The New York Herald Newspaper, September 15, 1874, Page 6

6 NEW YORK HERALD, TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER WW. _1874.—TRIPLE SHEET, NEW YORK HERALD BROADWAY AND ANN STREET. JAMES GORDON BENNETT, PROPRIETOR THE DAILY HERALD, published every day in the year. Four cents per copy. An- nual subscription price $12, All business or news letters and telegraphic despatches must be addressed New Yore Herarp. Rejected communications will not be re- turned. Letters ard packages should be properly | sealed. t The Gathering of the Clans. The State rings with the busy note of proparation for the battle at Syracuse. All the tokens are of angry, decisive, eager war. From the regions of the St. Lawrence and our inhospitable northern forests, from the borders of the majestic lake, from the roar of Niagara and the historic banks of the Hud- son, from the teeming metropolis, haddled far off on these sea-washed islands, the chiefs of the democracy are hurry- ing with their clans, Our reports tell what warriors are already in lineand who else are expected. The new young men, the “bucks’’ of the tribe, will see who are the leaders and what the battle-words will be. The old boys, the veterans, who sit apart and suu themselves like the Invalides on the boule- vards, will have their own communings and LONDON OFFICE OF THE NEW YORK | HERALD—NO, 46 FLEET STREET. Subscriptions and Advertisements will be | controlled sorrows, perbaps, and mourn over the time when an Albany Regency in its wisdom affairs, when bluff Dean | Richmond carried conventions in his hat, received and forwarded on the same terms | as in New York. Volume XXXxIx AMUSEMENTS TO-NIGHT. OLYMPIC THEATRE, No. 62% Broadway.—VARIETY, at 8 P. M.; closes at L045 eM. eIFTH AV! IBATRE, THE SCHOOL FUR SCANDAL, at SP. ML; closes at 11 POM. Miss Fanny /uvenport, Miss Sara Jewett, Lewis James, Charles Fisher. LYCEUM THEATRE, Fourteenth street, and Sixth avenue LA PRINCESSE DE TREBIZOS DE. at 8 P Aimee, Mile. siuneily. THEAT, OMIQUE, Ho, si Broadway.—VASIETY, at SP. M.; closes at 10:3 BOOTH’S THEATRE, sthird street and’ Sixth avenu . at 5 lowes at 10-3) P.M. rough. NIBLO’S GARDEN, Broadway, between Prince and lodston streets.—TAE DELUGE, at 8 P. m.; closes at Ir. M. The Kiraity Family. ROBIN: ON HALL, Sixteenth patos? ba between Brosdway and Pifth avenue.— VARIETY, BRYANT’S OPERA HOUSE, West Twenty-third street, near Sixth avenue.—NEGRO MINSTRELOY, at3 P.M.” Dan Bryant GLOBE THEATR Es 728 Broadway.: oye at Se M.; closes at 10 SAN FRANCISCO MINSTRELS, ay, corner oe wenty-uinth stree.—NEGRO RSLs y acs P, , METROPOLITAN THEATRE, No. 585 Broadway.—Parisian Cancan dancers, at3 P. M. CENTRAL PARK GAR’ Fifty-ninth street and Seventh aven| CERT, at 8 P.M. ; closes at 10-0 P.M. IN, THOMAS? CON- AMERICAN INSTITUTE, Third avenue, between sixty-third ad Sixty-fourth streets, INDUSTRIAL EXHIBITION, BAILEY’s CIRCUS, foot of Houston street, Eugt River, at 1 P. M. and 8 P.M. TONY PASTO. DPE Ra HOUSE, No. 201 Bowery.—VAKIETY, at 8 P COLOSSEUM, Broadway, corner of ‘hirty-fitth street—PARIS BY NIGHT, af 7:45 P. M. ALLACK’S THEATRE, th street,—OUR CLERKS, ICT S. and OFF TH LING, at 8 P J. L. Hoole, wooo's Broadway, corner thirtieth a2 P.M." UNDER TE at 10:30 P.M. M, Us Louis Aldri Tanger York, Tu day, Sept. 1b 1874. From our reports this mornng the rebebtites are thai ihe weather to-day will be partly doudy. Watt Srrrer Yxsrerpax.—Stocks were active, and showed generally a sharp advance. Gold was steady—109§ a 109}. Tue Srovx have been making raids in Mon- tana, and, though an organized attack is not expected, more troops are needed for the pro- tection of the settlers. Tue Trrat of the French officers accused of aiding the escape of Marshal Bazaine began yesterday at Grasse, but nothing but contra- dictions seems to have been elicited from the witnesses. Tax Retvurss From Marve are not very sig- nificant, but so far as they go they are auspicious for the democracy. The total vote is about 100,000, nearly 20,000 more than the vote of last Ma. Samver Witkesoy addresses us a letter, which we print to-day, contradicting a state- ment of Mr. Moulton’s, and pungently criti- cising that gentleman as he appears as a co- trustee of Mr. Beecher’s honor. On Anoruzr Pace we furnish the text of Governor Dix’s decision in the case of Mayor Havemeyer. As it was announced in the Heznraxp of Sunday, he censures the Mayor for his course, but does not remove him. Tae Annexation of territory against the will of its inhabitawts invariably ends in | trouble to the comqueror. This is now the case with Germany. The expt subjects trom Schleswig is resented by the Copenhagen government, which proposes to retaliate