The New York Herald Newspaper, June 15, 1875, Page 6

6 NEW YORK HERALD BROADWAY AND ANN STREET JAMES GORDON BE? PROPRIETOR. INETT i NOTICE TO SUBSCRIBERS.—On after January 1, 1875, the daily and weekly editions of the New York Husarp will be sent free of posta; and THE DAILY HERALD, published every day in te year. Four cents per copy. Twelve dollars per year, or one dollar per month, free of postage, to subscribers. All business or news letters and telegraphic despatchus must be addressed New Youn | Henarp. Letters and packages should be properly sealed. Rejected communications will not be ro- turned. Wed LONDON OFFICE OF THE NEW YORK BERALD—NO. 46 FLEET STREET. PARIS OFF -RUE S&C Subscriptions and advertisements will be received and forwarded on the same terms as in New York, VOLUME XL.- AMUSEY OLYMPIC T No, 644 Broadway.—VARIBTY closes at 10:45 rM. 2 FIFTH AVENUE THEATER : Twenty-eight. strect aud Br -fHE BIG BO. way NANZA, at 5 P.M. ; closes at 1030 P.M. CENTRAL PARK GA 1MOMAD! CONCE ts PM, THEODORE METROPOLITAN THEATIG, No, 248 Broadway.—VARIETY, at 8 P. ot WALLACK’S Proadway.—THE DONOVA VM. Messrs, Harrigan and Hart. BROOKLYN PARI VARIETY, at oP. Al; closes at I HYATRE 15 1. M. ROBINSON HALL, treet —English WOOD'S MUS troadway. corner of ‘Thurtieth HES, at 6 -F. <LITILE &UN M,; closes at i f. Mutiuee at ND POPULAR CON. CONWAY'S BROOKLYN THEATRE MAUD’S FAITH, at8 P.M. Miss Minnie Hamer. TROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART West Fourweuth street—Open from 10 A. %. 10 5 P.M. PARK THEATRE, Broadway —EMERSUNS CALIFORNIA MINSTRELS, wise. From our reports this morning the probabilities are that the weather to-day will be warm and clear or partly cloudy. Persons going out of town for the summer can tave the daily and Sunday Huraup mailed to | vem, free of postage, for $1 per month. Wart Srezet YesteRpay.—Stocks were nn- settled but showed an advancing tendency. Sold sold at 1163 a 1163. Foreign exchange was firm. Money easy at 1} and 2 per cent on call. ‘Tuz Urren Hovse of the Prussian Diet has «Jjourned after withdrawing State grants to the Roman Catholic clergy. The policy of Bismarck has had another triumph in this ‘cringeat measure against the Church. Faost mx June is rare, even in these un- tertain lagitudes; but yesterday ice was formed on lakes in New York and Pennsylva- sia, and the crops were injured by the un- seasonable phenomenon. Duan Or as a Disrerectayt.__The experi ment of disinfecting the Harlem fats with dead oil is considered a failure. The river Rhine washes the dirty town of Cologne, bat Coleridge, with good reason, asked: —‘‘What power divine shall henceforth wach the river _Rbine?” So with our own realm of smell and disease:—Even if the dead oil could dis- infect the flats, what agent shall be used to lisinfect the oi]? (OP oN easiness “Crotox Waren has done almost as much to build up the prosperity of New York as any other element of its success. No city, per- taps, of equal population bas a fuller and purer water supply than this. Yet the de- mand is so cgormons that it reqnires the con- stant attention of the civil engineers of the department to give an adequate supply. Some of the recent difficulties of obtaining water in the lower part of the city are detailed lo-day in a special report to the Hxnaxp, and show how a great calamity was averted, Tas Pmxe Ficxr soon to come off between Allen and Rooke, two noted pugiliste, ought to be prevented by the authorities, but will vot be. West Virginia lms become the favor- im fd for these discreditable encounters, and Pittsburg, Pa., is obtaining an unenviable reputation aa the headquarters of the rowdies and their friends. The reputation of that city is at stake, and it ought to be in the power of its authorities to prevent this contemplated act of brutality in the immediate neighbor- hood. Prize fighting has ceased to bea manly art and bas become a blackguardiy business, which only thieves and worse than thieves have any desire to encourage. Jouw Quixcy ApaMs. good feeling in American politics is refresh- ing at this time, when the bitterness of parti- san animosities is so great, and certainly the To roud of an era of “Memoirs of John Quincy Adams’’ furnish & remarkable contrast to the existing condition of the United States. Presi- dential rivalries, the third term question, the disorganized society of the South, Sherman's book, which has been thrown like @ firebrand into military circles, the Indians, all disturb the nation, but when we ¢nrn to these ‘Memoirs of John Quincy Adams” we find tranquillity and more spec- ulation as to the future than care forthe | present, Tho review elsewhere carefully analyzes a portion of the sixth volume of Mr. | Ladies and chil | NEW YORK HERALD, TUESDAY, Parti. pemdont