The Sun.
London, England, 1867-12-10 00:00:00

TUE SUN) LOADuN, TUESDAY EVENING, DECEMBER 10, 1867.

BPI3IT OP TIE PUBLIC ZOITANdLO.

The Ti+nu remarks upon the stranie aces e i the Irriiiß
(orpe Legislatif, with M. Thiel's, the biskilait of 00
First Empire, acting as Minister of the Second. AcedrcP
ing to him a zone of petty duchies, of petty cantons, Get),
many parcelled out, an unarmed Switzerland, "an enslavect
Italy, an effete Spain, is what beet suite France. Our
contemporary cannot believethatrraice ortbat the French
Emperor is to be swayed by views of such refined selfish-
ness. The time was when every European nation looked
upon our neighbour's gain as a loss to ourselves. Theis'
were selfish men among us who held it as an article of
faith that England should seek a quarrel with France at
least once every score of years, so as to secure our shores
from invasion by leaving not a single stick of the French
Royal Navy afloat. But we have Gamed to be jealous of
France, not because we deem her a less formidable &dyer.'
nary, not because steam navigation does not render our
shores more vulnerable, but because, with the conscious.
pess of our own strength, our oonfidenoe in our neighbour's
peaceful disposition has also increased. We think less of
the power France may have to go to war, and more of the
reasons she has to remain at peace. Why France should not
be equally easy on the score of Italy and Germany we are
unable to see. Were she to applaud herself for the generous
impulse which won Solferino and for the wise neutrality
which countenanced Sadowa, we think Italian and Ger-
man unity would rather add to than take away from that
moral ascendancy to which it ought to be France's boast
to aspire. As to Italy it is very evident that the breath
that has made can also unmake her. M. Thiere dwells at
full length on the sad spectacle of anarchy andbankruptcy
Presented at the present moment by the Italian kingdom.
France, who has long seemed to halt between two
opinions, has, according to the Herald, resolved her doubts
and those of the world by throwing her aegis defiantly and
resolutely over the head of the Pontiff. It is not for the
death of Pope Pius IX. that the Italians have to wait for
the accomplishment of their scheme of unity. Nor will it
make much difference to them who is the ruler of France
so long as the majority of. Frenchmen are, as they seem to
be now, of the opinion of M. Thiers, that France must
still be true to the worship " which has held her in
its arms for twelve centuries ;" that it is monstrous
" that she who has it in her power to be the protectress
of 200 millions of Catholics should not be willing
to exercise that power." The ilbjudged enterprise of
Garibaldi, the battle of Mentana, and the discussions and
recriminations which have followed them, are now events

of the past—sad memories which should be suffered to
sleep. For the moment they have caused a deep estrange-
ment between France and Italy, and may in this way
make themselves felt in the politics of the day. Bid Italy,
when she bas had time for reflection, will be ready to
confess that had she been in the place of France she could
not have acted otherwise, and determine within herself
that she must wait for the acquisition of Rome until such
time as the necessity of the perpetuation of this temporal
power shall have ceased to be air article of faith with
Roman Catholic Christians.

The rejection by the House of Representatives of the
motion to impeach President Johnson has created somt
interest on this side of the Atlantic. The Post thus in•
terprets it. It was well known that a large number of
the most bitter opponents of the President were averse,
from the employment of a measure which would strike
a much more fatal blow against the office of chief magis,
trate than against the individual who at the present
moment happens to fill it ; and, on the other hand,
it was equally notorious that many of the Demo-
crate who have given a consistent support to
the President were not unwilling that their oppo-
nents should commit the serious blunder which'
would be involved in the proposed impeachment. When,
however, as an antecedent step, a resolution was suli'
mitted having for its object the suspension of Mr. Johnson
from office pending the inquiry into his supposed guilt,
many who regarded his impeachment with disfavour
supported that resolution, in order thereby to supply an
additional argument against the adoption of the proposal to
impeach. There was, in truth, no blinking the fact that
if, after the resolution for suspension, that for impeach-
ment were carried, the office of Chief Magistrate of the
Republic would henceforth become contemptible, since it
would simply require the adverse vote of a majority, with
a naked assertion of guilt, to procure the deposition of the
President.