by the expulsion ot Germans from Denmark. ‘Tue Presrent, we learn from Washington, has announced to a committes of Southern men that he should have certainly vetoed the Civil Rights bill had it been passed by Congress at the last session. But, as usnal with our prudent Executive, he refused to say what he would do if it should be passed again. RE Tae Exxcrion in the Department Maine-et-Loire has resulted in for the French Assembly. The republicans polled forty-five thousand votes for their can- didate, nearly double that of the Bonapartists. The candidate of the party in favor of the Septennate received twenty-six thousand of no choice loses at 0:30 P.M. Mlle. | LADY, or. LYONS, | when the diamond chiefs of Tammany went blazing and rushing through the State with | lightning speed, like bandit chiefs rich in the | trophies of the road, only too anxious to dazzle «No. 255 | the rural mind with their ill-gotten, unwhole- some and evanescent splendor. The democracy have indeed fallen upon new men and new lines. We have no doubt when these leaders come together there will be remembrances of chastening and saf- fering. What sad days have passed since those tremendous times when the all-engulfing war swallowed the whole democratic party, including the accomplished editor of the World, the grave and sedate editor of the Express, the military prestige of McClel- lan, the memories of Jefferson and the Resolutions of 1798. It was an earthquake time, to be sure, and as the chiefs fold their blankets about them and draw to close communings around the council fires they can say truly that when the earthquake comes no |zone can tell who will be on the summit and who in the valley. If the uses of ad- versity are sweet and fruitful then the leaders of the democracy will assemble at their con- vention full of wisdom and kindness. They will know the virtue of concession; that self- denial is generally the overture to vic- tory, that success arises from the ashes of ambition. hey will learn that there can be no triumph of the democracy that is limited to any party or party fragment or that surrenders the hopes of national suc- cess to the puny hopes of a man or a faction. They will see that the skies are reddening with the hues of triumph—that trom the South and the West, and even from New England and Pennsylvania, brethren speak of victory. They may fairly reason that victory in New York in this coming campaign will mean victory in the Union at the next Presidential election and the possession of power for a generation. All this is plain. The democrats have vie- toryjwithin their reach ; but can they grasp it? They have against them the sternly disciplined republican party led by the youthful and fiery Roscoe Conkling. Its chief is John A. Dix, upon whom has fallen the singular felicity of wearing in his old age the ripened and still | ripening honors of a noble life, the confidence Vasa love of a people. Wellington said of Napoleon that his personal presence at Waterloo at the bead of the French army was worth dorty thousand men The presence of Dix in the republican party is in itself a large reinforcement. How, then, is this organization to be overthrown? Certainly by wisdom, caution, self-denial, courage—by bending all hopes and aims to the supreme purpose of victory. Let the one man be chosen as a candidate for the Governorship who will command the entire party strength and cowmend himself to fair men of the republican parity who are impatient with its shortcomings and only too anzious to aban- don it, a man who will carry the party and not compel it to carry him. Let there be a platform representing the ideas of the hour, the wants of the people, the lessons bequeathed by the war, the necessity for solvency in finance, freedom in trade, peace and recon- struction, the assembling of a national con- vention to decide upon the burning questions that now threaten the permanency of our repub- lican institutions. Let there be no shirking of issues, no subordinating the victory to any personal ambition. Above all things let the people sce by the tenor of the proceedings, the spirit of the platform and the character of idates put in nomination that the democrats have repented of their apathy when treason threatened the State and of their worse than apathy when Tammany threw New York into a ditch and plundered her like a highwayman. It would seem that this spirit animates the clans. It was shown in the effort to nomi- nate Judge Church. But that coy statesman toyed with his opportunity, and, forgetting that faint heart never won the Presidency, threw away the ultimate diadem. The har- mony which pervades the clans is broken by the one