The New York Herald Newspaper, November 28, 1878, Page 6

6 NEW YORK HERALD pile BROADWAY AND ANN STREET. JAMES GORDON BENNETT, PROPRIETOR, the year. MILY HERALD, p: y doy tn Te | OUTH SIXTH W YORK HERALD— | will he received and | forwarded ou the sitine terms as in New York, NIBLO'S GARDEN—Vic GRAND OPERA HOUS: LYCEUM THEATE BROADWAY THE BOWERY Tl NEW YORK AQ’ WIlITRHOYS OF 198. Thaskp Housks, GERMANIA Til FIFTH AVENUE SHEATH ABERLE’ SAN FRANC FOLLY THEA BROOKLYN At “NEW YORK, THURSDAY, N 5 The probabilities are that the weathey in New York and its ricinity to-day will be cool and cloudy, with cccasional ruin or snow, followed by gradual clearing. To-morrow it will be cold and partly cloudy. WaALt Srrrer Yrsterpa ket was active but irr being particularly weak. G were firm, States steady and railroads strong. Money on call was easy at 3 a4 per cent and closed at 3 per cent. Gold opened and closed at 1002, selling in the interim at 10014. he stock mar- Tuk Fast Duivine resolution on the upper boulevards has become a law. Let them out! Aw Iypias AGeNt has at last been indicted. Now let twelve honest Indians be put on his jury. Ir Is Some Coxsoratros to know that we have heard the last of the Vanderbilt will case for this year. t been admitted to the A Canaan has at honors and privileges of citizenship. Wonder if Tammany will let him in? Tue Port of the important decision to bank- ers, elsewhere given, is that they must transfer stock on their books when so requested by the owners. PrrwocTn Cav i received a severe slap from some of the Congregational churches last | the Queen’s chapel. NEW YORK HERALD, THURS DAY, NOVEMBER 28, 1878—TRIPLE SHEET. Thanksgiving Day. The briefest thanksgiving proctamation ever issued was one of Governor Marcy's, whieh, as neatly as we can recollect it, was couched in the tollowing terms:— Exrevrive ChaMBer, Xo.) In accordance with custom I hereby appoint Phuts- day, the 20th of November, as a day of public thanks- giving in this State. WILLIAM L. MARCY, ‘This was as business-like as the state- ment once made by the Duke of Wellington | that ona particular ocession he was en- gaged in “transacting public worship” in Governor Marcy prob- ably intended by his dry and naked an- | nouncement to intimate the slight esteem in which he held the great annual festival of the New England Puritans. More than forty years have passed since the date of that singularly curt exhibition of official piety, and within that petiod the regular annual observance of ‘Lhanksgiving Day has become an honored custom in every part of the United States, The appoint- ment of occasional days of thanksgiving was notan uncommon thing in the early history of the country, but, like the singing of a public “Te Deum” in foreign churches, it did not recur at stated periods, except in New England, being merely a recognition of . the Divine mercy in some extraordinary benefit or success, Asa regular autumnal observance it had prevailed for more than two centuries in New England before it was generally adopted in the other States, and in its diffusion it has well nigh lost its original character and significance. In New York, which, as the only State which borders on New England, would naturally be among the earliest to adopt the custom, the first regular Thanksgiving proclamation was issued by Governor De Witt Clinton in 1817, but the scarecly disguised contempt with which Gov- ernor Marcy felt at liberty to treat the observance nearly twenty years later showed how little hold it had State. In the Southgrn States its progress was still slower, A Jhanksgiving procla- mation was issued in Virginia in 1855, but two years later Governor Wise refused to make one. In the Western States, whose first settlers were chiefly from New Eng- land, Thanks;§ving Day became from the first 2 favorite and honored festival, and its popularity was gradually extended to the Middle States and the South. Previous to the civil war the custom had been adopted by about one-half of the Southern States. It is a noteworthy circumstance that the Governors of the several States are abandon- ing their former custom of ‘publishing an annual proclamation. Originally all these invitations came from the Governors, each selecting a day to suit himself, so that the festival fell on different days in different States. About the year 1860, or perhaps a little earliér, a practice, began to grow up of an exchange of views between Governors of neighboring States and appointing the same day by mutual concert. The con- venience ofa common day was so obvious and a general consultation among the Gov- ernors,so troublesome that in 1863 Presi dent Lincoln anticipated their action by appointing a day of general thanksgiving, and motives of loyalty favoring its indorsement the Governors of nearly all the States which had not gone into the rebellion accepted Mr. Lincoln's selection of a day and made their proclama- tions accordingly. From that year forth a evening in the refusal to invite her to attend a mutual council. Owixe To THE Harp Times the Travellers’ | Club has resolved upon a dissolution. It ia strange that with so many tramps around such a club should fai Amone Jersey Pouitictans the interesting question