The Sun.
London, England, 1865-05-19 00:00:00

COURSE OF EXCHANGE--This Evening.

Amsterdam Short. 11 174 11 184
Ditto 3 Months. 11 19i 12 3.
a
Rotterdam
Antwerp — 25 47 25 50
Brussels
Hamburg
Paris Short 25 174 25 25
Ditto 3 Months. 25 424 25 474
Marseilles
Frankfort on the Maine —120 f
Vienna — 11 224 11 271
Trieste — 11_ 224 11.. 27.
_ _

Petersburgh
Berlin
Madrid
Cadiz
Leghorn
Milan
Genoa
Naples
Palermo
Messina

84
4'7 •.•
471
254857/ 25 2
25 57/ 25 62
25 57 25 62
25 57/ 25 62
25 57 25 62
25 57 25 62

STOPPING THE TELEGRAPH. —A correspondent
writes from Savannah on April 29 :—" A curious incident
occurred yesterday. The telegraph to Hilton Head sud-
denly ceased working, and visions of guerillas disturbed
for awhile the brains of the operators. On investigation,
however, it was discovered that a few miles down the river
some negroes, who were engaged in rafting logs, wanting
some rope to secure their rafts, and having none at hand, '
had concluded to use telegraph wire for that purpose.
Accordingly they had actutilly cut down one of the poles,
and taken three or four hundred feet of wire to tie their
logs together with. The damage was soon repaired, and
the audacious darkies will probably not venture soon to
repeat their experiment."
PRESIDENT LINCOLN'S FIRST DOLLAR.—In Phila-
delphia, on the 24th ult., the Hon. Wm. D. Kelley,
who was on terms of intimacywith the late President Lincoln
from the day of his election to that of his tragical death,
delivered an address upon his life and character before the
Girls' High and Normal School, in the course of which he
related the following anecdote :—One evening in the execu-
tive chamber there were present a number of gentlemen,
among them Mr. Seward. A point in the conversation sug-
gesting the thought, Mr. Lincoln said, "Seward, you never
heard, did you, how I earned my first dollar ?" " No,"
said Mr. Seward. " Well," replied he, " I was about 18
years of age. I belonged, you know, to what they call
down South, the ' scrubs'—people who do not own land,
and slaves are nobody there. But we had succeeded in
raising chiefly by my labour sufficient produce, as I thought,
to justify me in taking it down the river to sell. After
much persuasion I got the consent of my mother to go, and
constructed a little flat boat large enough to take the
barrel or two of things that we had gathered, with myself
and little bundle down to New Orleans. A steamer was
coming down the river. We have, you know, no wharves
on the Western streams, and the custom was, if pas-
sengers were at any of the landings, for them to go out in
a boat, the steamer stopping and taking them on board.
I was contemplating my new flat boat, and wondering
whether I could make it stronger or improve it in any
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hw ht
unntkaw,o
amnedn
lcnonnikei n down w
atn ttoh
e the shore
different in b
oacar-s
singled out mine, and asked 'Who owns this ? I answered
somewhat modestly, I do.' Will you,' said one of them,
take us and our trunks out to the steamer ?' 'Certainly,
said I. I was very glad to have the chance of earning some-
thing. I supposed that each would give me two or three
bits. The trunks
on were put on my
sculledioiiatte thine
themtp a sehonuegatev
ytr
to
pt seatedthe
et
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atmh
steamec aste.lavTgeahsiengtheotnrubonkAard,aannfladd
trunks, and put them on deck. The steamer was about to
when I called out that they had for-
gotten to pay me. Each of them took from his pocket a
silver half dollar, and threw it on the floor of my boat. I
could scarcely believe my eyes as I picked up the money.
Gentlemen, you may think it was a very little thing, and
in these days it seems to me like a trifle ; but it was a most
important incident in my life. I could scarcely credit that
I, a poor boy, had earned a dollar in less than a day—that
by honest work I had earned a dollar. The world seemed
wider and fairer before me. I was a more hopeful and con-
fident being from that time."
A POPULATION COLU3IN.--For the benefit of
those who discuss the subjects of population, war,
pestilence, famine, &c., it may be as well to mention that
the number of human beings living at the end of the
hundredth generation, commencing from a single pair,
doubling at each generation (say in thirty years), and
allowing for each man, woman, and child an average space
of 4ft. in height and one foot square, would form a vertical
column, having for its base the whole surface of the earth
and sea spread out into a plane, and for its height 3,674
times the sun's distance from the earth. The number of
human strata thus piled one on the other would amount
to 460,790,000,000,000.—Sir John Ilcrschel in the Fort-

nightly Review.
The report of the Brazilian and Portuguese Bank,
to be presented on the 30th inst., shows that owing
to the late commercial convulsions at Rio the profits
of the year, amounting to £27,283, have been ab-
sorbed, and that £19,717 still remains to be, pro-
vided for to cover the estimated losses, which are
set at £40,000. A new local committee has been
appointed at Rio.