discordant voice from New York, the voice of the leader of the Emerald Ring. Mr. Kelly, with all the zeal of a novice and the heedlessness which the proverb expresses when it indicates the manner of the horseman who rides his steed to death, goes clamoring to the Convention with his gang of howling warriors demanding the nomination of ‘votes, which was a decisive defeat for the | present policy otf Marshal MacMahon. The new election is appointed for the 27th inst. ‘Tre Ricnmonp ‘ ‘Evquinee,” in comment- ing upon the views expressed to the Hzrarp by R. M. T. Hunter on the proposed conven- tion for peace and reconstruction, differs from that gentleman, and says :—<«“It is high time that the Heratp and its readers had learned | | | | the leaders will sincerely seek him, merchant, no representative of the wealth and | that all the currents of popular thought in the | Sonth have changed since the old pilots run ms upon the shoals and wrecked us in 1861.” | If by this is meant that the Southern people have repeated of the deeds that led to ge- cession and of their devotion to the blind Jeaders who took them there, then it is wise, But are the new pilots any better than the old Mr. Tilden. Answer is made that Mr. Tilden | is not an available candidate; that he has no control over the people, no sympathy with them; that his merits are what we admire in a man, but fear in a candidate; that he is asilent, | irresolute, distant, lonely man, given to rail- road law the Hatiet of the democracy, r a democratic administration, would | times might do time like We now need a bat in a 2 fragments. nor, would break man of granite. of porcelain. A man of granite can certainly be found it) Is there no enterprise of the mighty State, no such man as the republicans found in Edwin D, Mor- gan, around whom the impatient hosts of the democracy can rally? We undersiand the necessities of Mr. Kelly. Like the Irish peasant in one of Thackeray's sketches, who | insisted that the Hill of Howth was the highest mountain in all Ireland, be- cause it was the only one he had ever ones, and could there be any shoals more | dangerous than those of St. Domingo, war of | Faces and ranudiatian? ) seen, Mx, Kelly believes that Tammany is | the important elament in the demooratia and metaphysics, a philosophical | @ man | admirable attorney general or min- | this | Mr. Tilden offers us a man | party. ‘This idea possesses him. Ho distus it into the minds of his followers, of rising politicians, of the eager newspaper reporters, who lmow Keily as the bees know honey- flowers, and with whom he keeps in the con- dition of ‘perpetual interviewing.”’ So that Tammany, besmirched by Tweedism, may re- ceive a certificate of good character, let all be sacrificed! Let Mr. Tilden be brought down to Tammany as her own special candidate, demonstrating that Kelly has power beyond New York, and no matter what may come, So fixed has been this babbling Tammany chief in his pur- pose that when Judge Church, the universally conceded leader of the democracy, consented to throw away his splendid office and lead the party to assured victory, the Emerald Ring drove him from his purpose by clinging to Mr. Tilden and threatening war at Syracuse. Judge Church could not descend from the Bench to scramble with John Kelly anda crowd of Tammany followers for any nomina- tion, and he withdrew. Mr. Tilden remains, and a day or two will determine whether he has sagacity enough not to buckle himself to the democratic party, like a ball and chain, or whether tho party has courage enough to resist the proceeding. The Attempted Assassination of the Peruvian President. Assassination never pays; while it kills the man it often gives the principle he represents new life. The murder of Gwsar established the Roman Empire, and to the South no greater calamity could have happened than the death of Lincoln, But it is difficult to convince ignorant and excited men of this truth, and the latest example of such crime comes from Peru. Our Lima correspondence gives the details of the recent attempt to take the life of Mr. Pardo, the President of the Republic, as he was passing in broad daylight through the public streets, The assassins numbered about thirty men, who were so placed that it is wonderful how he escaped. One of them fired a pistol at him froma distance of four or five fect, and the others discharged their weapons from a short distance. ‘The affair ended quickly; the leader of the villains was arrested, with some of his companions, and a priest named Macia has been im- prisoned on suspicion of being the author of the conspiracy. Peru is said to havo a charming climate, but we should think it to be