The Sun.
London, England, 1869-11-17 00:00:00

NG, INOVEMBER 17, 1F69.

AMERICAN AFFAIRS.

(From the Anglo-American Times.)
NEW YORK, Oct. 30.

'We are on the eve of an election, and the political
papers are screaming into all ears, Register ! Re-
gister ! but the people will not register, and not-
withstanding that the fate of the Republic hangs
on the issue, as we are all told, they seem to regard
that downward course (for they are said to be going
somewhere) with perfect unconcern, indeed with an
indifference which would argue they rather liked
rolling downhill. The sensation of the week re-
lates to General Butterfield, as Father Ilyacinthe
cannot be stirred up for public amusement. The
Father visited Mr. Beecher's church, and the two rev.
gentlemen afterwards dined together, to the scandal
of the Catholics, who regard the pair as almost be-
yond the pale. The pair, too, ate a broiled beef-
steak—the sinner—on Friday, which finished him,
although he liked it so much that he finished the
broil. On his return from Plymouth church he
was inundated with visitors. Next day he gave
peremptory orders that no one should he admitted.
He does not intend to visit Boston, but be will, if
possible, go to Washington, while he wants to
reach Rome in time for the (Ecumenical Council.
He paid a visit to Air. John Bigelow, at Highland
Falls, as he knew him well in Paris. The strikes,
both in the Erie Railroad and in the Franklin Tele-
graph Company, are now adjusted, the former by
the victory of the men, the latter by a compromise,
the telegraph operators receiving an advance of pay
of from 15 to 20 per cent., and all who participated
in the strike are to be reinstated. Mr. Paul Spof-
ford, of the firm of Spofford, Tileston, and Co., died
on Thursday at his country seat, 79 years old. He
made his wealth in the shipping trade, and hav-
ing been established since 1818 is one of our oldest
and best merchants. Mr. J. M. Vickers died on
Monday morning, and the flag on the Gold Ex-
change was kept at half-mast during that day. The
well-known philanthropist, J. W. Farmer, who
established the soup-houses in the hard year of
1857, died on Sunday. The weather has been plea-
sant, and things, trade, speculation, gaiety, and all
else, dull ; in fact, we have not recovered our drun-
ken bout of the 24th September, though there was
an effort during the week to get up a sensation
from Paris, which is declared to be on the eve of a
great turmoil. But it failed in affecting the gold
market, and a joke has been going the rounds
that the Emperor was the only man in Paris
who went to the alleged rendezvous to see
what was going on. There was a seizure in
Brooklyn, in a sweet place called Dickson's Alley,
of seven illicit whisky stills, and we had a de-
lightful little fray. Stones and sticks showered on
the heads of the revenue officers, who were quickly
triumphant, seizing the stills as well as some of the
obstructionists. Next day a truck was driven to the
rectifying establishment of Goodenough and Frank-
ley while under seizure. The guard were gagged,
and six barrels of contraband whisky were delibe-
rately carted away. It is, unfortunately, too true
that we do more than our proper share of business
in the divorce line, but sometimes we get strange
specimens from your side. We get through the
ceremony of getting rid of one wife before we take
another, but not so with a Sir Culling Eardley or
with a Roger O'Connor, who was yesterday com-
mitted for trial for having wives in all conve-
nient localities, two of them being in the court,
where a pathetic scene occurred, wife No. 2, tak-
ing off her wedding ring and giving it to wife
No. 1, weeping as she thus rid herself of the worth-
less baggage. Perhaps she felt relieved on getting
home in reflecting that it was not her husband who
was in gaol for bigamy. The cotton case, involv-
ing the right to the proceeds of $250,000 worth of
cotton taken from the Confederate Government
and sold, has been settled in favour of Vernon K.
Stevenson, Judge Blatchford dismissing the attach-
ment. The libel suit of the Erie directors against
tho financial editor of the Times was argued on
Monday in the Supreme Court before Judge Car-
dozo ; the damages are laid at $lOO,OOO, but a deci-
sion has not yet been arrind at. The proceedings
against the British Life Assurance Company,
which was swallowed up by the European Assur-
ance Society, which the London Times announced
to have failed, was resumed also before Judge Car-
doze, and Judge Porter ou behalf of the defendants
urged the vacating the order of appointing a re-
ceiver. It now transpires the Society liss not
failed, though a petition is to be heard in London
for winding it up. I find the statement of the Gold
Exchange Bank Receiver gives the portion left of
the capital of $500,000, as $290,000. The claims
against brokers amount to $174,000, of which
$1.00,000 are sail to be good. The disputed claims
against the bank amount to $50,000, so it is evi-
dent that the bank is perfectly solvent, with
some 20 per cent. of its capital lost. Mr. Le-
grand Lockwood's home at Norwalk has been dis-
cussed, and the owner's chamber is described as
furnished with elaborately inlaid rosewood, the bed-
stead canopied with green, forming a framework of
gold and jet. Attached are a dressing-room and
an oratory, the latter frescoed in imitation of fluted
white satin, the windows hung with Persian fabrics,
and the ceiling in rose, drab, and gold, with a dome
of sky-blue studded with stars. 'The Post-office
Department has had to change the time of departure
of the western mail from 6.30 to 5.20 p.m. to ac-
commodate the Erie. The Boston mail for the
wet has to wait till next morning, and all
city letters have to be deposited earlier or they
have also to remain in the box all night. The
drawbridge of the Central Railroad of New Jersey
at Newark Bay has often been the cause of acci-
dents. A day or two ago a large sloop pressed by
wind and tide was driven against the draw so
damaged it as to render it impassable. It was quickly
repaired, but there is always great danger in such
an accident. Wall-street is marked by an extra-
ordinary dulness, the gamble having taken the heart
out of many of the brokers and operators. There
was a smash, by the way, on the Union Pacific in
Utah, by which three Mormons were killed and five
wounded. Civilisation is approaching the new
Jerusalem with all its benefits in its train, and Mor-
mon brains are beginning to be knocked out on the
roadside. I hear the accident was the result of
shocking carelessness,

