstanding debt appear to har- monize with the incorrect statement put forth by the Mayor in his last annual Message. The Commissioners refused to alter their revenue bond statement. They yielded to the demands of the Mayor on the other points, and thus altered and falsified their original report. While the mere statement that a certain num- | ber of warrants had been drawn but not paid | was harmless and unobjectionable, the deduc- | tion of the amount of these warrants from the total of the debt was a falsification by the Commissioners of their original figures and an indorsement by them of a wilful mis- representation. They know that the $665,000 represented by unpaid and undelivered warrants was a part of | the debt, and that it could not honestly be deducted from the amount of the debt as it existed on December 31. The facts are these: —Certain revenue bonds fell due in December last, which Mr. Green found himself unable to pay without incon- venience. Some of these were in the hands of banks which hold the city deposits. By an ar- rangement with Mr. Green they were ‘‘ex- tended’ to January and February to the amount of $665,000. The clerk in the Finance Department whose business it is to draw the warrants for bonds as they fall due drew | these warrants and marked them off as drawn on his books. But, in accordance with the arrangement made by the Comptroller, the warrants were laid aside and not delivered. In the meantime the bonds were held by their | owners until January and February; and, when they were paid, interest in full to the date of payment was paid also. No business man will for a moment pretend that these unpaid and interest-bearing bonds were not a part of the city debt on December 31, 1873. If the Comp- troller could strike them out of the debt simply because undelivered warrants were drawn against them, then, at any time a few days before his debt statements are made up, he can draw warrants for twenty million dollars’ worth of bonds, put them away in his safe, and diminish his debt statement by that amount. A merchant who owes ten thousand dollars would not pay the debt if he should draw a check for the amount and lock it up in his safe, Yet this is what Comptroller Green claims to do; and when the Commis- sioners of Accounts apparently sanction | such financial wisdom and honesty by deduct- ing the amount of these unpaid bonds from their debt statement they not only put them- | selves on a par with the Mayor and the Comp- | troller, but they commit an act of official dis- honesty. But we have evidence of a conclusive char- acter that Comptroller Green knows the im- | propriety of deducting this $665,000 from the December debt statement, and that his pub- lished exhibit was intentionally a deception. | His trial balance sheet for that month, which is the check upon all his books and accounts, was not made for the public eye; nevertheless, we have succeeded in obtaining a copy of that document, which is published elsewhere in to-day’s Henatp. From this trial balance sheet it appears that at the close of business debt by this amount of unpaid and unde- livered warrants, but, on the contrary, show the total debt to be nearly as originally stated by the Commissioners of Accounts— namely, $131,804,571. Yet, with this | balance sheet before him, with his ac- counts all made to harmonize with this statement, he put forth before the public, through an easily hoodwinked Executive, the A Question or Privinecr.—The Lord Chief | untruthful statement that the debt was only Justice of England addressed a letter to the | $131,204,571, Speaker of the House of Commons announce | ing the commitment of Mr. Whalley, one of | its members, for contempt. The matter came up in debate on a motion, made by Mr. Whal- ley himself, asking for a select committee to examine into the case and report upon it. So also of his false exhibit of revenue bonds outstanding on December 31. | In the Mayor's Message Mr. Green stated | the total amount of outstanding revenue bonds | to be $1,474,581, while from his own ‘‘trial | balance sheet’ he knew the amount to be $10,449,979. The consolidated stock which, ‘The result our readers know by cable; but the | very improperly we think, has been au- debate was interesting as showing the impor- | thorized to be created to raise the means of tance given by the House to any question | paying these revenue bonds—thus “paying as affecting in the slightest degree the indepen- | we go’ by funding bonds which ought dence of a member of Parliament, Mr. Dis-| to be met by taxation—was not issued raeli looked upon the question as one of the | until January. The $8,975,398 of revenue Gravest nature, and another membgz con- bonds, which, for some purpose to be here- tended that the power to commit . Whalley after tnvestlgated, Mr. Green chose to cover might become a source of tyranny unless | up and hide away in his published statement jealously scrutinized. So the committee was of January last, were in existence on Decem- ordered on the motion of the Prime Minister | ber 31 by his own showing, and it is not be- him self. | lieved that they are yet paid. Trickery and on December 31 the Comptroller's books