too hot for most people. Some of the citizens of Lima cer- tainly make it rather hot for the President. But the coolness he displayed is greatly to his credit, Although warned of the attempt to kill him he calmly, and without a guard, ap- proached his enemies, and after their fruit- less atiack received the congratulations of the people It was clearly no pretended assault made for the purpose of political effect, and the result has been to strengthen the party which Mr. Pardo repre- sents, His friends were, of course, enthusi- astic, and his opponents were obliged to join in the rejoicings. The leader of the opposi- tion was one of the first to offer him congrat- ulations on his escape, and the consequences in the Congress were still more agreeable. In shooting galleries, when the ball hits the bull's eye, the target frequently divides and unfolds a smiling face. The assassin, in this case, missed the President, but ‘‘rang the bell’ of Congress, which instantly answered by “the rojection of a proposed Dill to pardon all political offenders.” Tho opposition, no doubt, beheld this apparition with astonish- ment, and it is to be hoped that they will learn in Peru the lesson of history, that those who would kill others for political purposes, whether they succeed or fail, generally commit suicide themselves. Practical Views of the Convention. The delegates to the Couvention will reach Syracuse in the course of the day and evening. This assembly bids fair to be the most ex- citing one held by the State democracy in some years. So strong is the antagonism to Mr. Tilden in many parts of the State, and so deeply have personal resentments been stirred by indiscreet and passionate utterances and the bandying of accusations between Mr. 'Til- den’s supporters aud his opponents, that the sessions of the Convention are moro likely to extend through two days than to be completed in one. The caucusing will be active and strenuous during this evening and all the early part of to-morrow, the friends of cach candi- daie wishing to ascertain at the earliest moment what delegates are prepared to stand firmly by bim in the inevitable contest. When the trustworthy forces on each side have been mustered and enrolled every art of persuasion will be resorted to to enlist the unpledged or uncommitted dele- gates. This outsile struggle will probably be prolonged until long after the organization of the Convention, rec giving the committees time to complete their work, being taken with a view to concentrate @ majority on one of the candidates and pre- vent the weakening effect of an angry tussle in the assembled Convention. It, however, it should appear at an early stage that Mr. Tilden has less strength than his friends have claimed for him the contest may be shortened by his withdrawal. It is already apparent that he has made an ex- aggerated estimate of the number of bis sup- porters. It has been boastfully asserted that all the delegates, not only of this city, bat of | Kings county, the river counties and the county of Oaeida, were certain for Tilden. ‘The city delegates are undoubtedly his, being elected by Tammany influence. But in claim- ing those of Brooklyn he has reckoned with- out his host. The Brooklyn gle, the in- fluential organ of the Kings county democ- racy, which seldom fails to reflect their views, makes an urgent appoal to Mr. Tilden to withdraw in favor of Judge Uburch. Mr. Tilden could not be told in more cour. teous language that in the estimation of the Kings county democracy his room is proferred to his company in the gubernatorial contest, There i the populous county of Westchester. A Church delegation was elosen at White Plains | on Saturday. Even in Oneida, where Gov- ernor Seymour and Francis Kernan favor ‘Tilden and the Utica Observer has advocated 28, under pretence of , also a decided opposition to him in | his claims with great zeal, his friends have | | been rowing against the stream, and the dele- ; gates from the First Assembly district are reported as anti-Tilden, In Syracuse, where the Convention mocts, the democratic organ | them to pray for all. test, because the outside local pressure has considerable influence in a divided conven- tion. If, after counting heads on the arrival of the delegates, it is found that Tilden has less than a majority to begin with, his strength is not likely to increase in the political atmosphere of Syracuse. According to present appearances 9 majority of the dolegates will be Church men or un- committed, and if Tilden does not start with & majority he will have a hard road to travel. The delegates being three times as numerous as herotofore, with a new sprinkling of liberal