just now is, What will the republican Senate do with the Governor's appointments in which its concurrence is required ¢ Iy tue Wan of the bill-posters and the Metro- politan Railroad the company has been entirely suceessful. Instead of prosecating, it ought to drop an engine on the next bill-sticker. Tus Equiraute Lire has resolved to pay the | Dwig ve claim. Few will question the icers, that no one ever committed suicide for the benefit of his creditors. Jr Looks as if the Louisiana authorities were really in earnest in bringing to punishment the perpetrators of the alleged frauds in the recent election. We shali probably be in a better posie tion to jadge of their sincerity in a few weeks. Tarren Huexprep Dotians, the amount of the verdict against s railroad company in one of the courts yesterday for killing a boy, is not a very large sum for a life, but it will havea tendency to check the slaughtering propensity of the corporations. Ip THE ALDE urant the request of the en- cerprising advertising company that wants to decorate the lampposts with swinging sigus a majority of © ens will fecl like passing anothar ordinunee to—as faras they will go—hang up an alderman with each sign. CoLLEcTOR Switit, of Chicago, in a card else- where printed, rives to explain in regard to the indictment of Supervising Architect Hill and his immediate predecessor. He modeatly dis- chiims the prominent part assigned him in the affair, aud declares that he is only a patriot try- ing to do his duty and serve his country. ‘Tun Wrarusn.—The area of high barometer ed very rapidly eastward and is now over yva Seotia aud the northern section of the New England Sta The depression that was over the northwestern districts has moved into the lower lake regions and the Ohio Vall nd a | storm centre of considerable energy is develop: ing in the latter district. The low aves that was in the Bastern Gulf districts has moved into the Atlantic off the South Atlantie States. Rain has fallen in all the distriets except the northwest | aul the northern part of the New England | States, and heavy snows are repor in the Central Valley districts. The winds have been generally brisk on the Atlautie end Gulf const aud in the Jake regions, Elsewhere they have been generally fresh, There has been ageneral rise in temperature in the northwest and som ctions of the Gulf districts, In the other sections it lus fallen. The northwestern distarbance, having moved w the coast distric aud will winds, The hy remarkable rapidity into . Will soon pass into the ecenn ollowed by cold northwesterly ser on the Middle Atlantic be w and New England coasts will be severe during The weather in New York and its toanortow, vicinity today will be cool and elondy, with or- | long as the Republic. regular annual ‘thanksgiving proclamation has been “Issued by the President of the United States with the fall approbation of the country. For several years this had no effect in superseding the separate procia- mations of the State Governors, who ac- cepted the President’s designation of the day, but tried their own hands at » piece of graceful official rhetoric, But since they could only rgpeat the President's topics in different phraseology, which suggested comparisons not always to their ad- vantage, they have been gradually drop- ping the practice until the chiming chorus of repetitions is likely to dis out. Having passed from its original character of a State festival to a national festival there is no reason for the muititude of local proclama- tions, It is fully established as a national observance and will probably endure as But in the process of its extension its deep color of religion has faded into paleness and it has taken ona character in which social and especially family ieeling predominates. Its distin- guishing peculiarity is the gathering to- gether of all the scattered members of a household under the one roof to brighten the links of domestic affection. Originally it stirred the religious senti- ments of the observers to their profoundest depths, Borrowed by the Massachusetts Puritans from ao similar Hebrew festival the copy very far surpassed the model. It was not merely that the Puritans were pro- foundly religious and that their whole nature shot up into one growth of fervent piety, but that they were so circumstanced that their very lives depended on the harvest of each year. Their lot had been cast in a bleak climate and on a sterile soil, and they were so secluded and Gistant from the rest of the world that they were beyond relief in the event of a famine. They had | neither ships to bring fcod from Europe nor the means of paying for it if brought by others. It the crops of the year failed they were brought face to face with abso- lute starvation, without any hope of turn- ing away the wolf from their doors. They could not but teel the keenest anxiety re- specting their crops; and recognizing the | hand of Providence in everything their joy | over each ingathered harvest took the form of profound thanksgiving to Almighty God. The religious part of the observance was not, as it has become in our time, a vaguo superficial sentiment, but a fervid feeling which struck its roots into‘ the very