The New York Herald Newspaper, April 2, 1876, Page 8

NEW YORK HERALD BROADWAY AND ANN STREET. | JAMES GORDON BENNETT, PROPRIETOR. | All business, news letters or telegraphic | despatches must be addressed New Louk | Hegarp. | Letters and packages should be properly | Bealed. s Rejected communications will not be re- burned. i PHILADELPHIA OF FICE—NO, 112 SOUTH SIXTH STREET. rt LONDON OFFICE OF T NEW YORK ! HERALD--NO. 46 TREET, PARIS OFFICE—AVE DE-L'OPERA. Subscriptions and advertisements will be Teceived and forwarded on the same terms as in New York. AMUSEMENTS alee BAN FRANCISCO ML PARISIAN VARIETIES. VARIETY, at 81". X. PIG Titarne. Tw THIRD: STREET OPERA HOUSR CALIFORNIA MINSTRELS, ats P.M WOODS MUSEUM KATY, 8 P.M. W. on. EATRE. Minnie Patmer, THEATRE, P.M. HJ, Montagae. y THRATRE WA! FEARS, IDLE TEA TONY pasTows 8 VARIETY, at 8 P.M RAGLE THEATRE. VARIETY, at 8 P.M BROOKLY. VERREOL, at SP. M TIVOLE THE, VARIETY, at 6 P.M. ONTON SQUAR: FERREOL, at 8 P.M. O. i CHATRA VARIETY, at 8 P. M. BOWE HAMLET, at 8 P. M. THIKTY-FOURTH 8T VARIETY, at 8. M. T OPERA HOUSE. FIFTY THEATRE. PIQUE, at 8P. M. Fi port. GLOBE THEATRE, P.M. LE SHEET. QUADRUP ~~ XEW “YORK, “SUNDAY. APRIL 2, 1876, From our reports this morning the probabilities are that the weather to-day will be partly cioudy, with, possibhy, rain in the evening. Notice to Country Newspgaers.—For mpt and requiar delivery of the Henanp fast. mail trains orders must be sent direct to. this qfice. Postage free. Wart Srrexet Yestzrpay.—The market was agitated and feverish, because lower. Gold declined to 113 5-8, after sales at 413 3-4. Government and investment se- surities were quict. Money loaned at 3 and 4 per cent. Foreign exchange dull. Roorns, the delinquent bank teller of the City of Churches, has been captured in Tennessee. A couple of Brooklyn deteo- tives have trailed him down. If he were in ® higher line of business, suppose in Wash- Ington, with the government at his back, he would be regarded by some parties as a political martyr. Caxapian Banks, although enjoying the privilege of being entirely unconnected with those terrible people on the other side of the line who are supposed to be continually dabbling in questionable practices, are not quite blameless in their method of doing business. According to our despatches one big institution has gone np, and with little to console our friends across the border at that. Tur Mrsissirri continues to rise, swelled by the heavy rains that have been prevailing in the valley and over the tributary water- sheds during the past week. The floods are * testing the levees severely, and o break will be attended with very disastrous inunda- tions. The fact that none have occurred of any great conseqnence up to the present shows that preparations have been mfide for the rise of the river by strengthening and raising the levees. The river at Memphis is at present within fourteen inches of the level of extreme high water in 1867. Bismance's Brrtupay.—We receive from our special correspondent in Berlin an in- teresting despatch regarding the birthday celebration of the German Chancellor, Any special event in the life of the great statesman of Germany must prove of in- terest at the present time. Yesterday he was sixty-two years of age. Of course there was a great time about it among the mag- nates of Fatherland. The Ist of April, as the birthday of Bismarck, must for the fu- ture lose most of its traditional reputation for foolery. Tue Mereororocican Summary for the past month in New York city showsa mean barometric pressure of 30.02 inches, witha maximum of 30.51 inches on the 5th and a minimum of 29.217 inches on the 2ist. The highest temperature, 63 deg., was on the 7th, and the lowest, 9 deg., on the 19th, the mean for the month being 35 deg. The wind velocity reached its highest register on the 28th, at 11:20 P. M., during the storm, when it was at the rate of 72 miles per hour for i few minutes, There were in March nine | lear days, nine cloudy and thirteen fair; | but on fourteen of these days rain or snow | fell, making the precipitation for the month | 7.90 inches. ‘The mean atmospheric humid- | ity for the month is 68 per cent, the high- est degree being on the 25th, when it | reached the maximum 100, and the lowest | on the 14th, when the hygrometer indicated | 62.3 percent, The prevailing wind during | the month has been northwesterly ; but the | occurrence of five distinct periods of north- easterly wind, accompanied by rainfall, shows that as many areas of low barometer passed eastward during the time. A com- parison of