republicans, it will take more time to collect tho sense of the Convention in advance of its organization. Revolution in Louisiana. As we go to press we learn that the troubles in Louisiana have at last broken out in actual revolution. The two Goy- ernors, which are luxuries to which Louis- jiania has as much right as Arkansas, have come into direct conflict, and Lieutenant Governor D. B. Penn, in the absence of Governor McEnery, has issued his proclama- tion to the people, declaring that he has taken charge of the State. His address recounts the evils which Governor Kellogg's rule has inflicted, the plundering of the people, the corruption of the judiciary, tho de- of the right of snftrage, calls upon them to .sustain him in this bold effort to regain their liberty. He has gone sti!l further and appointed a pro- visional gencral of the militia, calling out all able-bodied men, and directing them to be armed and to be held in readiness to act. At @ mass meeting held in New Orleans a com- mittee was appointed, which waited upon Governor Keilogg, with instructions to de- mand his abdication, a request which he re- fused to consider, on the ground that armed bodies of men were collected in the adjacent and that’ ho would not yield to menace, From Washington we learn that Governor Kellogg has called upon the President to sustain him by the United States troops. Thus we have war threatened again in the South, and far more dangerous war in Louisiana than even the recent contest in Arkansas. Six men have already been killed in the streets of New Orleans and many wounded. If this is the beginning of strife, what may not be expected as the passions of radicals and conservatives, whites and blacks, become excited by the shedding of blood and the struggle for power ? The results of this conflict it is as yet too early to predict, and the reports may be exaggerated, but it seems to be the most important, the most alarming, that has occurred in the South for years. struction and streets, The Prayer for Rain, The prayer gauge which Professor Tyndall | proposed should be used in the London hos- pitals to test the efficacy of prayer as an as- sistance to medicine was never used, nor should it have been. Religion and science should not be forced into a prize ring to fight out the question of superiority. It is proba- ble that Professor Tyndall would have had the best of the contest, for prayer has never been known in our time to set a broken leg nor to do a cracked head as much good as a poor man’s plaster. But that claim for it is not made by religious people, who do not expect miracles, and do not desire a surgeon to pray for a fractured limb when he ought to put it in a splint. Tho strange sect in London known as the Peculiar People is an exception to this rule. Its mem- bers depend wholly upon prayer for the healing of their sick, and the death of a child thus treated recently caused the arrest of the father for manslaughter. Ho was properly acquitted, for there is no law to compel sick people to take medicine, and, with the exception of a physician’s services, the child had proper at- tention. The extreme drought which has for many weeks prevailed in the Middle States, wither- ing the foliage, consuming the pasturage, dry- ing up the brooks, filling the air with dust and inflicting suffering upon man and beast, is no doubt caused by a law of nuture, The winds and the tides and the clouds are not directed by chance, but like all other phenomena are governed by laws, go that, indeed, as the knowledge of meteorology increases, the state of the weather can be predicted from day to day. Yet while this is known the intenso suffering and mortality caused by extreme heat are as hard to bear ag in the days when such calamities were looked upon asthe punishments of mankind. In Phila- delphia, os our despatches show, the drought is not only the cause of discomfort, but an injury to business. The surrounding country is burnt by the fires of heaven. New York along the Hudson River is like a desert on the line of the Equator, and New Jersey is scorched with conflagrations and the air heavy with clouds of dust. Is it strange that under such circumstances the people of Philadelphia should have offered up in all their churches last Sunday—Roman Catholic, Episcopal, Lutheran, Methodist, Baptist—one earnest prayer for the cooling and refreshing rain? We think not, nor should such pleading be ridiculed by those who believe it to be una- vailing. For if men pray for one thing it is right for Prayer is the natural outpouring of the human soul to the power to which it humbly submits. Prayer permeates all our lives and thoughts, from the formal intercession