depths of their being. Oaly a small community sitnated as they were in a region of natural barren- | Hess, subject to the blight. of premature frosts, separated by a wide ocean and still more by poverty from all means of succor, could have made of ihanksgiving Day a | thing so serious and real as it was with the tutional rain or snow, followed by gradual clearing, Toaorrow it will be eold aud partly sloudy. one-half, and the brighter half, of these annual observances. A Past Day was just early Paritans, Thanksgiving was only | as regularly appointed by the Governor in as yet taken on the religious feeling of the |’ April as a Thanksgiving Day in Novem- ber. So great and constant was the anxiety of the Puritans respecting their crops that they assembled in their churches in deep humiliation every spring, before planting their seed, lest th sins should be punished with an unpropi- tious season, The Fast Day was continued in all the New England States down toa time within the memory of people who are not yet old, But when the harvest of each famine these observances gradually lost their intensity until the Fast Day was dis- carded and Thanksgiving Day parted with its deeply religious character and became © pleasant oceasion for a festive reunion of fumilies—a beautiful holiday which retains some tincture of the profound piety which marked its carly history. sons for thankfulness this year are fitly re- cited in President Hayes’ excellent procls- mation. Overcrowded Prisons and Asyluams. The presentment of the Grand Jury on the condition and operations of the penal and charitable institutions on Blackwell's Island is a paper that deserves serious at- tention, The increase of pauperism and crime necessitates what the grand jurors call a ‘cruel overcrowding, particularly in some of the asylums and hospitals” —a state- ment which will not be regarded as any too strongly worded in face of the fact that the lunatic asylum, which is designed to accom- modate two hundred and fifty inmates, con- tained last year no fewer than four hundred. As these afflicted persons are especially in need of space for the purposes of clean- liness, pure air and a proper separation of the different degrees and phasesof insanity, the evil of this overcrowding cannot be overestimated. Another hospital building which is intended for sixty-six patients has been forced this year, not to accommodate, but to hold one hundred and twenty-six. The evident remedy for this evil is an in- erease in the cxpacity of the buildings. If our criminals and paupers have grown upon our hands so rapidly as to render the institutions provided for their care and safe keeping insufficient we must build addi- tional asylums’ and prisons. But at the same time we can provide a partial remedy, or, at least, a relief, by exercising a little | common sense in the disposition and use we make of some portion of the army of thieves, debauchees and yagrants we are compelled to support. The statistics of the institutions show that twenty thousand commitments for vagrancy, drunkenness and petty crimes last year represented only five thousand individuals, or, in other words, that the persons imprisoned for short terms during the year averaged four commitments each. This makes it ev- ident that the practice of sending offenders for a few days or weeks to the Island, where they cau idle away their time, instead of being a punishment is a favor (p many who, as the Grand Jury says, regard the public institutions as “recruiting places.” The same story is true of able-bodied paupers, towhom the Island is a place of shelter, where eating and lodging are to be obtained without work. Every person committed for drunkenness, vagrancy or any other offence and every able-bodied pauper ought to be put to hard labor during his stay on the Island. We should then have fewer petty commitments and fewer sturdy vagabonds living at the public expense. This woald speedily thin out some of the institutions, So far as the hospitals, and especially the insane asylum, are con- cerned, if the present accommodations are insufficient they should be increased with- out delay. ; A Fair Offer for the Ablest Manager. There is in our possession a check tor twenty-five dollars on the Brooklyn Trust Company, drawn and indorsed by Mr. David Taylor, the business agent of the Redpath Literary Bureau, who have engaged Ole Bull for a certain number of concerts. It It was sent by Mr. Taylor to an uttaché of the Hgnatp, under the estensible sugges- tion that Mr. ‘Taylor was the cashier of the Heraip @nd was paying off the attaché for work already performed on the paper, but really as prepayment for a week's expected notices in our columns. Tho check may either be worth twenty-five dollars or be valuableonly asacuriosity. The attaché who recoived it turned it over to us, as he was in duty bound to do; and presuming that Mr. Taylor is satisfied with this and other notices we offer to dispose of his check as follows:—Let the visitors to the great Cathedral fair vote thix check to the ablest manager of a place of amusement in New York, the manager receiv- ing the highest number of votes to become its possessor, with such rights as may be vested in it. Thus the