Hard and fierce has the winter come upon us a
season which is dreaded by the poor as an invading
enemy. The vague eulogies of frost and snow as " season-
able," " natural," and " healthy," which proceed from
portly and well-wrapped figures and rosy countenances,
must sound like cruel mockeries in the ears of men

who have no defensive armour against the attacks
of cold and want. Thus opens the Daily News an
article, painting in strong colours a terrible picture
of the distress which exists in the East of London. That
part where suffering is now most intense was a few years
ago the centre of a thriving industry. In the Poplar
district, and especially in the Isle of Dogs, lately the
seat of an active shipbuilding trade, with ironworks and
chemical factories, and great industrial establishments of
various kinds, there are, a medical visitor writes, " hum.
dreds of persons quietly and calmly dying by inches?
Four thousand persons are at work where sizteen
thousand once had employment. The tradesmens—
the butchers, bakers, grocers, drapers, publicans,
who are the camp followers of the great industrial
army—have shut up their shops and gone. The num-
ber of persons receiving outdoor relief is greatly in
excess of what it was last year ; and the number of ;cases
on the books of the medical officer is more than four-fold
the average of the past three years. From many houses
every article of furniture has been sold. The people sleep
on the bare boards, with old sacks only for their covering.
At Shoreditch, Whitechapel, Hackney, the same features
are presented. In the East of London, north of the
Thames, twelve thousand men, representing not fewer
than fifty thousand persons, were a fortnight ago out of
employment, and, with those dependent on them, starving.
The increased severity of the past few days cannot but
have increased the number of sufferers and the severity of
their distress. The Poor-law system is quite unequal to
grapple with this mass of misery.
In an article on the annual display of stock at the
Agricultural Hall, the Standard contends that we are
eating up, notwithstanding all the loud pretence about a
preference of green crop over wheat-growing soils, our
stock-rearing lands—not in all districts, but in many, and
those of an important character. Without assigning a
general result to any single cause, we maintain that one
influence of this process is seen operating in the-butcher's
shop. As to the cattle plage, which suspended the
Christmas Show at Islington for a season, the magnitude
and gravity of its import were, from the beginning, fortrade
purposes, grossly exaggerated. There was ssme loss of
property, some derangement of business, some interrup-
tion of fairs and markets, some damage to dairy produce,
but, with sixty millions' worth of live stook in the country,
was a rise of thirty per cent, and more, in the cost of meat
for public consumption ever, in the worst time of the
,pestilence, justified? That, perhaps, is an old argument
which need not again be pressed ; but we could wish that
the Smithfield Club, now holding its annual splendid
show, could ultimately tell us a little more about the most
important system of husbandry in England, the means we
enjoy of supplying a meat diet to the people, the protec•
tion of our rural economy from foreign infection, and the
possibility of reconciling, with any number of incompa-
rably symmetrical oxen, sheep, and pigs on show, the
profits of the trade with the necessities of the population.

The Telegraph does not think that such processions as
those which have lately traversed the streets of Dublin,
Limerick, and Cork should be permitted if their tendency
is to excite to a breach of the peace. There can be no
doubt that Allen, Larkin, and Gould made a good end of
it in a religious sense. There was no latitudinarian indif.
ference to the priest : they went to their doom chanting
the sad psalms appointed by their Church, and consoled
to the last by the ministrations of their spiri-
tual guides. This has in a manner endeared them
to many thousand Roman Catholics who have as great a
horror of Fenianism as any Protestant in the land. With
somo cunning the Fenians have played on this national
and sectarian sentiment, this womanly tenderness, and
their mock funeral processions have had a Catholic
character which has greatly helped their success. But
the slight union between Itomanism and Fenianism
cannot last : it is the offspring of the emotion of
the day. While it did last it was as well not
to affront the feelings of poor pious souls by arrest-
ing even mock hearses or seizing even empty Coffin., ;
but probably we have heard the last of Fenian funeral
processions permitted by the authorities. If such sedi-
tious language as that recently delivered by a man named
Martin were allowed to be repeated, the impunity would
be interpreted as an incentive to license. Thus, we might
have disturbances of such a character as to demand the
exercise of lamentable severity. To save the country
from such a melancholy necessity, the Government may
have to invoke the agency of the law, and to punish
sedition with a rigour which shall be merciful in its uteri.
_
nes%