of the priest to the simple “God bless you’’ of the parting friends. It is an instinct which science cannot destroy. all that science can do for the suffering sick we implore relief from sources which | science cannot reach. It may not be logical, | but it is necessary, for our very wishes are prayers, and we cannot say that it is useless, ‘Those who have faith in a Power which « for the happiness of human beings will not presume to ask Him to alter the laws by which the universe is governed, but they are not for. bidden to ask that He will supply their wants. ‘The greatest of all prayers was not made only and the democratic sentiment are earnestly for spiritual strength and salvation, but for so | against him—a disadvantave in snch a con- { formmon a thing as “our daily bread." and After | that example is justification enongh for the simplest supplication. To pray for the highest and the lowest is equally philosophical and equally religious, and though the rain may not fall at the bidding of the churches there will come to those who have sincerely prayed that ‘gentle dew from heaven” which always rewards gratitude for blessings of the past and faith in protection for the future. end Reeonstruction—A Voice from Washington. We print this morning o statesmanlike article from the Washington National Republi- can, @ newspaper holding delicate and official relations with the administration. ‘The value of this article is twofold. It presents with consummate ability the republican side of the question, ‘‘How to solve the problem of recon- struction.” It gives us an idea of the attitude of the President on the subject. If correctly represented he is in this respect far wiser than his party, for, while some of the kettle- drum newspapers—whose duty is to bang away at the old tunes until they have new music, and timo to learn it—bave been disposed to ridicule the HenaLp argn- ment as a “sensation,” a covert “plea for dis- union,” or an assault upon the republican parly ‘tin the interest of the democracy,’’ the President sees beyond this the presence of a vast and living idea, and he proposes to accept and study it. On many occasions General Grant has shown himself rich in saving common sense. And if wo are perfectly informed as to the meaning of this voice from Washington he is disposed to show as much wisdom and courage in dealing with the South as he showed when, in spite of the furious protests of alarge body of his followers, he defeated inflation and put himself on record in tavor of national honesty and solvency. The writer of this article arrives at the Heraxp's conclusion by new ground. He criti- cises our position as “an attack on the republi- can party,"’ and at the same time thinks we sup- press the argument which we ‘‘do not attempi to answer,” ‘‘that the South is responsible for the ills under which she is suffering, not be- cause we of the North had made the mistake of treating slavery as a crime instead of an in- stitution, but because the Southern states- men, the leaders of her opinion, her journal- ists and her politicians, have been and are to- day making the mistake of treating treedom as 8 crime instead of an institution." We did not fail to note this presentation of the case, but we regarded it as an antithesis rather than as a serious, coldargument. While tue Southern leaders brought on the war, as the means of founding a government, whose corner stone would be slavery, we cannot forget that before, the war, from the time of Jefferson, almost without an interruption, to the time of Lincoln, the Southern men governed the country. John Quincy Adams was an anti- slavery man, but as President he was acqui- escent in slavery. Martin Van Buren be- lieved in free suil, but never expressed that belief until he had retired from the Presi- dency. Other Northern Presidents—Harri- son, Pierce, Fillmore, Buchanan—gave way at once before the will of the South, and became partisans of slavery. Twenty years ago there were only two or three men who dared to say in the Senate that slavery was other than a sacred institution. Even when the war became o fact Mr. Lincoln was believed to care more for the good will ot slaveholding Kentucky than for the aid of anti-slavery Mas- sachusetis, and Mr. Seward, who preached about ‘higher law” and ‘irrepressible con- flicts’’ when a Senator, no sooner became Sec- retary of State than he hastened to assure for- eign Powers that the war was not against slavery, but for the Union. The conclusion to which we are therefore inevitably forced, and from the pitiless logic of which there is no escape, is that, haying protected slavery as an institution for genera- Peace tions and having only