ablest manager will be honored like the most popular general, who was voted a sword; like the most popular police inspector, who was voted a glorious shield; and like the most popular editor, who was voted a gold pen, or something of that kind, by admirers visiting the great fair. As a United States bond for a large amount has been offered to be raffled for at the fair we hope that this little contribution of Mr. Taylor's check will be accepted. It is small in amount, but the recipient will feel large, Of course we do not need to indorse it, but cnly to present it to the ablest manager in New York. Visitors to the fair should choose this manager by their votes. The check might afterward be framed and placed in the corridor of the place of amusement conducted by the ablest manager. It would be a great advertisement for him, As an offering from the visitors to the fair it would be worth more than many photo- gtuphs to the manager, and it would pay him and the fair; too, if his friends would flock around and support him. Perhaps the fair might extend its time for a few days in order to allow ladies who attend mati- nées to express their opinions about the “blest” manager. Indeed, if the price of votes were small enough, Mr. Taylor inight even become the owner of his own check, as, of course, he would if some other “ablest’” manager shonld get it cashed at the desk of the Brooklyn Trust Company. Now, which of the lady managers or which of tlie tables will be first in the field | tor this check? First come first served, year ceased to be the only barrier against | Our special rea- | ! attention and comment as The Pommerania Disaster. The latest despatches in regard to the loss of the Pommerania throw little or no additional light on the disaster. Captain Schwensen, whose explanation woul: in all probability clear up so many of the mysteries that envelop the case, is so prostrateld by illness at Rotter- dam that be is unable to make a statement, and until he has so far recov- ered as to be in a condition to give his ver- sion of the calamity it will be impossible to form an accurate judgment in the inat- ter, Lhe captain of the Moel Vilian has already told us all he has to say on the sub- } ject, and there is really nothing of im- portance in the latest accounts the passengers give of the ecollision., It will be seen trom our despatches that in London, where the calamity has made a profound impression, the fact that all the crew should have been saved while so many passengers were lost, has attracted as much it has on this side of tke water. In one of our de- spatghes this morning it is reported that some of the crew were overheard de- seribing how they drew their knives and kept the passengers from the boats. This may be an idle rumor, but it is hard to re- sict the conclusion that the conduct of the erew was not all that it should ‘have been when the supreme moment came. For exact information upon this and other points we must, in all probability, await the official examination. Slightly Tending to Diplomacy. In justice to the diplomatic representa- tives of the United States in foreign coun- | tries we publish elsewhere in to-day’s | Henatp a gallant vindication of our Minis- ter to Brazil from the charge of being ‘‘the meanest man in Rio Janeiro.” “The cham- pion who stands forth on behalf of the as- sailed Minister is the United States Consul at Rio Grande do Sul; and we insist that the “rheumatic pains with an increasing tendency,” superinduced by the cold and damp air of Lake Patos, from which that honorable gentleman appears to have been suffering when he penned his defence of the Minister's character, ought not to be re- garded asin any way impairing his testi- mony9 Indeed, the philanthropist who will stand by his friend and use a pen “slightly tending to diplomacy” in an- other's behalf while his own joints are racked with rheumatism, is doubly entitled to credence. The several counts in the indictment found against our Minister charge that he lives in a room in a low part of the city of Rio Janeiro; that the said room is scantily furnished; that it serves the purposes of bedroom, dressing room, parlor, reception room and public office, and that he rides in the lowest grade of street cars—as bad, we presume, asa Third avenue horse car—for the purpose of saving fare, Notwithstand- ing all this he receives a salary of twelve thousand dollars a year, and is thus a man of means, although this proves nothing, as it is well known that men of means are -often the meanest men in a community. All these charges are successfully met and triumphantly refuted by our United States Consul with increasing rheumatic pains and a friendly style of correspondence slightly tending to diplomacy. The United States Minister to Brazil does not live in the lowest part of Rio Janeiro, but, on the contrary, resides in the most aristocratic, pleasant and beautiful quarter of the town, even if it does go by the somewhat unaris- tocratic sounding name of Botofogo. He does not make a single chamber answer the several purposes specified in one count of the indictment, but, on the contrary, occupies the ‘‘entire south halt” of a large and desirable building. He does not