THE NSW GOLD MINES OF NEW ZEALAITD.-7-7:,
The discovery of gold on the western shores of the middle
island of New Zealand has added much importance to the
anchorages on the open and exposed coast. The Board of
Trade have published a pamphlet compiled from the 're-
marks of Captain Charles W. Hope, R.N., commanding
her Majesty's ship Brisk, 1867, from which it ap-
pears that the whole population on the west coast is at
present estimated at from 40,000 to 50,600 colonists.. In
1850 not a single European resided oil the whole !Luca
khit.--40. Mad

1.44 W. AND ZOLIQX,

mk *4le f.
%loritplio; which Was Cried N'tetstminstei before
hsticePiab, irita an action for libel. The plaintiff was
the iestitelerk of Fulham, and the defendant the pito
inietork,l the West London Observe: It appeared that at
vestrrnleeting complaints were made that one of the
rate colUsctors had committed errors of account. At that
meeting-s Mr. Bryant, in the course of his speech; made
inte:of certain obeervationi which led to the impression
that the :retry clerk had cooked the accounts. The speech
was ri;perartod in the defendant's paper with an interpola-
tion, " It was believed that the vestry clerk had sent in
his reeigTiation." The plaintiff,seeing thereport, instructed
his Solicitor to write the defendant a letter demanding an
itialogy and a contradiction inserted in that newspaper,
but no notice was taken of it. The plaintiff was
now ready to accept an apology and a verdict to carry
costs. The defendant said he never received the letter,
and that he never refused to insert an apology. Mr.
Bryant said the report of his speech was a correct one.
The jury returned a verdict for plaintiff ; damages, £25
IMPORTANT CONMOTION UNDER TnE SMOKE NUMMI,
Acr.—At the Southwark Police-court, the Messrs.
Hepburn, extensive tanners, of Bermondsey, were
fined £5 and costs for using furnaces in their works
which did not consume their own smoke. The inspector,
after looking over the works, gave the defendants notice
of the alteration required, and they promised to see to it,
but at the conclusion of a month it was still undone.,
Twenty-one days more were allowed, and on the work
not being then completed the present charge war
preferred.

ACTION FOR DAMAGES TOR A FATAL RAILWAY ACM
DENT. A case which was tried at the Manchester Assis,si
iaised an important question. It was an action by a
widow against the Oldham, Ashton, and Guide Bridge
Railway Company. The plaintiff's husband, on the 9th
of February, took a London and North-Western ticket
to go from Oldham to Greenfield. He was crossing the
line to get to the platform from which the train would
start, when he was knocked down and killed by a train
belonging to the Manchester, Sheffield, and Lincolnshire
Railway Company. It was contended that the mode of
conducting the station was so dangerous that it was not
to he wondered at that the man was killed. Persons
were obliged to cross the line and to run about to find
where the train would start from. For the defence the
point of law was raised whether, when the contract
was with another company, and deceased was
killed by another company's train, the defend-
ants could be made liable. His lordship WAX
inclined to think not, but refused to stop the case on that
account. Ultimately the jury were discharged, not being
able to agree. His lordship said that he merely took the
verdict for form's sake, as the plaintiff was poor, and it
would save litigation. The point raised was a radical
defect in the case.

ANOTHER ACTION AGAINST A BAIINAT COMPANT:i
£1,200 DAILAGES.—In another railway case tried 4.
Manchester, the plaintiff, a cotton-spinner and mann•
facturer, laid his damages at £4,000. While the plaintiff,
wife, and children were travelling from Huddersfield to
Todmorden, on the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway;;
an accident happened, and plaintiff was injured, as he
alleged, seriously. The defence was that his injuries were
very small, but it was shorn that ho could not attend
market for three months, and Mr. Baron Martin said
he was entitled to substantial damages. The jurpreturned
a verdict for £1,250.