temperatures of March for the past six years shows that in 1871 the mean temperature forthe month was 45.7 deg. ; 1872, 30.3 deg. ; 1873, 35.7 deg. ; 1874, 3 fleg., and in 1875, 32.5 deg. The compara. | tive precipitation for the same years shows a | March rain and snow fall in 1871 of 6.84 | inches ; 1872, 3.93 inches ; 1873, 1.88 inches ; | 1874, 1.85 inches, and 1875, 4.25 inches. The | ‘month hes boon, therefore, tho wettest | | of productive property owned by churches, Taxation ef Church Property. | That part of President Grant's last an- | nual Message in which he recommended , taxation of church property has occasioned much disenssion and led to some incipient action in several of the State Legislatures, New York and Massachusetts being leading | instances. The subject is still under con- | sideration in the Legislatures of both of | these States, The New York attempt has | called out an emphatic letter of condemna- tion from ex-Governor Dix, whose tone we cannot approve because it substi- tutes denunciation for argument. So im- portant a question should not be de- cided on sentimental grounds, even if the sentiment appealed to be the sacred one of religion. It seems to us that exaggerated expressions of horror have no rightfal place in such a disenssion, and we regret that Gen- eral Dix has so far deviated from his habitual cogent reasoning as to declare that the proper way of treating the proposal to tax church property ‘is to scont it out of the commit- tee rooms, legislative halls and social éircles, which it has defiled by its presence.” This is not the tone of a statesman but of azealot. “The scheme,” says General Dix, ‘should be repudiated and denounced in all its parts, One can hardly debate it without a feeling of debasement. It is not a subject for hu- man logic.”. ‘Heaven forbid that the tax gatherer shonld be sent to fill his bag of ; lucre by levying contributions on the sanc- tuaries of the living God!" Such un- restrained ‘invective has no tendency to convince opponents. Woe dislike this method of defending the exemption of church property, for the same reason that we dislike the appeals to sectarian prejudice which are so freely employed on the other side of the question. ‘This is pre-eminently & question which should be decided by calm reasoning and fair argument. : General Dix has contributed nothing of any value to the discussion beyond the statements of faet in his letter to President Grant on the 17th of December, wherein he showed that all the property of Trinity church, except that devoted to sacred uses, is subject to ordinary taxation. Other gentlemen of high standing have rendered better service by treating the question on its proper merits, The most valuable arguments which have yet appeared are those of President Eliot, of Harvard University, and Hon. George H. Andrews, of this city. The very able letter of President Eliot was not elicited by the recent phase of the con- troversy. It was addressed to the Tax Commissioners of Massachusetts in 1874, and printed among the legislative documents of that State in 1875. It is a masterly production, in which the question is argued on broad general principles. The twelve letters of Mr. Andrews, published in one of our city journals, were prompted by President Grant's Message, and are a fuller and more exhaustive discussion of the sub- ject than has appeared from any other source, Mr. Androws has long served as one of our city Tax Commissioners, and is among the best informed men in the coun- try on questions connected with tax- ation, which he understands in all their bearings and details. His letters area magazine of pertinent information, abound- ing in the most recent statistics, explaining the present state of the law, arguing the question from the highest standpoints of public policy, and convicting President Grant of inconsiderate haste and glaring in- accuracies. President Eliot ig a Unitarian and Mr. Andrewsa Baptist. Neither of them can be suspected of a predilection for the Catholic Church. They are both republi- cans, and neither of them has any party bias against the views of President Grant. Their arguments are entitled to respectful attention until somebody shall have suc- ceeded in refuting them, a taskin which no- body has yet succeeded. Having informed our readers where they can find the subject very fully handled we proceed to state our own views of it. It is important, at the outset, to draw a line of distinction between two classes of ecclesias- tical property. One class consists of prop- erty which is devoted solely to religious uses and