Voter.” | Political and “The Inde~ | The meeting of John Gochrane’s Liberal Republican State Committee at Albany, last week, and the resolution it adopted to hold pulse to the recent gush and nonsense about | “the independent voter’ in certain journals | which slipped their party cables after tho great Greeley defeat in 1872, and have since been drifting about in search of a new politi- cal anchorage, These papers have failed, as yet, to comprehend the relations of inde- pendent journalism to politics. They have | not emancipated themselves from the old notion that a public journal needs a special | political constituency. They are acting like | recently hatched chickens that wish to get | back into the protecting shell. Fora year or | two they kept insisting that the democratic | party, with which they bad acted in the Greele campaign, should disband and give place to new organization, of | and through which they could re-establish the | party relations which they bad been forced | into renouncing by the defeat of a movemen! which they intended and expected to lead. | They did not profess independent journalism with deliberate forethought, from a conviction party trammels, bat because their abortive at- | tempt to form a new party had sundered their | connection with the republicaos, and the sentiments in which they had educated their | readers did not permit them to join the demo- crats. None of the journals to which we ailude suffered any diminution of prosperity and we have looked upon this hankering for | “the fleshpota of Egypt” with regret and | wonder. One of the most prominent of them went back, several months ago, into the re- publican party, and the others are still uneasy, | blindly groping for some shred of a party | which they may be thought to represent. Tho | | liberal republican organization, which they *, closes at 1047 | pioneered, having become virtually defunct, | they now assume to be the organs of. “the in- dependent voter." | The independent voter may be left to take care of himself without a special wet nurse. If he pinned bis political faith on any of these new nondescript organs he would be as ser- vile as when he followed them as organs of the republican party. Independence in poli- tics consists in following one’s own judg- | ment. It is as abject to be guided by an organ as to accept the dictation of a party. The really independent voter is a man who “steers by his own compass,” and it is ridicu- lous for any newspaper to assume to be his organization and discipline; they cannot ment to the majority of the organization. ‘The independent voter is a citizen who refuses | to be bound by party ties, and it is sheer ab- | surdity for any journai to treat him as if he | belonged to a pocket party and needed an | organ. The recent foohsh gush about “the independent voter” is the last dregs of the unsuccessful movement to supplant the dem- ocratic party by a new political organization. Nobody who is a competent judge of present | tendencies has any doubt that the Presidential contest of 1876 will be waged between the old democratic party and the republican party, which has been so long in power. Every attempt to form a successful third party has | utterly broken down. The liberal republican | party is a thin ghost hovering over a political | grave ready to vanish at the first crowing of | the cock. The farmers’ movement in the West, which at one time seemed to portend a political revolution, has lost its aggressive vigor. It will hardly make a ripple in the | elections of the present year, and next year it | will be utterly lost im the great Presidential | maelstrom. The republican party is too | | much weakened to afford another split, and he democratic party is too confident to court | or encourage any separate movement. We | are on the eve of a square, old-fashioned | contest between the two great partics, in which the independent voter will | be fonnd on one side or the other. | His independence will be manifested in changing his party relations if he dislikes | | the candidate or the platform of the party | with which he has been accustomed to act. | Practically, this is the only choice that will \ be left him, and it is mere thoughtless chatter | to talk of the next Presidential olection as if it were to be anything different from ao strng- gle between the two existing parties, or as il the independent voter would have any influ- ence in either of the national conventions by which the issueg of that contest will be shaped. ‘The sooner the hermaphrodite organs, which would like to be independent if they knew how, dismiss such nonsense from | their columns the less they will confuse their | readers. ‘They betray their misconception of