and | accounts make no pretence to decrease the | | divide the Irish people. statement without an object. What object had Mayor Havemeyer and Comptroller Green in thus grossly misrepresenting the condition of these revenue bonds? The precedent set by Mr. Green in calling om and interest-bearing debt can- celled because he has drawn and locked up in his safe a warrant for the amount is, as we have said, a dangerous one. But it is not 50 dangerous as that with which we are supplied by the Commissioners of Accounts. These gentlemen have an important duty to per- form. They are required to examine at stated interva's the vouchers and accounts of the Comptroller and Chamberlain and to publish the result of their investigation in the official paper of the city, Instead of doing so they place their report in the hands of the Mayor, suffer it to be criticised and abused by the very officials of whose accounts it is an investigation, and after a week of contention allow themselves to be coerced into sacrificing their convictions and falsifying the result of their labors. The object of the creation of such a commission is obvious. It is designed as a check upon the financial officers of the city govetnment and as a safeguard against the dishonest practices of three or four years ago. But what is its value to the people when it subjects itself to the manipulations and browbeatings of the Mayor and his financial allies? The mistake of the charter is in placing the Commissioners of Accounts under the supreme control and power of the Mayor. They should be re- moved only as other heads of departments are removed, and then they might be expected not only to make honest reports, but to pub- lish them as required by law, without allow- ing them to be tampered with by unauthor- ized parties. The Irish Question. The gallant Irish brigade in the Houso of Commons made a demonstration of their forces at the very outset of the session. Mr. Butt, the famous barrister and the leader of the home rule party, moved an amendment to the address to the Queen expressive of the de- sire of the Irish people for self-government. The result was an interesting debate in a middling sized House and the defeat of the motion bya vote of 314 to 50. In other words, both parties in the House—that led by Mr. Gladstone as well as the party in power— united to deny the requests of the home rulers. The fifty represented, with perhaps one or two exceptions, the Irish membership of the House of Commons. This result is not surprising. The assault seems to have been hastily made, Mr. Butt, the mover of the resolution, declaring that his party did not resolve to press the amendment until the evening previous. To this Mr. Gladstone aptly replied that in a matter as important as “home rule” its friends should have considered the subject maturely before asking the opinion of the House of Commons. But the important point of the debate was made by Lord Robert Montagu when he ar- gued that Ireland was as much entitled to self-government as the colonies. Another member, the somewhat famous Major Nolan, showed that for the first time since the Union Irish counties had been able to send delegates who really represented Ireland. But even this debate illustrated the unfortunate spirit of disunion now pervading Ireland, for one of the most earnest opponents of the motion of Mr. Butt was a member from the Protestant province of Ulster. Mr. Gladstone took an early and prominent part in the debate, and seemed anxious to remind the Irish phalanx by his prompt opposition that to its members he owed the beginning of his fall from power. He contended that there was no Irish grievance that could be remedied by home rule. He reminded Irish members that they could only settle their grievances by attending in their places and supporting measures of ameliora- tion for the Irish people. The O’Donohue also assailed the motion as a stealthy pretence to The government, through the new Secretary for Ireland, taunted the home rulers with not knowing exactly what home rule meant, and said that if Irish members would bring in bills to improve the country the government would consider them. He dwelt upon the evidences of dissension among the Irish themselves, the pain- ful and deplorable spirit to which we have often alluded, and which has a rancorous life even here under the emblems of the orange and the green. Ho contended that the Irishmen of Ulster would oppose home rule with arms, and that the Irish peerage were in favor of the Union. In fact, there was only evil in the agitation, and Ireland could best be served by her members avoiding home rule and devoting themselves to ‘‘the prosperity of the country.” To all of these arguments the reply may be made that Ulster no more represents Ireland than New England the United States; that its inhabitants are descendants of aliens and oppressors, and that the free will of the people in Ireland should decide its destinies. This is the foundation of the whole Irish grievance, and we do not see that the govern- ment has made any response to it. The only response that can be made is force. Ireland | is held with the iron hand, as Germany holds In this | generation of blood and iron, when an English statesman’s highest ambition is to be a sub- servient imitator of Bismarck, we cannot expect much attention to any sentimental issues of nationality and self-government. Ireland will have justice when she can oom mand it, and not till then. | Alsace and as Russia holds Poland, ——— Mansa Burcuars’ Toors.