abolished it as a cruel, reluctant, necessary meas- ure of war—not that we loved the blacks, but becauso we would conquer the whites—we are bound to so consider it in dealing with reconstruction. This is a new and it may be a startling position. We are not surprised that it should be unwelcome to a defender and an exponent of the republi- can party. But we are surprised that delibe- rate, sagacious thinkers like the Hon. John M. Francis, of Troy, should assume that because we have presented this proposition as a vital element in any reconstruction problem, we propose to pay the Southern masters for their negroes! We expressly disclaimed any such purpose. It is a clamor and not an argument. We feel that something should be done for the South; that we should avoid this St. Domingo war of races that seems gathering its brutal force, that we should stamp out the spirit of repudiation which stains and corrupts our credit, brings injury upon the American name and which, if not checked, will bring this Republic into a con- dition compared to which disunion would have beena blessing. Rising to higher ground and appealing, not to the fears of the North, but to those nobler feelings of fraternity and kinship which lived at Brandywine, New Or- leans and Monterey, when Northman and Southman poured out their blood for the one dear old flag, we asked from the North that we should cease to tease and plunder and harass the South, and enter upon the work of reconstruction in a brave, manly way; that we should look at reconstruction as a solemn, high duty, and not as a mere political expedient. And we said; ‘‘What better means of arriving at a har- monious result than for these Commonwealths, through their representatives, to meet in solemn national convention in 1876, to con- | sider the state of the Union, the wear and tear of the hundred years of republican ex- periment, what the war has imposed upon the South, what we can in our strength and vic- tory do to ease that burden, and how we may best begin the second century of our national | lite of liberty and union ?” Is there anything clearer than this, and can | there be any duty more immediate and sacred and pressing than to bring the old family to- gether; to heal the wounds and remove the | scars; to insure freedom and civil rights, life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness to white and black? The Republican is afraid that we nean this as “an attack on the republican party.” We do not deny that imputation. We care nothing for the republican party. Its work is done. the country party which rallied tha Its old leaders have passed | into exile, silence or death, It is no longer | ren cpm. to tho “atveae of union and liberty, It came into life with fair, noble hopes, alive with a beautiful enthusiasm for country and freedom. It drove Lincols into emancipation, compelling that reluctant statesman to do the crowning, conclusive act of war. But it has become aon unclean, noisome thing—reeking with jobbery and cor. ruption, living only for the ambition of ita leaders—and so far beneath tho resolute, high purpose which impelled Lincoln to hia duty that it crawls at the feet of Grant— afraid to question or to doubt, willing to call him Cwsar should he demand it—crawls ab- ject and pitiful under the chair of a Presi- dent who looks out upon the sea waves from his cloud land of tobacco smoke, not deigning to answer the question that is in the heart of every republican. We have no respect for this decaying remnant of a republican party. We share in the con- tempt which the President feels for it, and which its leaders have invited by theiz cowardice. We welcome as a happy omen the fact that in the question of reconstruction aa in that of inflation the President is disposed to listen to the voice of the country, and despise the wishes of a party which, as he knows only tod well, will, when his purpose becomes manifest, crawl towards him with contented, unquestioning and servile alacrity. Mr. Potter on the Democratic Platform. The letter herewith published of Clarkson N. Potter, the popular member of Congress from the Westchester district, to the Chairman of the Democratic State Committée, making suggestions as to the platform, offers some timely advice to the Convention, which, we fear, is too good for such a body of mero poli- ticians to follow. Yet it is one of the best cards the democrats could play even as politi- cians. Mr. Potter has a clear perception that a string of stale commonplaces cannot stir public feeling, however solemnly the well worn platitudes may be put forth. He wishes to see his party present issues important enough and practical enough to awaken