The Sun.
London, England, 1869-01-30 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, SA ult DAY EVENING, JANUARY 1!-- 30, 1869.

tered Boston steered by an ingenious contrivance of
spars, for which the underwriters of Boston pre-
sented Captain Murphy with $l,OOO. The Elsa
left oil Christmas Eve, and to the day of her arrival
at New York encountered a succession of frightful
storms. On the 28th a sea broke amid ships on
the starboard quarter, carrying Mr. Molyneux,
fifth officer, from the saloon deck with such force
against the iron bulwarks that he was almost
instantly killed and swept overboard. Alexander
Nlalcoltn, second officer, had his collar bone broken,
and several others of the officers and crew were
more or less injured. Another sea broke into the
officers rooms, drenching all. On the 31st a hurri-
cane from the north-west raged around for five
hours, and this was but an episode calculated to
make them appreciate the difference between the
continued gale of wind and a cycloon.
It has been proposed in the House to assume the
protectorate over Hayti and San Domingo as a
means of stopping the constant revolutions. The
resolution was introduced by General Banks, and
referred to the House Committee on Foreign Affairs,
who have consented to have it reported.. AI( xico
is even worse off than Hayti, and as that Republic
borders on the United States, Congress has a much
more clear right to reconstruct and pacify her than
any island in the West Indies. Resolutions have
been introduced, but not pressed, to recognize the
independence of Cuba, as well as of Crete. Mr.
Robinson, the " faithful Fenian," brought in one
on the 12th instant to secure the annexation of Cu'aa
without purchase. He asserts that the Spaniards
having thrown off their own Government, cannot
impose that they have elected on the people of
Cuba against their wish, and he desires either the
independence of the island to be recognized or mea-
sures taken for annexation, provided " no payment
be made to the dethroned Queen, or to any other
person arrogating the right to dispose of or control
that island contrary to the wishes of the people
thereof."

The Republican caucus at Jefferson City on the
13th instant nominated General Schurz, United
States Senator on the first ballot. Senator Morrill
of Maine disputes the election of Hamlin, as the
choice of the caucus. His friends assert that the
question is not settled, and that the Legislature
will have to decide the matter. Hannibal Hamlin
was Vice-President during Lincoln's first term. Of
the 149 votes east be received 75, and that 75 was
exactly one-half of the members present in -the
caucus, but there was one blank ballot inten-
tionally so cast by a member, as he afterwards
stated. William 111. Stewart of Nevada was re-
elected. New Hampshire will complete her elec-
tions next March, but she has already renominated
her three Republican Congressional Representa-
tives, adopting as a platform impartial suffrage, the
inviolability and sacredness of the National Debt,
urging a return to specie payment, and the refunding
of outstanding obligations in Bonds bearing a lower