—It is difficult | 9. Sgcide hich is the most remarkable—the | air of innocéHes oF the eeling of pride in his work which the man Stuener, arrested and locked up at Police Headquarters yesterday, evinced in his conversations with the de- tectives. He followed the business of manu- | facturing burglars’ tools, and it was by the use of his neat instruments that the recent escapes from Sing Sing were effected. “I makes dem for ail de poys,’” he said, and at the time of his arrest he had nearly completed a very large order for implements which would re- lease fifty prisoners ata time. It is a very re- markable story, and yet he was so unsuspect- ing that, though he was at Police Headquar- tera, he supposed he was at a hotel, and hay- ing, a8 he thought, completed his business, he declared his intention to ‘go pack home in my shop.” He may now wish for a few speci- mens of his handicraft to do for him what his | skeleton keys have done for others, Congress—Western Plans. Mr. Wilson, of Indiana, in his place in the House, on Friday, ‘‘warned New England that the South and West could control the govern- ment if they chose; but if they did,” he added, ‘‘it would be on the principles of jus- tice to all and equal rights and privileges to all.” This is nothing less than we should have anticipated from the superior virtue of the West. Mr. Wilson’s observation is sig- nificant. It indicates that the ordinary Con- gressional mind has aptly seized the political possibilities of the future as they have been made evident by the recent votes on financial points, and is prepared to accept the sectional relation of its district to other parts of the country. Already a Western advocate of free currency mills warns the people of the At- lantic slope that the West can outvote them if it will, and that, therefore, they might as well hold their peace in Congress, People on this side the mountains may say what they choose, if they choose to say what meets the wishes of the people on the other side, and their votes will be esteemed of value, too, in support of Western measures; but if they oppose what they deem unwise or shortsighted in Western propositions, ‘down with them at once,’’ says the West, ‘and let them know that we can do without them; and, in short, that we only tolerate them in a spirit of indulgence—only accept the fiction that their votes and voices are of any weight here in order not to make ourselves disagreeable.” Wonderful magna- nimity of the West! For Wilson, of Indiana, is of course a fair average. How near this Western tone on finance is in essential charac- ter to the bullyragging that was formerly heard in Congress when some member from the middle of South Carolina informed the world how easily his section could whip the North ! But then, also, it chivalrously refrained from doing it because it would not ruthlessly use its power; so now the West and South together can vote us all down, ‘if they choose; yet, even if they do, it will only be on the principle of ‘‘justice to all,’’ which we are exceedingly glad to hear, though we should like to know more exactly the Western notion of justice in finance. One of the cardinal points of the Western ‘gustice to all’’ is that everybody shall have plenty of money, to which the people can scarcely object. Western men propose two plans for securing this result, which plans, like the swan on still St. Mary’s Lake, ‘float double, swan and shadow.”’ One is the re- distribution of the currency in existence, so that those who have too much shall divide with those that have none—a policy which is not new, but has been urged in many coun- tries. It was tried by the famous Mr. Cade, sometimes familiarly called Jack Cade, who conducted a financial revolution mainly on this notion of the redistribution of the cur- rency. The other plan is to respect the dis- tribution as it stands, but to print enough currency to issue to the unsupplied districts, so that they will have a fair proportion by comparison with the districts already sup- plied. Although we call this another plan it is as we have intimated in the observa- tion that these plans float double— “another and the same.” It is toler- ably clear that if a law is proposed to take away from every man fifty cents of every dollar he possesses, and another is proposed to make every dollar in the people’s pockets worth only fifty cents, the result is pretty much the same to the people. Indeed, it would appear like a superfluous exercise of the intellect to pretend to distinguish or choose between these propositions. Yet these are the propositions of the Western men, who, if they are not admitted, intend, many thousands of them, asin the case of Trelaw- ney, to “now the reason why.” Redistribu- tion has always been more or less popular with the people, but it was never understood in this country that our