yields no income, like church edifices and burial grounds ; the other class consists like the stores and dwellings of Trinity church, for example, let to tenants who pay rents, The first of these classes of church property is a source of constant ex- pense; the second class is a source of income. By the laws of the State of New York the first is exempt from taxa- tion, and the second is taxed like the prop- erty of private owners. We think this a sound and just rule, and there are no diffi- culties in its application which might not be removed by specific legislation relating to cases where these two kinds of property | seem to shade into each other. Exemption | } \ can be fairly claimed only for such church property as is strictly devoted to public | uses, including, certainly, church edifices | and burial grounds, and perhaps schools, | hospitals and other charitable institutions | maintained by churches, not as a source of | profit, but as a relief to suffering indigence. We think we can make the ground of ex- emption clear by a simple illustration. Why does not the State or the city tax the public property owned by itself? This city has public property of immense pecuniary value, but nobody thinks of urging that the Central Park, the old and the new City Hall, the public school buildings, the Tombs prison or the institutions on the islands should be taxed. It would be absurd and whimsical to maintain that this property should be assessed, because when the tax came to be paid the city would have no other resource for meeting it than taxes col- lected on other property. ‘To extend taxation to public property wonld bring no relief to any taxpayer, for in just the proportion that the rate was diminished by including the city property in that same proportion it would have to be increased again to get the means of paying the city’s proportion of the tax. In applying this illustration we must con- sider the nature of church ownership. The congregation which builds and supports a church derives no more revenue from it than the city does from the Central Park or the City Hall. If the church were assessed the tax would come ont | the church us a relief to the taxpayers who | compose the congregation because the same being announced to be travelling. Queen Victoria seems to have provoked j unkind comment because she passed assessed ror this private property. It would be absurd enough to urge the assessment of individuals would have to pay the church | tax. It may be answered that it would, never- theless, be a relief to the rest of the commu- nity ; but this is a fallacy resting on the assumption that the rest of the community do not also support churches, The | truth is that the whole community | is divided up into small groups of } peopie, each of which supports its own place of worship, so that what is true of any one congregation is true of the community st large. A poor congregation builds ao cheap church ; a rich congregation erects a magnificent edifice on costly ground ; the value of the church property is a pretty fair measure of the pecuniary resources of the congregation, If church property were assessed the tax would fall upon the indi- vidual taxpayers of the respective congre- gations, who would have to pay as much mere in contributions to the church as they paid less on their private property. The supposed relief to the taxpayers would be hike s man trying to increase his money by taking a sum out of one pocket and putting it into the other. ‘ This parallel holds true only in the rough and is not quite perfect. There is a fraction | of the community which takes no interest in churches and contributes nothing to their support. This small minority would be somewhat relieved by the taxation of church property ; but they have no title to ask the majority to grant them such relief. A tax on churches wonld be a tax on the most liberal, public-spirited and gencrous part of the community for the benefit of the irreligious and selfish few, who deny their families the advantages of religious instruction. Our American churches and Synagogues are supported by the voluntary contributions of their members, and a tax on them would be a tax on the best sen- timents of humanity, Every wealthy church or synagogue makes provision for its own sick and poor, thus lightening the expenses of the public institutions of charity ; many of them support their own schools, thus saving the taxpayers from a part of the bur- den of the common school system and tho necessity of additional school buildings, tenchers and text books, and the irreligious