inde- pendent journalism by assuming that it re- quires, or will lead to, a different method of conducting political contests from that which has heretofore existed. The Hxnato has been | an independent journal for more than forty years, aud may claim to have some knowledge of the requisites of independence. These forty years have brought a pretty constant suc- cession of fierce political struggles, generally between two parties, although there have been sometimes three or four, and we have never tound independent journalism difficult by reason of the division of the community into hostile party camps. We have unflinch- ingly told to both parties the truths which it most behooved them to consider. We have fairly published the speeches and documents of both, enabling our readers to form an in- dependent and impartial jadgment. We have exposed the abuses and done jastice to the sound measures of both; but we never con- | templated anything so fantastic and chimeri- cal as the abolition of political parties, | knowing that the government of a free coun- | try cannot be conducted without them. We | have always regarded it as a public evil for the party in power to be so strong as to have | no imamediate fear of its adversary, since the | most efficient check on bad government is the mutual watechfalness of rival parties powerful enough to oust each other by appeals to the people. ‘The independent voter’’ is no re- ‘Adams’ “Memoirs,” and presents with fores | cont invention of callow journalists; he and pictnresqueness all the saliont points of | has always existed; he has always made him- that interesting work | self felt in great emergencies: he bas not ex. | a State convention, have given a fresh im- | which they would be the natural organs | that journals are more usefal when free from | by their disconnection from political parties, | organ. It is still more ridiculous to attempt to form the independent voters | into a party. Parties cannot exist without exist without some surrender of private judg- | erted his power by acting outside of parties, but with parties. He has bad the courage to boldly change his party relations in obedi- ence to his sense of the public interest, in- stead of hovering, as he is now advised to do, on the outskirts of both parties and demand- ing consideration for a pretence of neutrality. The Hxnarp has always been willing to see | citizens take sufficient interest in public ques- tions to enlist on one side or the other, and hos never perceived the necessity of coddling a special class of independent voters when experience has demonstrated that there are always citizens enongh who have sufficient patriotism to chango sides whenever there are strong reasons for putting the government into new hands. Independent journalism does not seek to annihilate parties or to es- tablish a balance-of-power party, of which it seeks to be the organ, but simply to guide the public judgment in reliance on that large body of honest voters who have 60 | many times in our history ejected and | reinstated political parties. Voters of this class have always been pretty well distributed through both political organizations, and | their power is exerted, not by standing aloof | from ordinary politics, but by frankly chang- mg sides when the public interest is betrayed | by the party in power. It is a sham inde- | pendence, either in voters or journals, that | dares not support what is right lest Mrs. | Grandy should accuse them of inconsistency. | It does uot yet appear which political party will best deserve support in the next great | contest, but it is evident enough that there | will be only two parties to that contest, and that all citizens who contribute to the resalt will vote with one or the other. The inde- pendent voter will not stand aloof, but act with one of tho parties, and the most solid | proof he can give of independence is hy openly voting with former adversaries if he thinks it for the public interest. It is the duty and province of independent journal- ism to assist citizens of both parties in form- ing a correct judgment. The Yachting Season. | Those who sail down our beautiful bay will see here and there far off on the horizon be- ‘ yond Coney Island, or near the Highlands, or beyond the sea that breaks on Sandy Hook, white canvas flashing in the sunlight like the wings of gulls. Or as the idle traveller upon | the steamboats that rnn from the Battery to | Staten Island gnzes upon the sunset he | may hear tho rush of waters and see the ; shadow thrown upon the waves as a mighty yacht bends its masts to the breeze, and passes by like a sudden apparition of swiftness and grace. Or along the | pleasant shores of that fair island, which even | now with its forests