AN ACTION Yon Minn num.—Another case at the
Manchester Assizes-was an action brought against a shippet
named Wchner, to recover £154 is. 11d., the balance of
an account on sale of 4,000 dozen umbrellas. The
umbrellas had been ordered for the Calcutta market, at
the rate of 1,000 dozen per month, but the deliveries being
behind time, the manufacturer agreed to a deduction being
made in order that the goods might be sent by steamer
instead of sailing vessel, to save the Calcutta season.
The defendant, however, sent the umbrellas by the over:j
land route, and deducted the amount in question. The
jury found for the plaintiff for the amount claimed.
INCENDIARISSI BY A GIRL —Eliza Sparrow, a girl aged
15 years, has just been convicted at Norwich Assizes of,
setting fire to a coalshed, outhouse, and other premises of
her master, Mr. George Bunn, at Acle. The prisoner
eoriibssed to the constable's wife that she had done the
acts charged, not thinking that she was doing any harm,
but tempted to do so. After the failure of one attempt
she said she felt so had she did not know what to do, and
could not sleep ; that the thought came into her head
again on the SUnday following, when she took a match and
set fire to the straw. She was sentenced to a month's im:
prisonment and hard labour, at the expiration of which
time she was to go to a reformatory for five years.

Arraurr To MURDER • POLICEMAN.—A young Irish,
woman, named Mary Quirk, was brought up at the Sal-
ford Town Hall, charged with attempting to shoot a police-
man who is alleged to have seduced her. Police-constable
Sowerby said he was on duty on Sunday night, and
at about eight o'clock was going along the Crescent"
in the direction of the Pendleton Police-office;
when the prisoner overtook him and walked alongside
of him until he got to the office. He endeavoured to
persuade her to go home because he was on duty, but
she refused to do so. After calling at the Pendleton Police;
office, at about a quarter to nine, he got upon an omnibus
cod the prisoner got
Corner inside.
going H
fromePendleton
et to Manchester,omnibus
a tthe rne of OldfieW
and
road, and walked in the direction of the Salford Pace.
office. At the corner of Bezley.square he saw the prisoner,
and again asked her to go home. She replied that she
would if she liked. He then left her and went to the
police-office, where ho remained from half-past nine until
twenty minutes to two. He then left the office to go
home, and was turning from Kirkley-street into Bruns-
wick-street, when he again saw the prisoner. She said
to him, "It is the last time I shall come. You have
two cartes de visite of mine ; will you give them to me ?"
He replied that he would bring them to her. He then
saw her raise her arm and at the same instant heard the,
report of a pistol, and felt a smarting sensation in his
right arm and in his eyes from the effects of the flash. He
did not see the prisoner again. She had repeatedly told
him she would shoot him. He ceased to keep company
with her about two months ago. The prisoner cross-
examined Sowerby to shew that he had used her very ill,
and was with another woman at the time when the pistol
was discharged. The prisoner said the policeman had
kept company with her for five years. Mr. Trafford
advised the prisoner to reserve her statements with re:,
gard to Sowerby's conduct to her, and committed her for I
trial.

THE COMMERCIAL BANE CORPORATION.—An applicatiot
to the Master of the Rolls in the matter of the above;
company, tor consent to a call of £lO per share required
to satisfy the liabilities of the old company, was opposed
g company (which Wwarfboynformed
theed shareholders eohf ol
thede rosl
do f
one)t the
on
h
x itst ino
ground that questions
were in dispute between the two companies, and therefore
the question should stand over. His lordship, however,
consented to the application.
Tun POWER OP A COMPANY TO ACCZPT BILLS.-12 toe
matter of the General Estates Bank the power of the
directors to accept bills on the part of the company was'
questioned, there being no special power given to them is
the articles of association. His lordship the Master of
the Rolls held that the directors had the power.

Mn. CANT, M.P. FOR BARNS/APIA IN THE COMM 07
EXCHEQUER.—On Monday an action was tried in the Court
of Exchequer, which throws considerable light upon the
unseen current of an election to the City shrievalty. The
defendant was Mr. Thomas Cave, M,P. for Barnstaple,
in 1868 Sheriff of London. The plaintiff was a Mr. Hayes,
who had helped him to obtain that distinction, and now'
claimed 100 guineas for his services, which he alleges that
he specially stipulated should be paid him. Plaintiff and
defendant each appeared as witnesses, and contradicted
each other so flatly as to make the case one of personal
veracity. On the one hand, Mr. Hayes swore that Mr.
Cave made a contract with him for the £lOO, and Mr.
Cave as distinctly swore that what Mr. Hayes had said
was false. Mr. Hayes stated that Mr. Serjeant Tindal
Atkinson was employed to act as orator on the day cf
the election. This also was denied. The jury, after
little deliberation, found for the defendant.