minority have no equitable claim to profit by such liberality beyond the benefit they derive from diminished public taxation for the support of educational and charitable institutions, It is quite possible that the exemption of some kinds of church property from taxa- tion may be attended with abuses in relation to other kinds which ought not to be ex- empt ; and we favor a stricter scrutiny by the public authorities, As President Eliot fitly said, in concluding his wise, impressive letter :—‘If abuses have crept in, let them be reformed. If institutions which are really not of a public character get exempted, cut them off; if greater publicity is de- sirable in regard to the condition and offairs of the institutions €x- empted, provide for annual published re- turns ; if there be fear of improper sales of land, long exempted, to the private advan- tage of the trustees or proprietors of the mo- ment, enact that all sales of such property shall be by order of a conrt, and that the Court shall take cognizance of the invest- ment of the proceeds. But while we reform the abuses, let us carefully preserve the precious uses of the exemption statute. That statute is an essential part of our existing system of taxation. It may be expedient that the whole system should be recon- structed ; but the exemption of religious, educational and charitable property is cer- tainly not the point at which the recon- struction should begin.” Our Paris Cable Letter. The production of a brand new opera is the best thing Paris can find to agitaté itself over at present, and the news that ‘Jeanne d’Arc” will move to poor music cannot be compensated for by putting the Maid of Or- leans into gorgeous stage clothes. The valorous pucelle has not been well treated by Frenchmen. The Englishmen who burned her, Bob Southey who wrote his empty and pretentious epic about her, and the Roman Church that has lately refused to canonize her have treated her little worse. She is one of the most unaccountable pheno- mena of history, and we wonder that Susan 'B. Anthony does not write o woman's rights lecture about her, and so res- ene Joan from Frenchmen and English- men and turn her devotion and her daring to some world-wide purpose. The health of the Czar and the rumors about his abdication are discussed in Paris with an apparent belief in the latter story. This does not find credit in London, and the truth of the matter must be left to the future. This seems to be the season for royalty to turn peripatetic, six of the sovereigns through France without stopping, to change | cards with President MacMahon, a fact | which, if it can be credited to anything | political, can only mean that Her Majesty | | liked the Empire better than the Republic, which is natural enough for a Queen. It | will not hurt anybody, though it may rejoice the Bonapartists, who need just now ‘all | they can get. Theatrical chat and personal | notes in Paris are interesting this week. Tue Wrature Dvuntxo To-Dar will be clear or partly clouded. Northerly to north- easterly winds will prevail, following the eastward movement of the high barometer, now central over the eastern lake region. The barometer will fall stendily ond the temperature will rise. From the southwest an atmospheric depression is advancing tow- ard us through the Ohio Valley, accompanied by heavy rains, which will cause the rivers of the watersheds it crosses to rise consider- ~ ably, notably the Mississippi and Ohio, We | may expect the threatened chango to-night | or to-morrow morning. Its appronch will be | indicated by inereased cloudiness, light rain and possibly snow in small flarries. When the storm passes the wind will change to westerly and northwesterly very rapidly. Look out for the weak dams in New Eng- of the pockets of the same persons who are { land! NEW YUKK HEKALD, SUNDAY, APKIL 2%, 1876.-QUADRUPLE SHEET, Real Estate—Rents. Few subjects are more discussed at this time by the people of the city than the ever- present ones of honse and home. For nine months of the year it is mostly home ; for the three months that precede the Ist of May it is strictly house; and the subject thus restricted is one that leaves no hour altogether free of anxiety and inquiry to. heads of families, Shall they stay where they are for yet another year and endure the ills they have rather than tempt fortune by venturing upon the unknown ills that are snre to be encountered around the corner? Shall they accept the moderate reduction to which the landlord assents and yield their more extreme demands on that head? How can they most gmcefally