looks to us as it did two hundred years ago to the Dutch merchant | who had his humble home upon the shores of | Manhattan, the traveller may see yachts, ex- | quisite in form and lightness, quietly riding | at anchor like the albatross asleep upon the | | sea, Everywhere the Bay of New York seems | | dotted with yachts of all sizes and styles, | from the tiny boat which a zephyr might cap- ' gize, to the majestic ship which seems to defy the storm, and to have her destined march | upon the mouatain wave, her home upon the | | deep. | With such a harbor, with cruising grounds | | so fine, and with natural advantages which no ‘other American city rivals, it is not to be | wondered at that New York leads the yacht- | ing interests of the country. Our clubs are | numerous and were never s0 prosperous as | now. The season this year has begun auspi- | ciously. Yesterday another event of interest i was added to the list—that of the Corinthian | sloop race of the Seawanhaka Club, which | was won brilliantly by the Addie Voorbis. The entries we print for the regatta of the New York Yacht Club, which is to be sailed to- | morrow, indicate another contest of unusual | interest. The opening of the yachting season has been attended with all the spirit and | popularity the friends of this noble sport could desire, and there is every prospect that 1875 will become memorable in yachting annals. A good breeze is all our yacht clubs | ask; that granted, they will supply ail else | that is required themselves. | | | | | | The American Team in Ireland, Our riflemen have been safely landed on | ‘who sol JUNE 15, 1875.—TRIPLE SHEET. a md The New Evidence in the Beecher Case. The statements of Mr. Leys, published in the Henaxp yesterday, and of the carpet layers, published in the Hrrarp and Sun, have ex- cited much attention. It does not yet appear what action counsel will feel it their duty to take in relation to these unexpected develop- ments; for although Mr. Beach called atten- tion to them at the opening of the Court yes- terday morning and intimated that he would make some motion after the recess, the subject was not brought up again during the day. The Brooklyn Hagle, which has steadily cham- pioned the cause of Mr. Beecher with remark- able zeal and ability, devoted last evening the longest editorial we recollect to hayo seen in its columns on any subject to an attempt to weaken the statement of Mr. Leys, the druggist who sold a deadly poison to Mr. Beecher in May, 1871. It points out discrep- ancies between the testimony of Mr. and Mrs. Moulton on the subject of poison ahd the statement of Mr. Leys; but among its infer- ences from these discrepancies it fails to draw one which strikes us as important, The discrepancies prove that the story of Mr. Leys was not invented to support the testi- mony of Mr. Moulton and his wife. Had it been fabricated for that purpose its inventor would have made it tally with their state- ments. Prussic acid is a liquid, and the poison spoken of by Mrs. Moulton was a powder. This is the main discrepancy; but there are several minor ones, and, taken together, they preclude the hypothesis that the story of Mr. Leys is an invention intended to match with and corroborate the evidence on the subject of poison given in court. It wears the appearance of a fact stated precisely as it occurred, without any attempt to accommo- date it to the exigencies of the case. 4 Besides this circumstantial confirmation of ita genuineness there is another, more direct, which is furnished by the Zagls itself. Itsent reportey to Whitestone, where tho druggist it a poison “HSW Foskdes, atid Mr, Loys repeated his statement of the sale and exhibited the ledger in which it was charged with several other articles. Whe Henaxn, therefore, anticipated the Hagle by an interval of only ten hours in publishing the main features of the story. We can perceive no warrant for the tone of + complaint and invective in certain quarters at the publication of such facts. If theso statements are true thoy ought not to be suppressed; if they are false itis in the in- terest of truth to put them forth, so that they can be met and exploded. As Hildreth, the historian, says, in his remarks on the old Sedition law, it is better that such things as- sume a definite printed shape; ‘‘especially if printed in newspapers and pamphlets they can hardly fail to come to the speedy notice of the party concerned, whereas spoken slanders circulate privately behind a man's back and may do irretrievable injury before their existence is known; and even when it is knowa, the fleeting and changing shape of all merely oral declarations may often occasion great difficulty in grasping them for refuta- tion.’’ In accordance with this sound line of remark we took pains to sift this poison | story as soon as its secret circulation came to our knowledge, and we succeeded in tracing it to its original source and putting it on record, for easy refutation if there was no good evidence to support it. Our publication yesterday narrowed it dowa to a single witness and enabled the friends of Mr. Beecher to go directly to that witness and verify our report. If there is ® mass of con- cealed facts it is better that they be brought to light and weighed before the trial ends, and not be held in reserve to destroy the moral effect of the verdict after it shall be rendered. If the counsel and Court deem the new facts important we suppose the case can be reopened for the admission of further evi- dence ; but if on examination out of Court they are thought to possess no weight they will have no subsequent effect in unsettling public confidence in the verdict. We can see no sound moral objection to the publication of new facts in a case which has been so long obtruded on public attention. There is one statement in the Higle's tele- gram from Whitestone which will make an unpleasant impression. Mr. Leys, the drng- gist who sold Mr. Beecher the poison, is rep- resented as saying to the Zagle reporter that | the shores of Ireland. Deputations from the | Corporation of Dublin and from the Irish | Rifle Association met them before they | | touched land, and welcomed them in the | name of the Irish people. That these were | | no empty forms of welcome was shown by the | enthusiastic ovation tendered the representa- tives of America by the populace. The tele- graphic accounts say that “the Americans | were escorted to Queenstown, and upon their arrival met with an enthusiastic reception from the population.” Americans at ail times are sure of kindly and hospitable greeting in Ireland ; but then it is evident that the Irish masses look upon the present | occasion as of peculiar importance and sig- | | | nificance. The gentlemen of the American team are not looked upon so much as oppo- nents anxious to carry off laurels as the rep- resentatives of a nation bound by ties of blood with the Irish people. Hence the warmth of the welcome offered to the Ameri- can riflemen—a welcome that even kings could not command. Whatever the result of the coming trial of skill the visit of the Ameri- can team cannot fail to strengthen the bonds of friendship between the | two countries. It will also have a ten- | dency to remove many prejadices which can be very well dispensed with. Some of | the experiences of the Americans will perhaps | | surprise them, bat in a little while they will | become accustomed to the ways of the people | among whom they are thrown. Almost on | setting foot on land they had the honor to be | enlisted among the noble band of ticket-of- | leave men. It being contrary to British law | for people to carry arms in Ireland, the police authorities furnished the visitors immediately | on their landing with licenses or tickets of leave to carry arms while they remain in Ire- land. This graceful little attention on th part of the Loudon authorities will save the | Americans from the danger of being marched | off to jail by some officious policeman. We may, therefore, breathe freely, as all danger | of political complications aro at an end, and’ there is no longer any fear of our British cousins mistaking the American team for | Fenian army bent on the conquest of the | during the pr Greona Isle \daty of Mr. “he never talked about it except to the physi- | cian of the village, Dr. Bleecker, and the latter is too honorable to say anything to the injury of Mr. Beecher.” The purport of this is that itis an obligation of honor to suppress facts and stifle evidence if they make against the defendant. Without discussing this curious point of honor wo may, perhaps, be pardoned for raising a question as to the extent to which it has been applied by the friends and partisans of Mr. Beecher. Do they make it a point of honor to smother evidence against him? Are there more facts of the same startling character as this purchase of poison, which the possessors have felt it obligatory to suppress and hide of the trial? Are Mr. Beecher's adherents in a tacit league with each other to suffocate and conceal the truth, and to pour out the vials of their hot indigna- tion upon everybody who ventures to state what he knows? The temper they exhibit at the disclosure of Mr. Beecher's purchase of prussic acid proves that they would have sap- pressed this fact had it been in their power, and makes it crelible that they would sup- press other facts and all faets which are in- consistent with the they g of his innocence. | If it should turn out the! this policy of