interest. The Senate has decided not to admit the
Georgia men to seats in the Chamber. At any rate
the Judiciary Committee settled the case on the
15th instant as far as Mr. Joshua Hill is con-
cerned. After considering the election of the
Senators by a Legislature from ,which thecnloured
members were expelled on •the grOdn(i that they
were ineligible tinder the State Constitution; the
majority ruled against that gentleman, a decision
which it is thought, will be sustained by the Cham-
ber. Tennessee's claim to another representative was
rejected by the House Committee on elections.
The Reconstruction Committee of the Represen-
tatives have closely examined General Gillen about
the vote in Mississippi on the Constitution. He
asserts it to have been given fairly and without in-
timidation against the Constitution by a majority of
6,000. The General's opinion is that Mississippi
would ratify our embodying the principle of negro
suffrage, but free from the disfranchisement of the
whites by an overwhelming majority. It was its
proscriptive character which brought against it the
opposition of all white men who carried with them
large numbers of the negroes.
There are few subjects in which we take a greater
interest than in the success of Mr. Jenckes' Bill,
and as we feel sure that it will triumph, we rejoice to
see that war against it has commenced. Whatever
may be the shortcomings of the American press, it
has always been well in advance of the people in
advocating sound and judicious reforms, and it has
F:o worked on the public mind in that of the Civil
Service that such men as General Logan have be-
come alarmed. He attacked it furiously in the
House on the 9th, but he showed that he neither
understood the bill nor the reform it proposed to
effect. "It was," he said, "the opening wedge of
an aristocracy in this country," by which " the
Vice-President would be made the supreme ruler
and dictator, and first judge upon the application
of employes, thus making the public patronage sub-
servient to one man, who would know no-superior."
The aristocratic wedge w
hi c
h is, in truth, the present
system of patronage
this Bill would destroy,
and, instead of the Vice-President being made
under it the supreme ruler and dictator, he would
have no patronage nor appointing power whatever.
Mr. Jenckes has been invited to explain publicly his
Civil Service Bill at New York, and he was to have
done this on the 16th instant, nor could he have had
a better place wherein to find ample illustrations of
its necessity.
Mr. Henry Willard announc3s that
the meeting will be in the Chapel of the University
building, University-place, and there will be present
S. L. M. Barlow, S. B. Chittenden, Win. B. Astor,
jun., J. Cisco, George Opdyke, August Belmont,
and A. A. Low.

Mrs. Sue Murphy's case of Decatur, Alabama,
has for the present been dropped by the Legisla-
ture, after a great deal of talk in the Senate. This
payment as a loyalist for damage sus-
property during the war. It has pro-
ltaadinyedelatoimheedr
duced an immense amount of discussion, not from
its amount, but from the precedent it might esta-
blish. After two weeks' argument the bill has been
' without a to the Committee on
Claims, will perhaps not again be resuscitated.
A Commission,
however, is proposed to sift all
recommitted
and
these Southern claims, and to select from among
them cases of real hardship.

The repeal of the Tenure-of -Office Act begins to
look doubtful from the action of the Senate. It is
thought that the House Bill cannot pass the Chamber
in its present shape,and that the Tenure-of-Office Act
will be retained, but in a modified form. The Ju-
diciary Committee, however, has killed Senator
Wdde's proposal to render the President and Vice-
President of the United States ineligible for re-
election. Senator Trumbull, the Chairman, fa-
voured it, but he was overruled by his colleagues.
_ _

We are told that Senator Chandler, on his no-
mination for Michigan, vigorously denounced Great
Britain in a speech of acknowledgment to the
caucus, declaring that at an early day he would
'foreclose his mortgage on Canada. Some one hints
that it was to Great Britain's hostility he owes the
opposition to his re-election, and the circulation of
the stories about his drunkenness. But Butler
declares that opposition to be only part of a cru-
sade against all the promoters of President John-
son's
impeachment. Senator Chandler has received
certificates of sobriety from that gentleman as
well as from Mr. Henry Wilson, and Mr. Stanton
testifies to the confidence reposed in him by Mr.
Lincoln.

• Some mouths ago, it may be remembered, a mys-
terious old plan of telegraphy was revived with a
great flourish of trumpets. Without wire or any
medium of communication men were declared to
have instantly forwarded their thoughts across Lake
Ontario. The inventor or resuscitator of a marvel
incredible to mankind has turned up at Washington
in no less a place than the Senate, and with no lees
a sponsor than Mr. Sumner, requiring no, es 3 a
sum to demonstrate the value of his invention than
$50,000. But although the Senator from M issachu-
setts present edihe memorial of Dr. Mahlon Loomis
of Washington to the Chamber, he did not endorse
it. To say as he did "it was either moonshine or
important" was not to say much, for that it certainly
is, which—being the question. Many Senators,
as is natural on such occasions, laughed outright at
Loomis and his invention, but Mr. Wilson brought
them up with around turn, and for doing this he was
well placed, as the speech of Prof. Morse had scarcely
ceased to ring in the ears of some legislators. It
was premature, said Senator Wilson, as yet to sneer,
considering that many o . the greatest men had to