shorten sail on this point and go out of the grand house they have lived in to a smaller one and a cheaper rent without the air of defeat? These are difficult ‘points, but they must be met. Our report in another column exhibits that the number of houses to let at the present time is considerably greater than was the number to let at this time last year ; but the large agents, who may properly be regarded as a class of experts on topics of this nature, take a view of this fact which deprives it of any significance that might be deemed threatening in the real estate market. They regard it as an indication only of s prosent want of agreement oa terms between Jand- lords and tenants in actual oocupation ; a general result of colloquies between the ¢ which are terminated by a defiant dec! tion on the purt of the tenant that the ja lord can “pute bili on the house.” Natu- rally there are mang such conversations every year, and there ars always o great many mors houses to let than there are ac- tual removals. Quite as neturally, in view of the hard times, thera have been this year many more conversations of this sort than is common, and the larger number of houses with pills on or in the hands of agents is the consequence of this fact. Bnt os the Ist of May comes nearer and nearer landlords and tenants who stood on absolutely inconsistent platforms in Febru- ary and March mutually melt under the in- fluence of the April sir and a compromising spirit. Tenants who on the quarter day stood out for a reduction of twenty-five per cent relent a little as they see the number of people who want ‘just such a house ;” and the landlord who was not sure but rents should go up, ‘because moderato sized houses are greatly called for,” is not alto- gether satistieds with the applications, So they come together; a reduction of ten per cent is agreed upon; the bill is taken down, and the family remains. It is thought that this is the real explanation, and will be the result of the fact that an excess of houses to rent is in the market. Some general reduc- tion in rents seems likely to be a necessary consequence of the movement toward ‘‘hard- pan ;” but opinions seem equally clear that it will be a slight one. In fact, our people seem destined to liqui- date the inflation of rents by another pro- cess than the general reduction of figures. Pedple will mostly get smaller rents by get- ting into smaller houses. Inevitably, there- fore, there will be a movement toward houses of a moderate size; but many people in this class of houses will’go into apartments, and of these movements the first will neutralize the other so far as to prevent ao considerable fall. For larger houses the reduction will be greater. But the demand for houses here, in view of the necessary limit of supply, will prevent any great decrease even at this point, especially ina time so likely as the centennial year to inspire social activities. April Fool’s Day. This year men have three hundred and sixty-six days in which to make fools of them- selves, and candor compels us to say that they make excellent use of the opportunity. Not contented with this perennial exhibition of the folly of humanity they have set apart one day in the year in which to make fools of each other—a superfluous occupation, like painting the lily, yet one in which everybody takes particular delight. Yester- day was the Istof April and it was celebrated with great enthusiasm and unusual success. Some of these follies we would briefly report. * Intense excitement was caused early in the day by the rumor on Wall street that Grant had really decided to be o candidate fora third term, notwithstanding the ruin that has fallen upon his administration. Thou- sands of people were made April fools of by the story that Tilden had written a letter declining to permit his name to be submitted to the St. Louis Convention. A very large number of persons were hoaxed by the an- ‘nouncement that Tweed had returned to the city. The report that Pendleton had given | back to the railroad company he 60 ably represented in Washington seventy or eighty thousand dollars was not so successful, most persons receiving the intelligence with undisguised derision. The statement that | Schenck, after the conclusion of the investi- gation of the Emnia mine, intended to go back to England and insist upon a vindica- tion in the British courts, was also met with incredulity. On the contrary, the story that Bergh had been arrested for sonking a cat, which every night bewailed its lost loves on the wall beneath his window, in kerosene, ond then sctting