con- cealment has been so far successful as to have withheld from the jury evidence which might control their verdict is it the daty of the press or the duty of any lover of fair play to enter into their confederacy for hiding the truth? If Mr. Beecher’s purchase of poison in 1871 has no proper bearing on the case his friends have no reason to object to its publication. But if it does bear on the case and is perti- nent evidence justice and morals forbid its suppression, It is for counsel to judge, or, rather, it is for the Court to judge, if coun- sel should make an application to that effect, whether the new witnesses whose statements have at last come to light shall be brought into Court to testify and be cross-examined. If they have hitherto withheld important evi- dence from a false sense of honor that is surely no reason why the press should become their accomplices in concealment when the facts come to its knowledge. It was the clear Leva to communicate Mr, Beecher’s purchase of potson to the counsel for the plaintiff befora their evidence was closed ; but his failure to act in the interest of justice is no excuse for imitating his bad ex- | ample. To-Day’s Centennial. It is not easy to keep the run of centenaries nowadays ; and in these spring and summer months, when @ century ago great eventa succeeded each other go rapidly, one is very apt to lose sight of substantial anniversaries. Of such is that which should be commem- orated to-day. Without disparagement to the just bygone Lexington, the near-at-band Bunker Hill ond next year's Independence, let us nover forget that this day, one hundred years ago—the 15th June, 1775—George Washington was made Commander-in-Chief of the Continental Army. We know pretty well how the great choice was made, and that odd self-revelation, the diary of the elder Adams, tells us what risks were run about it. There was, we read, ex- cept, perhaps, in the case of CGoneral Ward, no professional or military rivalry, but there was sectional antagonism and civil aspirations. The great difficulty was in the East. ‘Mr. Hancock and Mr. Cush- ing,’ we read, “hung back; Mr. Paine did not come forward, and Mr. Samuel Adams was irresolute.” The truth is, Hancock, who had never seen a battalion in the field, wanted to be Commander-in-Chief himself. When John Adams determined to support Washington's nomination, and did so, he tells us that “on Hancock's face mortification and resentment were expressed as forcibly as a face can exhibit them.” The nomination strictly came from Maryland, though the sug- gestion ig a to John Adams, whose high di tif It is, With all_his defects, that to im we owe, in their respective high functions, George Washington as Commander-in-Chiet, and twenty-five years later, at a peaceful crisis of almost as great moment, of John Marshall as Chief Justice. All these risks were run, all these rocks nd shoals avoided, and Washington was chosen, and instantly accepted—less than twenty-four hours intervening—the high trust conferred on him, which, while peril threat- | ened, ho never relinquished. More than eight years afterward, the “‘indepondencs and ikea 5 2 of the United States being se- cured, “rebutmed his commission to the body which bestowed it, with words quite as solemn as those in which he announced the accept- | ance. “I close this last act’? (how poorly did he forecast his future) ‘‘of my official life by commending the interests of our dearest country to the protection of Almighty God | and those who have the superintendence of them to His holy keeping.” It was three days after his being commis- sioned—a hundred years ago next Friday— | that Washington wrote to his wife the only letter of all of his to her which has survived, telling of what had been done. It is a | modest, manly, affectionate and, if we may coin a word, husband-like letter, at the end of which we find a passage which seems | to conflict with one of John Adams’ assertions asto the antagonism of at least one of his Virginia friends, He tells his wife that he has | made his will, and had employed his dear | friend and colleague, Kdmund Pendleton, to | draw it. Such are some of the thick coming mem- | ories and associations which crowd upon us as we think of the century which to-day expires. | Let us do full honor, if only a reverential memory, to the 15th of June, 1775. | The Sutcide Clause in Life Policies. | Life insurance has come to involve the in- terests of such multitudes of people that everything relating to the conditions which affect the contract is of great concern. A contemporary, speaking of some recent decis- ions, recommends to the companies ‘‘to so frame their contracts as to be clearly not lia- ble for payment in the event of the death of the insured