boast of a camp bedstead, a three-legged stool, a cane chair with a deficient seat and a deal table as the extent of his household goods, but, on the contrary, sleeps on down, lounges 6n richly upholstered ottomans, entertains his guests on satin damask sofas, buries his velvet slippered feet in Turkish carpets and is altogether ‘‘elaborate” both in style and person. Indeed—and we ro- cord the fact with o thrill of national pride—his apartments are better furnished than those of the British Minister, and our gallant rheumatic Consul slightly tending to diplomacy boldly makes the assertion regardless of the risk of disturbing our friendly relations with Great Britain. As to the Third-avenue-car-like means of trans- portation alleged to be used by our Minis- ter, the slander is conclusively set at rest by the disclosure that no such objectiénable street cars aro tolerated in the aristocratic region of Botofogo. We have to thank the United States Con- sulat Rio Grande do Sul and the intelligent people of that foggy and boggy peninsula for the high opinion they entertnin of the Henaxp, received. gratis at the Consulate and ‘attentively read by all.” It is grati- fying thus to be able to dispense free infor- mation, or, as our correspondent has it, “knowledge and pleasure,” to the citizens of Rip Grande do Sul. our Consul’s promised letter on topics of generalinterest. Meanwhile we congratulate him on his triumphant vindication of the: character, residence and furniture of the nation’s representative at Brazil, whom, on the strength of the defence, we unhesi- tatingly believe not to be the meanest man in Rio Janeiro. The Great Athletic Meeting To-Day. The open meeting this afternoon on the new grounds of the Scottish-American Ath- letic Club, at Ninth avenue and Fifty-fourth street, promises to far outstrip, in point of nuinber of contestants, any event of the kind ever known in this country, if not even in England. Upward of five hundred youth, including many well known ama- teur athletes, are on the lists, and, as the races are to be handicapped and the man- agement is in the hands of men well known and of long experience in these matters, the meeting will probably prove one of ex. ceptional interest. This vast list of entries shows the wisdom of charging, practically, no entrance fee, and how easy it is at any time to get upa fine field meeting, espe- cially in this city or its vieinity. The hour of starting is fixed so late—two o'clock that unless the utmost despatch is shown in getting off the numerous heats darkness will cut off the later events. Great care should be taken not to crowd too many into one heat, especially as: the corners of the track are a little skarp and the men are likely to run unsteadily there. Doubtless, if all goes off well now, a winter meeting of | this famous club a few weeks later at the | Hippodrome wil! draw even greater crowds than did the police ath!etic. meeting last winter, when these snine Scotchmen showed what they knew about the ‘tug of war.” Down Among the Stalactites. 4 Whether it be 1 shivering meteorologist reading the thermometer in the Arctic re- gions when it registers fifty or sixty below | zero, or a geologist in a cavern, crowding hiniself between rozk walls, knocking his shins over stalagmites, in regarding their devotion to science we are filled with beautiiul thoughts. <A ribald rhymester ones wrote and published a burlesque upon such fine endeavors. Ih was called “The, Hunting of the Snark,” and became popular for a while among the ignorant masses, who do not appreciate these sub- lime inquests because they do not under- stand the lofty motive of the scientific explorer, To them a scientist squeezing himself through a remarkable cavern is only a man going through o hole under- ground. Wesha!l not stoop to point out their mistake." Such people would be sat- isfied with the first thousand stalactites they came to. ‘They wou!d not be wrought into fine scientific frenzy and want to see any more stalactites. ‘They would erroneously say that one stalactite was as good as an- other, They belong to that class who care nothing about the solar spectrum, and would not know the difference between the Fronenhoffer’ lines and a clothes line. But, scouting their sordidness, let us point with pride once more to the votary of science who lays aside his stovepipe and his sober suit of academic broad- cloth and takes his blue jean overalis and his tallow candle, his compass and his cold lunch, his thermometer and his ball of twine, and goes wriggling and squeezing along for whole days among exyuisite stalac- tal formations, bent—ay, often bent dou- ble—on his mission of adding to our knowl- edge of the beauties of the world. So was our correspondent lured to Luray, and how fervently he examines and how lucidly he explains the intricate labyrinth of rocky delight to be tound there may in other col- umns be more fully known to our readers, Slavery in St. Croix. The recent outbreak of the negroes in the Danish island of St. Croix, which re- suited in the destruction of so much prop- erty, cannot of course be justified. In taking the law into theirown hands and avenging their wrongs with the torch angl the dagger the