fire to its tail, met with more acceptance. It was thought that he was entitled to that little Inxury. A great number of well meaning but ignorant peo- ple in Brooklyn were deceived by the report | that Mr. Beecher intended to sue Moulton | Finally, a great hoax was success- | fully perpetrated by the announcement that | having attended the services of | for libel. Tooker, Moody and: Sankey at the Hippodrome, had been accidentally converted, and intended | to exchange the dramatic profession for the ministry. s It is strange that in New York, a city renowned for its intelligence, with a grand intellectual press, ruled by the noblest in- tellects, such as —— and —— and —— (the reader will readily recognize the allu- sion), with its schools, churches, libraries | and ite countless benevolent institutions, lunatic asylums and hospitals for the de- | velopment of imbeciles, it is strange, we | | say, that such hoaxes as these could so | easily succeed. But it is so—we regret to say it—but it is so. Our people have been fooled so often and so greatly, that even if they were told they never had been fooled and never would be fooled they might actually imagine that information to be true. Our London Cable Letter. There is now no donbt that the title “Empress of India” will be added to the royal style of England. The English growl will be drowned in the salvos of big guns and the blasts of the royal trumpeters. Nominally to honor the most important of English conquests— Indin—it will give most satisfaction in another conquest—Ireland—because to the Irish people alone it will bring a gift. The release of a few unimportant prisoners was & small price fora Ministry to pay for so im- portant a triumph, but in accepting a bar- gain with such conditions Ireland has no cause for regret, and in helping to force a distasteful title on Englishmen the patriots of the Emerald Isle may persuade themselves they. are having a sardonic revenge on John Bull. Next in in- terest to this imperial topic comes the inter-university boat race, The “‘light blue” is becoming a faster color in sporting estimation, but the sympathy of the Lon- doners will row in the Oxford boat, as they | have a long count of defeats to wipe out. | Spelling bees, it appears, have had their {hum out in England, os they have ‘had here, and the new society amuse- | ment about to take its place is a | very primitive ome. Whether dancing | or singing is the older art, it is fairly demon- | strable on philosophic grounds that people danced r surg, or hopped and howled, before the great god Pan went down in the reeds by the river to discover the germ of Wagnerism in his pipe. That in a civilized age sated, nay, maddened, with the con- cord of sweet sounds from brass, wood, sheepskin and catgut, society should turn away from instrumental music and dance to chorused nursery rhyme is suggestive that the human tympanum has its limits of endurance. It is a return to first principles, recalling the sated Sybarite, who turned from pité de foie gras with disgust and dined on a red herring. We may soon expect to have these ‘hops and howls” become the rage here, for the amuse- ment, like the musio, is likely to prove catching. Walt Whitman’s Want—A Public. pierced the several crusts of society, begin- ning at the bottom one, had some great ad- always had enough to eat and to wear. maxims are that all poets should be well vantages over their less lucky brethren who | given to hope will A| Dr. new school is fast gaining ground, whose | us from Jerusalem to Emmaus and introduce hungry this uf g ing-buffalo be an improvement | ideal of strangling the last king with | the entrails of the last priest, but it is still a little wild to run 1 steady government on. These are some of the reasons why Mr. Whitman is unsuccessful here. Whether his “Leaves of Grass” will, like Drayton's ‘Poly. olbion,” be dng up aftera couple of cen- turies to give asubdued mummified pleasure to the curious, we leave to the literary bur- rowors of that period, and the defence of our poets, whom Mr: Buchanan calls ‘‘crows,” we leave to themselves. Pulpit Topics To-Day. A question of some importance will be discussed to-day by Mr. Smith, of Brook. lyn—‘“‘Ought Moody and Sankey to be sus- tained?” They have been pretty well sus. tained up to the present, and we see no rea son why their ministry should be less ae ceptable in the future than it has been in the past. To be sure there is a sameness about both preaching and singing, but the multitudes attend, and hearts are touched and transformed. But it ig said that there were