interest, excite discussion and cause a wholesome ferment in the public mind. He would have the powers of the State Legislature so curtailed as to exclude all private bills, all separate local legislation, and the creation of corporations, except under gencral uniform laws, thus destroying cor- ruption by drying up its sources. He wobld have the powers of Congress hemmed in and restricted by similar prohibitions, He would send all private claimants away from Congress to the courts of justice, forbid all subsidies and gratuities of every kind, prohibit Con- gress from creating corporations within the States, give it a supervising control of inter- state ‘railways, and make every other change requisite for cutting up corruption and extortion by the roots. Mr. Potter thinks the perpetual power given to great corpora. tions inconsistent with the genius of our in- stitutions. We prohibit titles of nobility and the entailing of estates so as to build up great aristocratic families, but we endow gigantic corporations, more dangerous than any titled aristocracy, with perpetual life, and let them grow and accumulate until their power eclipses that of our legislative bodies. Our politicians continue to thresh over the old straw of defunct controversies, unmindful of new questions which involve _ the freedom, prosperity and the very life pf the country. We are glad that a rising statesman like Mr. Potter is so impressed with the magni- tude of these evils, and sees the importance of erecting barriers against the swelling tide of legislative corruption and corporate ra pacity. He sees, too, like all clear-sighted men who reflect on the subject, that the only remedy which can go deep enough is a thorough revision of the constitution, and we welcome him as a valuable ally in the effort the Hrnaup is making to draw public attention to the importance of a national convention fos amending the constitution, PERSONAL INTELLIGENCE. Mr. Thomas NR Rooker and family have returnea from Saratoga, General S. C, Armstrong, of Virginia, is staying at Barnum’s Hotel. General James H. Ledie, of Utica, 1s stopping at the Windsor Hotel. General John UW. Parke, United States Army, is at the Brevoort House. Now’s the time to pray for rain. successtal if they Keep at it. Wiliam Henry West Becty, ‘the infant Roscius,” died receutly aged eighty-two, Lord Colville and his son, the Hon. C. Colville, of England, are sojourning at the Brevoort rouse, Mr. Wililam McMichael, United States District Attorney of Philadelphia, 1s at the Hofman Hoase, Captain W. H, Thompson, of tic steamship Britaunic, 13 quartered at the Futh Avenue Hotel, Ex-Atiorney General Benjamin Harris Brewster, of Pennsylvania, bas arrived at the Brevoore House. None of Beecher’s friends have read Moutton’s statement, Strange, what a general loss of curt osity. General George W. Cass, President of the North- ern Pacific Railroad Company, is residing at the Brevoort House. All the organs say that Moulton’s last paper is of no consequence, but it seems to have surred them up terribly. It 1s satd that if a gun ts fired over a recently caught lobster both bis ciaws will drop of. Now for experiments, Mr, John Welsh, President of the Boara of Ki. nance of the Centennial Commission, has apart- ments at the Brevoort House. Mr. J. M. Walker, President of the Chicago, VYarlington and Quincy Raiiroad Company, is registered at the Windsor Hotel. ‘yhomas Ogden, of Manchester, took pity on a little abandoned puppy, aud now the Coroner saya that Thomas’ trouble was hydrophobia, Seiior Don Luis de Potestad, Secretary of the Spanish Legation at Washington, arrived at the Albemarie Hotel yesterday from Newport. Frank P, Blair, who ts at Clifton Springs, N. ¥,, had a serious relapse within a few days, but is raijying again, He sat up during a portion of yesterday, It is now by established usage in this neighvor- hood a capital otfence to refuse to go weh a policeman when arrested. J¢ 18 the only cpitas offence we nave leit. Grant considered two days before he wast satis. fled that he coula not do justice to Linco} in an oration. Alimosi any one could have toldhim in two minutes. Why didn’t he ask ny? Uld Gideon is Not dead yet He de odt0 OB~ liver an oration on Lincoln, because bis knogl- edge of Lincoin’s ideas and his sympatty them would enter into what he should tay give offence to, the present republican p Naturally. “Well may the nation deplore his loss, Sure to be Welles of Lincoln. But the souta moat of al\® was the only man who had such @ hold on ¢ confidence of the Northern people tat ne cou have compelled his party (0 treat the Souta cently, ‘Thus even-handed justice commends noisoned Chalice ta our lina,’