unfortunate people were guiliy of the gravest of crimes, for which, it is to be presumed, their ring- leaders have before this been severely punished. But this is only one side of the picture. It will be seen from the letter elsewhere printed this morning that there is a terrible record of inhumanity end wrongdoing on the other side of the ac- count. For more than thirty years the so- called freedom of the blacks of St. Croix has been a mockery anda delusion, Under the forms of law they have been plundered and oppressed in every way possible, and itis not surprising that, despairing of a redress of their grievances, they at last rose against their persecutors and in a few hours destroyed the accumulations. of years. The authorities and the planters cannot be held wholly blameless in the matter. Common prudence, to say nothing about justice and humanity, ought to have prompted them to pursue a different pol- icy; but they goaded the half-savage people depetdent upon them to desperation, and to-day they bewail their folly amid the wreck and ruin of their plantations. Inthe end justice and fair play is the best, the cheapest and the wisest policy, and it is to be hoped the planters of St. Croix have: at least learned this lesson from their terrible experience. Medical Ethics and Puffery. We expectantly await | By the current number of the Medical Record it appears that the supervising com- mittee on good behavior of the local county society has in the past eleven months caught the professional brethren in ‘‘one hundred and seventy-five alleged breaches of the Code of Ethics” —one hundred and seventy- five offences against that very code for the violation of which the profession has the right to parboil its victims, It would seem, therefore, that the committee has been very acute and diligent in its inquiry or that the profession is gloriously indifferent to the obligations of its own code. With thisnum- ber of violutions actually discovered and dragged into the light of open day—brought fearfully home to the trembling delin- quents—one expects to read of the applica- tion of a discipline that will make these eases terrible examples. Gut there was no | discipline at all; for the delinquents, we suppose, would not stand it. It appears they did not know they were de- linquents. They had certified with an honest simplicity characteristic of all medical men that the public would be ben- efited by drinking a little water now and then. Asa general rule all water has a cer- tain value asa beverage—a point that is only doubtful as to the Croton in August -and the value of water as a beverage is nearly in proportion to its purity, But even the Ger- man mineral waters are better than river waters. So the doctors delinquent had urged the people to drink these. It was plain puffery, as the committee on good be- havior understood it, and they were ready to put the sinners over the knee of castigation ; but when the case was explained the sinners | gave it up and promised to sin no more. | ‘Thus have we narrowly escaped a fierce and savage professional war. In thissame Hecord | we notice, by the way, the argument from | Dr. Hammond that when you poké the end of your finger in your ear the roaring noise, yon hear is the sound of the cireulation in your finger. It may be true! But when you poke the handle of a knife in your ear, and hear the same noise, what is the cause of that? head against stalactites and barking his | Andvrassy’s Turn, Exploding « dynamite bomb in’ an elley beside the palace in which Count Andrassy was present at a banquet is avery mild demonstration of the spirit that is supposed to be abroad in all the capitals of Europe, and to menace the lives of all sovereigna and magnates. near them, From the desperate fellows in Pesth we should have expected more than a mere squil if we had thought of them as likely to emulate Passanante, Moncasi, Nobiling and Hidel, But they may have wisely thought that was enough for Andrassy. It is very likely the Count would, if his taste were consulted, rather face a whole confec- tionery shop fall of these bombs—rather have them at his table for dumplings—than encounter such an explosion as that pre- pared for sim in the Austrian Delegation. | Austria was not very handsomely used at | Berlin, when she was merely authorized to occupy the provinees her governn:ent coy. eted, She was shabbily used in those provinces when the people tought desper. ately against her intention to defend them from themselves. But what wore these mis- haps to the refusal of the pariiamentary authority to entertain a proposition to pay for the occupation? It adds gall to this refusal that it comes from the Ans- trian side of the monarchy. From Hun- gary it would have been natural enough; but if the usually less cantankerous side of the monarchy cuts up capers of this sort where will such parliamentary difficul- ties stop? How quaint is the contrast be tween Austro-Hungary and England! Free Britons were once never weary of de nouncing Austria as the type of all evil ab- solutism in government; yet in Austria to- day there is » more practical parliamentary control over the Ministry than there is in England. A New Gemeral Average System. The