government was or- ganized to carry it out. If Congress votes it our Police Commissioners will be under obliga- tion to apologize most humbly to the Commu- nists whom they caused to be clubbed in Tompkins square sometime since, because this is the middle point of the system of those politicians, Redistribution is all they ask for. They are poor and others are rich; this they regard as a hard- ship. So the Westand South are poor and New York and New England are rich, and that is a hardship of the same class. And as Congress is very likely to relieve one of these hardships, it is monstrous that people should have been clubbed for proposing to relieve the other. As Congress is so likely to admit this view of Western ‘justice to all and equal rights and privileges to all,’’ it would be o good notion if some exponent of the system in the House would tell the country how far down in the scale they propose to carry it. Up to the present time they have only pro- posed to apply it to banks; but if Congress has the authority to say that @ rich section of the country whose credit system is operated by a certain bank sball surrender half tho money it holds and only have half of what it has shown itself entitled to possess, and that this half shall go to a poor section which has not shown its right to possess any, then Con- gress may have the authority to apply the same principle to still smaller sections of the country—say farms—and to individual for., tunes, and, if it has, people would like todxnow it early, especially particular Hoos*ers, who want to pick out the men whop They will call upon to divide, Ppflation s Seems to us, considering the whole subject together, much thé simpler plan. It operates more easily and in ways less likely to offend prejudices in favor of a man’s right to earn all he can and keep what he earns. It robs people without their knowing it. Better still, it robs while seeming to enrich them. It makes ‘‘money’’ more plentiful, as they say. It makes it cheaper. Making money cheaper sounds well to the people, because they do not sufficiently reflect that when things are cheap it is just possible they may be poor. Cheap money means that you can get more of it for any given article than you could when money was not cheap. With a pale of boots that would only procure the maker ten dollars at one time, he may get fifteen if money gets good and cheap, and that may please him ; but the man who comes to buy, and finds that cheap money means dear boots and dear every- thing, will form new views. He will find that Congress has simply taken out of his money, by making it cheap, a certain portion of its power to purchase the commodities the people, Order in France. Marshal MacMahon, in o recent letter to the Duc de Broglie, alludes to the vote of the Assembly conferring power upon him for seven years, and adds, “My first duty is to look to the execution of this sovereign decision. Be not uneasy, therefore. During the seven years I shall be able to make the order of things legally respected by all.” This means that all the power of the French army, com- manded by the severe and earnest soldier now the President of France, will be devoted to the consolidation of the form of govern- ment called “the Septennate.” If Marshal MacMahon lives and holds his army well in hand we have no doubt he will redeem this assurance. With a government as strongly centralized as that of France it would be very difficult for any revolution to shake the hand that holds the sword. At the same time it shows the inborn love of order now underlying the French character, that the people should calmly submit to a power imposed upon them by on authority which does not represent the national will and has not been approved by suffrage. The most persistent enemy of the Septennate is the Napoleon party. Its leaders used MacMahon to overthrow Thiers. Now they look around for an ally to assist in over- throwing MacMahon. The recent demon- stration at Chiselhurst has been officially punished in the persons of the Bonapartists who visited the grave of the Emperor and at the same time held office. The Duke of Padoue has been removed from his office of Mayor. The prefects in Corsica have been punished also, and this we think with o cruel irony, for the Corsican who could dis- honor Napoleon would be an extraordinary Frenchman indeed. If Marshal MacMahon honestly governs the nation during his Septennate, and gives reasonable play to public opinion, we do not know but that it will be the best in the end for France and liberty. The republicans need a season of ripening. They have never really known the true responsibilities of government. It would be disastrous for them to return to power without having a party so trained that it would sustain a conservative administration and not crumble into chaotic fragments. When the Republic comes we want it to re- main—to have within it the true elements of strength and discipline. This would be in- finitely better than another Reign of Terror, like 1793, or a reign of dreams and folly, like 1848. Under the salutary discipline of Gam- betta, who is the first Frenchman since the elder Bonaparte who seems to have the gift of