more inquirera and converts after Mr. Lloyd's ser. mon last Monday evening in the Hippo- drome than theré has been after any service of Mr. Moody’s there. Mr. Lloyd isa man of faith and of works, too, and he will speak to-day about the trials and rewards of faith. ‘This is the saving element that is lacking in so many persons, and the one thing about which Mr. Phelps will speak. It is one of the three steps that Mr. Nicholas will advise impenitent persons to take in coming to Christ. And if they should not know very clearly what saving faith is Mr. Giles will tell them what it is and how it can be gained and exercised and made ef- fective in man’s salvation, It is this that gives Jesus the pre-eminence and that cures the leprosy of sin. Hence Mr. Wright will invite men and women to exercise this faith in Christ to-day. The Bible is acknowledged to be a remarkable book, and Mr. Hepworth will explain ita effect on man’s mind, while Mr. Alger will offer his people some of its consolations amid the trials of life and show what a bad The idea that poverty isa good training | bargain man makes who gains the world school forpoetry has been held by a great | and loses his soul. The constraining power many, and undoubtedly the poets who | of Christ's love, right and left, will be con- sidered by Mr. Leavell, and His presence at the Feast of Tabernacles and His inspiration be portrayed by Armitage. Mr. McCarthy will take us to Christ and His kinsfolk and tell us fed, and that the works of the particular | when the end of this dispensation will come. poets who write for ‘future ages” and | Mr. Johns has a hinged subject to examine— all that sort of thing should be forced | the open and closed door—and he will down the throat of the present age, whether it would or no, Buchanan, himself, we believe, a poet, is the exponent of this newand dangerous doc- invite his people to enter while the door is Mr. Robert | open, ere it be shut and no man can openit. The cry of the departed saints will go up from Mr. Andrews’ altar, and will be an- trine, and he points his moral with the case of | swered by him or by Mr. Jutten in the resur- Walt Whitman. We do not know what Mr. ‘Whitman has to say of this doctrine, but in his heart of hearts he cannot approve ‘it. The picture which it would bring to his mind of bloated poets and a public dosed in platoons with his poetry as it came raw from his hands, just as old sea captains administer castor oil and lime juice to their crews, would be revolting tohim. Blatant, coarse and sensual as his song is, the ‘‘good, gray poet” would much prefer the modest, kindly offices which in old tinies men did for one another to the style of this druamhead Mr. Buchanan, who would go about shouting his friend’s poverty with the energy of an intoxi- cated tam-tam beater. To help a shunned fellow creature, be he poet or pariah, is a good office, and to help Walt Whitman put his poems in durable bind- ings, where posterity may get them, if it wants them, can scarcely be considered criminal in this liberal age. The chances against survival are very many, and Walt Whitman's friends have a right to assist him in the task of guarding his poems for the three incubatory centuries he deems necessary against the grinding teeth of the cynical rag mill of time ; for, as Swift says in the ‘Tale of a Tub,” ‘Books, like men, their authors, have no more than one way of coming into the world ; but there are | ten thousand to go outof itand return no more.” So far Mr. Buchanan has a tolerable cause, but beyond that he plunges into a quagmire, to use a mild expression. When he berates the American people, calls ‘typical Yankee editors” pudding | heads, scolds American poets for ‘‘rooks” and | “crows,” calls Whitman asick eagle and ‘‘the only remaining prophet” whom America | wants to murder, Mr. Buchanan is reck- lessly floundering. There is a certain quality in Whitman’s writing which is not overlooked or underestimated in this ; country—namely, his bold belief in | the great destiny of the United States—but | his unconthness, his catalogue tediousness, | which is that of a business directory, albeit | in spasms, remove even the least objection- able of his ‘‘poems” from that interest rection. Tue Intxess or Prestpent Grant causes considerable uneasiness among his intimate friends, and is threatening to assume a very serious phase. The President complains of physical prostration, which produces a reac- tion on the brain and renders a cessation from all mental effort positively necessary. It is satisfactory to know that everything that medical