Association for the Reform and Codi- fication of the Law of Nations, which has for its object the codification and unifica. tion of the International law, has agreed upon a system of general average, which we publish elsewhere in to-day’s Herat, Official communications have been received by the European committee and by the secretary of the American committee signi- fying that England, Germany, the Nether- lands, Belgium, Sweden and Norway, Dens mark and France are prepared to accept the new rules. Several influential meetings have been held in New York, Boston and Philadelphia, at which these proposed rules have been approved, and it only remains for the shipowners and underwriters o! this country generally to express their approval of the new system to bring about uniformity in a most important bratich of international relations, is ‘““PERSONAL INTELLIGENCE. Senator Ferry is registered in Chicago. Absinthe roomis'are popular in New Orleans. Some of these nights a good frost will kill Sunset Cox. Séuator John H. Mitchell, of Oregon, is.at the Hoff man House. ‘The two strongest republicans in Ohio are Garfield and Sherman. We suppose one of the little Lornes will be called a Lornette. Sec? Private Dalzell says that Grant never appointed a privgte to office. Senator Jerome B. Chaffee, of Colorado, is at the Fifth Avenue Hotel. _ ‘The latest Julia‘ has for her Christian name Alfa She ought not to draw Omega house. In Brazil a good slave costs $1,000, and it costs, in. terest and all, $20 a month to support bf. ‘The young men at the Academy who go out be tween acts probably go out for an opera glass. Time changes all things. Yesterday it was the turkey that gobbled, and to-day you gobble the turkey. - Sandwich Islanders are being constantly removed to the plague spoton one of their islands, They seom to be a piague-going people. Here is an illustration of stupid English wit from London Judy:—"When is a ive pound note like a pice ture at an auction? When it’s ‘gone!’ ”’ Colonel Tf. L. MeKenny, who was for many years in charge of the Indian Bureau, and who was an Episcos pulian, used to say that the best way to subdue the Indians was tosend Roman Catholic priests among them. Captain Richard L. Law, United States Navy, Chief of Bureau of Yards and Docks, arrived at Annapolis, Md., yesterday, on a visit to the Naval Academy, and received a salute of ten guns from the United States ship Santee. As Adjutant General Townsendg past age for his office the two persons who are prominently talked of for his suecessor are General Drum, who is next in rank, and General Nelson Mills, whose wife is a nieco of the Shermans, Senator Sargent said to a Washington Star reporter that the next Presidency depends upon the election in California, which will go republican, because the State will poll a large vote and the Kearneyites will draw votes from the democrats. . London Trth:—"That Dr. Newman is to be made a cardinal is not very probable; the rules of his order forbid his accepting the red hat; and though this difticnlty could of course be got over by the personal interposition of the Pope, the opposing influences seom still likely to prevent an act of justice whiclt would be most popular among English Catholic lay- men,” Sidney Colvin says of Englishmen and the study of classical art:—‘If we are not to be left behind by Germans, by French, by Grecks, even in that part of archwological research in which we were till lately foremost, in the conduct of actual explorations and discoveries—if our too ambiguous national mission on the Mediterranean coasts is to have bne good re- sult, atany rate the increase of the sum of human knowledge and the advancement of ourown culture— then let us find the means of sending English scholare to work in the sites which scholarship holds sacred.” GENERAL LE MONUMENT. NO SUFFICIENT FUND COLLECTRD--POSTPONE+ MENT OF THE ENTERPRISE FOR THE PRESENT, 4 [By TELEGRAPH TO THE HERALD. ] Ricumoxp, Va., Nov. 27, 1878, The Commissioners appointed to select the best model for an equestrian statue of General Lee met to-day, and after @ brief examination of the models on exhibition and an inquiry into the finén. cial condition of the Lec Monument Association in- definitely postponed the whole matter, There were present Senators Morgan, of Alabama, and@ariand, of rexentatives Rogan, of ‘Texas, aud Arkansas; Manning, of ey Colonel Green, of rth Carolina; General Wilcox, of Louisiana; Captain , of Tennessee; General Marens J. Wright, of Missouri; Captain . Colston, of Mary- land; Governor surer Tt, ML , Hunter and Anditor Taylor, Virginia, and others, Congressman Regan was chosen chairman, ‘There were only exhibition, of which that sent by Mr. », but formerly of Philadelphia, was ‘The exitire amoun ascertained not to exceed § Senator Garland then pre lution, which was adopted :— Whereas the funds int for the corp! Go invare the sume, c association wag the models presente Resolved select wn ai ission is not now prepared t ch releetion be pestpomed Wnt such time ws th wagers may dewignute. The meeting then adjourned, and wntil some‘more Practical weans of raising fande is established the ef- torts to build a iwonument to the memory of Lee are at a standstill,