political sense and tact, the republican party has made more real progress than at any point of its history. And if Marshal Mac- Mahon “‘preserves order,’’ with a reasonable liberty of thought and action, the process of education may enable a genuine republic to sueceed this odd combination, which is neither one thing nor the other. Proposed Dog-Muzzling Ordinance. The paternal interest of our Aldermen in the well-being of the citizens is sometimes curiously illustrated. Sceptical persons are in the habit of proclaiming the care and thoughtfulness of the city fathers all moon- shine—an opinion that finds too ready echo among the unthinking and impressionable masses. It must be consoling to the public benefactor to remember that virtue is its own reward, and that, sooner or later, the virtuous, especially if they happen to be Aldermen, are sare to receive the reward of their good works. With a thoughtfulness beyond all praise one of the much abused class has inti- mated his intention to propose the arrest and detention of all dogs found wandering about the streets unmuzzled during the summer season. Alderman Morris proposes to insti- tute an order of dogcatchers, who shall be paid fifty cents a head for every unmuzzled animal conveyed to a central depot, which shall be presided over by the humane and enlight- ened Bergh, who shall tenderly care for his prisoners until they shall have been reclaimed by their owners. The object is not, however, so much to increase the comfort of the dogs as to guard against rabid demonstrations of the canine tribe during the dog days. Per- haps Mr. Bergh may look on the proposition as an interference with the liberty of the ani- mal and a deprivation of the sacred right to bite which nature conferred on the lower animals, We confess that this question has a serious side, as affecting the status of thedog tribe, and we would not be much surprised ‘if Mr. Bergh should appeal to Albany fora bill securing to the dumb animal the right to go unmuzzled during the sultry summer months. We admit that such action would be thoroughly consistent, but our sympathy is not very actively engaged in the interest of the dogs, and we shall be thankful to Alder- man Morris if he will secure the passage and enforcement of the muzzling ordinance. A Dovsrrut Rumor.—We reprint with fear and trembling this special telegram from the Pall Mall Gazette :— BERLIN, Saturday afternoon. The American government intends to appoint Dr. Thompson as Ambassador to Berlin In succession to Mr. Bancrolt, wi Wishes to be recalled. Dr. Thompson 18 im Supporter of Prince Bis- marck’s aed aa one of the speakers at the Protegtgpt Neat Sgpr" Hall, in London, =x We cannot imagine our govornment doing 80 grotesque a thing as to appoint a clergyman to a Court like that of Berlin. Have we not peculiar people enough at home without select- | ing a divine whose chief merit seems to be that he went to London to abuse the Pope and praise Prince Bismarck ? Tue Barworina For Unrrep Srares Szy- ator in the Massachusetts Legislature yester- day was of no greater significance than the voting which preceded it. So consistent have been the friends of all of the candidates that Mr. Whittier has never failed of his solitary vote any more than Dawes and Hoar and Curtis have failed in receiving their propor- tions of the ballots, We scarcely believe the old Quaker poet will be elected ; but as some- equally remarkable must happen before anybody can be chosen we may contemplate fora moment John G. Whittier in Charles Sumner's seat. His speeches would be all in verse—good, earnest, sweet and pensive rhymes of New England. The Cape Cod fish- ermen would get their poem, and his well known friendliness to woman suffrage and his wonderful appreciation of locality in his poetry might call from him a ballad on the famous cows of Glastenbury. But we do not [he must have, and he will discover that 4 believe the commercial and shipbuilding in- terests or the labor movement would bring from him anything better than ‘Skipper Ireson’s Ride’ and ‘Cobbler Keegar's Vision.” After all, it may be better to leave Mr. Whittier to the work he can do so grace- fully and send some politician to Washington. Misapprehension of Fimancial Facts. Some gentlemen in Congress seem to bo laboring under honest misapprehensions in regard to facts in financé—and one of these, apparently, is Mr. Harris of Virginia, who stated in the House yesterday that the present volume of currency gave to each person in this country but $16 72 per head, while in France and Germany the average of current money was $28 50 per person. His statement merely re-echoed the one made by Mr. Sherwood, of Ohio, on Tuesday, which presented the fact more fully in tabular form, and summed up its practical point in the phrase that ‘‘our cur- rency is, per capita, $8 less than England, $10 less than Germany, and $18 less than France."” Now, it is odd that it did not occur to these exhaustive financiers to inquire into the causes why our circulation is in its relation to the population so much nearer to the propor- tion observed in England than to that ob- served in France. Is it because England is poorer than France that