by suicide.” We suppose that the most careful and prudent companies have gone as far as they can go in aiming to be free from liability when the insured puts an end to his own life. We happen to have before us | at this moment four policies issued respect- | ively by four of the best conducted companies | in this conniry. The exception clause in the Mutual Life's policy is, ‘die by his own act or hand, whether sane or insane;” that of the | Continental reads, ‘die by his own hand or the hands of justice;” that of the Equitable is, “die by his own hand withm two years from the date hereof;"’ and that of the Travellers’, of Hart- | ford, runs, “shall die by suicide, felonious | or otherwise, sane or insane.’’ How much these various forms of excluding the risk of | suicide from the risks of the policy tend to | secure to the company absolute immunity in any and every case of suicide may, perhaps, admit of question. Itis probably implied in every contract of life insurance that the in- sured will not put an end to his own life. But self-destruction is so liable to come to any man without that conscious intent which legal and ethical philosophy makes the test of wrong-doing that the courts have held that to constitute a suicide, which is to be followed | by any legal conseqnence, the act must be | premeditated and fully comprehended. The | self-destruction of an insane person is not | | suicide in the legal sense. The Court of Ap- peals of this State, construing the terms | ‘dies by his own hand’ and “suicide,” | has held that they mean the same thing, | jand that both expressions refer to an act of criminal selt-destruction— | namely, one that is perpetrated ander circum- | Stances of moral responsibility. To avoid | this discrimination has been the purpose of | | the clause which declares that the company | | shall not be liable if the insured shall “die | by his own hand, whether sane or insane.” | ‘This is an express stipulation on the part of | the insured that if he dies by his own hand | the company shall be absolutely exonerated | from payment of the policy, even if he is morally irresponsible for his own death. Whether the law would regard such a contract as valid may possibly admit of question. On | the one hand it may be said that there is some repugnance between the terms “suicide’’ or “death by his own hand’ and ‘‘nsanity." “Suicide,” nightly defined, means in its legal sense the self-destruction of a sane person, and the self-destruction of an insane person is not “suicide.” It might be contended, therefore, that the terms ‘sane or insane’ are to be rejected as inoperative, and that the olanae is to be interpreted aa an area. mont that if the insured commits “suicide” or “dies by his own hand” the policy is to be payable or not payable according to the circumstances which make the death, in the legal sense, death by suicide or death by an act of insanity. On the other hand it may be said that it is competent to parties to make any contract that they see fit to make; that seif-destruction by on insane person is one of the risks against which the under- writer chooses to guard, just as he chooses to guard against the risk of death by the hands of justice, and that the one 18 just as likely to occur as the other; and that when the contract is that the insurer shall not be liable if the insured ‘dies by his own hand, sane or insane,”’ there is no repugnancy, be- cause the insane man who destroys bimself in his insanity ‘dies by his own hand” as liter- ally and legally as the man who puts an end to his own life in full possession of his reason. The Court of Appeals, in deciding the case to which we have referred, said that it was com~ petent no doubt for the insurer so to frame his policy as to exempt him from liability for a death occasioned by a fit of insanity. Upon the whole, however, we are inclined to think that the best course for life insurance companies to pursue in regard to this particu- lar cause of death is to stipulate that they will not be responsible in case of suicide, leaving Tt to the law to determine what constitutes suicide. They would thus insure against death inflicted by the insured on himself ina fit of delirium, just as they insure against death by smallpox or any other disease ; and we do not seo why men may not properly seck and be allowed to have the continuance of their- reason insured, as weil as to insure the continuance of their health in any other respect. It is no more difficult for a compe- tent medical examiner to estimate the present | average soundness of 9 man's mind than it is to estimate the present average health of his body. Hono Br a Mos.