skill can sugges‘ is being done for the distinguished sufferer and that abso- lute rest for a short time will help in a great measure to restore him to health. The cares of the Presidential office during the present period of excitement must necessarily in- juriously affect a temperament naturally disposed to quiet. Tae Kueprve or Eeyrt, who has been in very tight financial circumstances, has found friends in Paris. A glance at onr despatches regarding the successor to the Pharaohs will show that he is not as entirely bankrupt as many people have imagined. PERSONAL INTELLIGENCE. Utah lost 4,000 cattle by the snow, The prospects of the English iron trade are gloomy, There is nothing so hard in the breaking away of a d—m as this swear and tear, ‘The two gas companies of Detroit are fighting and Lewis puts kerosene into his column, Itis a noteworthy fact that gas stocks are always readily taken as investments, because they pay largely. In San Francisco cucumbers are selling for $1 apiece, while peppermint 1s only twenty-five cents a bottle. A Kansas paper says that ‘‘n lady may beg lady an¢é wear pantaloons.”’ True, if sho don’t try to put ‘om on over her head. Miss Luey Frelinghuysen, daughter of the Senatot from New Jersey, is towed Mr, Charles Robbing, of New York, in April. The Whitehall, Times says:—‘‘Post tradors are now called aides-de-camp.—Nxw York Hrraup.’? We amend. Wouldn't aid-de-scamps be better? Frank Blair died worth $500. Now, if Frank bad re- { mained in the republican party, and had watched his | chances, what a fortune he might havo left. Montgomery Blair says that the democratic party te be strong must be clean, and the Pittsburg Commercial | wonders whether this ts a political or a soap campaign, A “broker” writes that he does not like to read our which would make his work profitable, | money article. Why, then, does he persist im ‘doing ‘This is the most hopeful view. When it | 9%? He shows a mighty accurate acquaintance with i ‘ ++, What he doesn’t like, H is added that the “good, gray poet” A boy in Maryland had a water snake two feet long | has more unfiltered filth and naked | taxon irom him. Chandler held one of his boote in nastiness in his works than would fit out an | front of him, and the water snake went for it, singing, | armada of Swinburnes in their most inde- | “Home, Sweet Home.” as | ; a4 | The St, Louis Republican says:—"The nne Sem i Puchipegry ibheatsite (nino rn | cheyennes for all, says the Burlington Hawkeye, We that in a country where women can read it knew these miscrable punsters would be cheyenne would bo hard to circulate his prophet. | pricks at ihat territorial journal.” Then, as to the prophecy. We heartily | The Rochester fiona says;—'‘Mona,” wo learn from sympathize with the aspirations after de- | the accomplished schotar of the Pittsburg Commercial, | mocracy which penetrate so many of Ri benaaeal ieecaih hie eras” that knows mi 1s own in these foreign dressin, the band of modern English singers— “94, potrott Free Pret visi thas ar be ether el Mr. Buchanan, we believe, among the | the phitadeiphia Star had on overcoat stolen from him 'number--and can dimly understand how | six years ago and identified tton the #treet the other even the incoherent exulting yells of Walt | ars oAN ra yA a te Wane the tails, * * | A Texan writing toa frend in Washington says:— Rieke tech, peri he 5 eaten | “Po you remember whon | asked you to see petkeay voice em, so that they absor! @ MOA! | gout securing a trading post for me in Toxas that you | stench of the breath for the sake of the | wrote back saying that he listened to you with a pe- democracy. In America, however, where | culiar smile?” freedom is, there is no such temptation. | The Reading Eagle says that a Philadelphia firm ie | | sending lithographed letters to villae girls inviting | The engl rps aioe of the Beclara- | them to Ieave Note quietly and accept a position in the tion of Independence had its echo in © Centennial, The meaning of this villanous invitation our day in the Proclamation Of | will be apparent to poople of the world. Emancipation; but, as Americans dine daily | Spring has a sentiment which comes before the on the roast beef of liberty, they cannot, ex- | violets and anemones. In the leafless wild wood j | Maple sugar is babbling and boiling, while turw jeeers oe, Such. eetesceniee cerca | seachele i gingham aprons—we mean that down is exhibit the same enthusiasm over the meat | ihe Greenwich street cellars men are making «le that glows in the breasts of the freedom- | Sugar out of dirty molasses ana brown sagas,