WASHINGTON, Oct. 29.

General Belknap has arrived, and is the guest of
Colonel Dayton, of General Sherman's Staff. He
has taken over the War Department. Secretary
Fish leaves to-day for New York, to vote on the
Tuesday elections. Mr. Law, the new Minister to
China, has just had an interview with him, but in
the absence of the President in Philadelphia, who,
with his family, will return this evening, instruc-
tions could not be given. Much anxiety is felt in
the Revenue Department to suppress the outrages
on the Revenue officers in the South, and as protec -
tion cannot be secured through the civil authorities,
it is proposed to delegate their protection to the
military. The gigantic frauds on the Revenue,
which have been worked into a system, cannot easily
be suppressed ; smuggling, counterfeit stamps, fal-
sification of returns, and every description of eva-
sion is practised, so that only a third of the tax from
tobacco has come in from the South ; indeed, the
frauds in tobacco are almost worse than in whisky
in the States of Virginia and North Carolina. Pa-
trols of the military arrest squads, and combinations
frequently involving Government officers are being
broken up, but at no small risk to the Revenue
officers. Some interest is taken in the elections in
New York, which promise to be close, and num•
bers of enip/oyc's will go there to vote. The New
Jersey Republic in Association has discovered what
it considers with reason to be a false return. On
calling the roll of clerks from that State, it was
found that most of them had never been in New
Jersey at all, but belonging to States whose quotas
being tilled up they had to palm themselves off as
of another State or fail to secure the appointments.
The Secretaries are doing all they can to relieve
themselves from the pressure of personal applica-
tion for office. Secretary Fish directs written ap-
plications only to be received, the President having
ordered that such applications be made to the heads
of the 'different Departments, and not to the White
House. Secretary Robeson has directed that no
apl 4icant for employment in the Navy yards be

admitted to an interview, and that the applica-
tions must be addressed to the Commandants
of these yards. He has begun some changes
which it is announcad will give general satis-
faction, if not to the employes, to the country.
Paymaster Bogart, who has been in prison for
nearly a year for the alleged misappropriation of
$lO,OOO, thought he had been libera.ed. He was
first brought before a civil court for trial, but be-
fore the case was concluded it was transferred by
order to a court-martial, and the second trial was
held in the Brooklyn Navy-yard, but as the sen-
tence was never announced the proceedings were
not promulgated. Mr. Bogart has been imprisoned
in the Receiving ship Vermont, where orders have
been sent to release him, the proceedings of the
court-martial having been set aside, but he was re-
arrested for another trial by the civil authorities.
The Iron and Steel Association still push their al-
legation of the undervaluation of foreign steel, by
which much of the duty is evaded and foreign com-
petition favoured. Mr. Boutwell informed Messrs.
Felton and ..11‘Alister, who had an interview on the
subject, that it was being thoroughly investigated.
Gen. Spinner's report will tell iu favour of women as
clerks, as in some classes of work they far excel
men—in copying and preparing mutilated currency,
in counting coupons and calculating interest, in
detecting counterfeits; two forged coupons sent
from Germany had been stopped by them after the
engravers and men had passed them as genuine.
The General thinks that on a fair start the women
would earn most money. General Butler and his
nephew, George Butler, arrived last Saturday, and
secured what they sought through the interest of
California ; the Senators of the Pacific Coast and
of New York all recommending George 11. Butler
for the Consul-Generalship of the East Indies.
Mr. Butler served, in the war, and was with Gen.
Lander previously in his expedition across the
Plains. He has resided for some years in New
York, where he is well known as a journalist. I
cannot say that General Grant has been always
fortunate in his appointments, but it is impossible
to be so under a system which makes party claims
weigh heavier than qualification. The most unfortu-
nate of his appointments is that of Gen. Butterfield,
who you may remember made such a parade of
counting the cash before he would take over the
Sub-Treasury in New York. The sight of so much
gold may have fired his imagination, for, although
a wealthy man, he seems to have allowed himself
to be used in his high office as a tool of a gambling
clique. He has resigned, but his successor has not
yet been named. Samuel R. Harlow has been ap-
pointed United States Marshal for the Southern
district of New York, in place of Barlow, who has
given up the post. I suppose the latter found his
duties irksome under the pressure of the Cuban
filibusters.