—Lynching generally de- feats its object, for it saves the criminal whom [it legally pimishes from the agony of suspense. It gives him but a short and sud- don shrift, The most appalling picture which even the {magination of Dickens conceived is that of Fagin in prison, counting the daya and hours before his execution. Nor can any one imagine cruelty greater than that of the cold, heartless process of the laws, acting like a merciless, soulless machine, We think, therefore, that the men who forcibly took from jail at Annapolis, Md., the negro Simms, and hung him in chains toa tree, actually saved him from prolonged mental anguish at the cost of brief physical pain. Our correspondence gives a full account of this useless act of vengeance, which deteated jus- tice, saved the victim many days of uncer- tainty and fear, and did nothing to vindicate the unfortunate victim of his brutality. The eaptared Indian tries to provoke his captors to kill him, in order that he may escape the slow torture of the stake; and in this case an outraged society has ren- dered the wretched negro the last favor be could ask from it—a speedy death. Tur Coat Trovsies are ceasing to be troa- blesome. Tho miners are preparing to resume their work, and the strike is evidently at an end foratime. But that it will begin again is unfortunately almost inevitable under the present arrangements. PERSONAL INTELLIGENCE. On the Ist of June ten rabid dogs were killed to Paris. Secretary Bristow ts the only member of the Cabinet now in Wasnington. Attorney General Pierrepont arrived in this city from Washington yesterday. _ Frenchmen are disposed to fancy that absinthe is only their equivalent for gin. Assemblyman George West, of Ballston, N. Y., 1s stopping at the Grand Central Hotei. Colonel Thomas P. Ochiltree, of Texas, is among the late arrivals at the Everett House. Congressman Thomas ©. Piatt, of Owego, N. ¥., 1s registered at the Hoffman House. Captain Edward Simpson, United States Navy, 1s residing temporarily at the Everett Honse. Miss Lotta, the actress, arrived in this city yew teraay and took up her residence at the Gienhaw | Hotel. Joseph Vernet valued his pictures by the square foot—125 francs @ 100t—or thive foot by jour, 1,606 francs. Senator Aaron H. Cragin, of New Hampshire, arrived from Washington yesterday a: the West moreiand Hotel. Congressman John 0. Whitehouse, of Pough keepsie, has returned to lis old quarters at the Albemarle Hotel. General Thomas H. Neili aod Surgeon Wilitem S. King, United States Army, have arrived at the Fifth Avenue Hotel. The King of Sweden has personally conferred the Order of the Seraph, the aighest in Sweden, upon Prince Bismarck. Mr. H. C, Johnson, Unitea States Commisstoner of Customs, arrived at the St. Nicholas Hotel last evening from Washington. captain Anderson, chief astronomer of the Boundary Commission, left for ireland yesterday, | the work of the Commission having been com- | pleted. There is a political doctor tn Paria, who says:— “[ prefer tyranny to license; for tyranny disgusts us with slavery only, but license disgusts us with Uberty itself.” The mantcipal authorities of Paris have tn con- sideration the project of organizing a life-saving brigade of Newfoundland dogs, to be posted all along the banks of the Seine. ler Majesty bas conferred the distinction of Companion of the Order of St. Michael and St. George upon Colonel Jonn Dyde, the oldest militia oMicer in the Dominion of Canada, The last man hanged wrote as follows to the shertft:— Please admit my friend, Mr. W. 8. Grady, to my § one o'clock, ALFRED ARING. On dit that the Prince Imperial, who will pase the sammer at Arenenburg, in Switzerland, saye that im {ts retirement be finds “the oil with whieh the athlete prepares his body for the struggic.” Anotuer bistoric epigram invented by some one else. Kari Blind nas written an essay on the “Crema- tion Customs of the Teatonic Races from Ancient Times,” which is to sppear In Fraser. Besides the historical quotations from classic, Scandina- vian and old German sources, it Will contain what may be termed the poetry of “Pireburiai,” ag the German expression is. ‘The dispute on etiquette that now troubles the Engitah court 18 bevween the Princess Beatrice and the Duchess of Edinburgh, The Dacheas claims precedence a8 an imperial Princess, but Beatrice will not yicid the rights of the ro; vy; and the war is fierce. in conseqnence the at the same ceremonies, jin the ps of Gulzot there have veon found some additions to his memoirs, written in 1849, in which ~ details @ conversation held that year with the Dachess of Sagan, the niece of Tatleyranda, Guizot spoke of the revolution of 1843 as not haw ing produced a man; and the Duchess sald si aa met in Germany & little Pomeranian named Bie miarck, Who wou'd be talked of some day. if ae abonld tie, —————