the English people only have $8 per head more than our people, while the French have $18 a head more? As England’s capital for population is enor- mously greater than that of France, and as her financial operations, even for capital, are greatly in excess of those of France and are more rapidly and easily made, it follows that the proportion of currency for these countries does not represent their respective wealth or poverty, and does not even indicate the facility for financial operations. Proportions of currency, therefore, indi- dicate some other point than these, and that point is the difference in the systems of the several countries, which point well observed might have been instructive to both Mr. Sher- wood and Mr. Harris in just the contrary way to that in which they have applied it Differences in the proportion of currency to population simply indicate the degree in which the commercial systems of various countries have dispensed with the use of money—have availed themselves of modern financial contrivances to economize the hand- ling, carrying and counting of money. Handling, carrying and counting money, aside from the risks of loss and error in- volved, are and always have been among the heavier practical taxes on commerce, and banks were first instituted to overcome this embarrassment to trade; and since their in- troduction other great improvements havo been made, of which, perhaps, the greatest is the clearing house, which originated so late as 1780. It is a fact that in our legitimate financial operations we are fuller of the spirit of the age than any other people, and are in advance of the commercial nations in our application to financial problems of the devices for economizing the use of money. In France over the whole range of the rural districts the people want money down in gold or paper, and operations are primitive; in England checks and bills are used more, and here far more than in England, and that is the whole secret of our smaller proportion of currency to people. ‘Wagner at Home. Notwithstanding the sudden enthusiasm felt in New York over the music of Wagner the great composer does not seem to prosper at home. Heis building a theatre in Bayreuth, in order that his operas may be ‘properly in- terpreted.”’ But the theatre does not progress, and a recent appeal for funds to complete it seems to have produced but little. The total amount subscribed, including the profits of Herr Wagner's concerts in North Germany, is about seventy-five thousand dollars, and nearly the whole of this sum has already been ex- pended in constructing the outer shell of the building. The few workmen who still remain are employed in removing the scaffolding, but nothing more can be done for want of funds. It is estimated that a further sum of one hun- dred and fifty thousand dollars will be re- quired for the construction of the stage, the purchase of scenery and the engagement of painters and musicians. As there does not seem to be any prospect of obtaining this amount by subscription, it is proposed to apply to the ‘‘crowned heads’’ of Germany for their combined assistance in behalf of the un- dertaking. It might be well for the lovers of Wagner, who crowded the Academy during the “Lohengrin” nights, to show their admiration for the master by a contribution to his darling enterprise in Bayreuth. Why Prince Napoleon Stayed Away. A good deal of curiosity has been exhibited to know the real reason which prompted Prince Jerome Napoleon to absent himself from the Chiselhurst assembly, and consequently to quarrel with the Prince Imperial and the Empress. An official explanation appears in a London journal, saying that ‘the Prince adheres thoroughly to the democratic and anti-clerical policy he has always advocated, and is utterly opposed to the present counsel- lors of Prince Louis. The Prince Napoleon | regards the course they are pursuing as im- hich was lately held ju St. | politic i a elf "4 likely to be attended with aisnstrat “Franee. The he men, who now advise the hak Louis are, fn his opinion, those who ruined France under the Empire, and who now malign Prince Napoleon while giving bad counsels to the son of Napo- leon IIL” This is an eloquent and a virtuous | reason, and, we presume, with the ingenious Prince one reason isas good as another. He has never been @ tractable Bonaparte. With royal blood in his veins and a daughter of a royal house for his wife, he has never en- thusiastically welcomed as allies the crowd of princes who bear the Napoleon name—the Cassagnacs, the Spaniards and the clergymen. His defection will not hurt the party he abandons nor aid any new party that may receive him. , Tue Bos Vest Nuisanczu.—We are glad to see that the Superintendent of Markets is taking active measures to suppress the vile traffic in impure meat which is carried on by unscrupulous parties in this city. Yesterday some arrests were made, which will, no doubt, have a good effect. However, spas- modio efforts at repression will not put down the dangerous and dishonest practice of bringing diseased and impure meat into the market. What is needed is a constant and close supervision, which ought to be casily che) ciel ail