FEARFUL DEATH. —Mr. Alderman Ueorge Job-
ling, of Tynemouth, one of the owners of Belside, Walker,
and other collieries in Northumberland, and a borough
magistrate in North Shields, met with a frightful death at
the Howden station of the Tynemouth branch of the North-
Tastern Railway, on Sunday night. Mr. Jobling, on Sun-
day, had been dining with his cousin, Mr. Thomas Jobling,
at Willingtoa House. He appears to have gone on the line
of railway at the west end of the Willington Viaduct, and
was walking down to catch the train from Newcastle to
Tynemouth at Howden. He had evidently forgotten that
the train leaves Newcastle at a quarter to nine on
Sunday evenings, instead of nine o'clock as on week-
days ; and he had been walking within the down rails.
He was overtaken by the quarter to nine train befor
he could reach the Howden station. His attention
had been called to the noise made by the approaching
train. He turned round to look, and was immediately
struck by the buffers of the engine and thrown under the
wheels and crushed to death. The engine-man felt that
he had gone over something, and as soon as the train
stopped at Howden a party ran back to the spot where the
accident occurred, and found Mr. Jobling's body dread.
fully mutilated. It was removed to the railway 'station at
=re the eqpa:sutell 14 44/

PRO7ECTION 1N A NUTSHELL.

The November' number of the New York Free-
Trade journal, called The League, republishes an
article first issued two years ago in the New York
Evening Post, as it finds in the case commented on,
" Protection in a Nutshell." The thread works
owned by Hartford capitalists at Willimantic are
the most extensive in the country, and at that time
they had just finished a new mill 400 feet long,
five storeys high, and built of granite—a work
of great labour and cost, constructed out of the
profits of the company without disturbing its
capital, which, with this addition, was estimated at
$1,000,000. These profits were over 300 per cent.,
and it was therefore an easy matter for the com-
pany to make this addition to its factory, and a
wise expenditure in increasing the productive
power of so profitable a business. The Hartford
Times, boasting of these results, thus continued its
comments :—" Thread that used to cost the needle-
woman four cents a spool. now costs ten—the same
as the imported English thread of J. and P. COATS.
One reason why COATS'S thread works more
smoothly on the machine, and is better liked than
our, is in the fact that the greater dampness of the
English climate is more favourable than our dry
air to spinning cotton. Again the highly electric
condition of the atmosphere of the Western
World is probably unfavourable to the necessary
compactness and smoothness sought for in the
fabrication of this article, the strands and fibres
being more inclined to rough up and fiy off.' "
This unconscious admission—though unseen by
the writer—was quickly detected by the oppo-
nents of the Protection system, and enabled them
to condense the subject into a nutshell. Here
is a manufacture, says the Free-trader,w hick, from
physical causes, cannot be brought to perfection in
America, but which, by enormous protection, has
been made to pay 300 per cent. profit. The tariff
on imported threads is equal to 70 per cent. in gold
on the cost; the tax on the domestic article is 6 per
cent. in currency. The effect has been twofold.
The three—cord glazed threads, such as made by this
company, cost much less in England, and are sold
at lower prices than the six-cord goods. But the
duty has raised them to the same price; and the
sewing woman in the United States has to pay as
much for the one as for the other. The price of the
best ought not to exceed 6 cents a spool, even with
gold at 140, while the price, as the Hartford Times
observer, is 10 cents. The difference comes out of the
pockets of the needlewomen and their customers. By
thus raising the price 40 per cent., the Hartford capi-
talists are enabled to divide three times their ori-
ginal capital per annum. The effect on the national
revenue has been to entail a loss of nearly $200,000
per annum, as spool cotton used to pay a yearly
income of half a million, while now it gives but
$300,000. Thus the revenue suffers in an equal
proportion ; both the State and the poor being
robbed of 40 per cent. to pay the lucky speculators
300 per cent. on their investment. We would like
to know what the country gains by the Willimantic
Tbreadworks. What the company gains is dis-
tinctly stated, and what the country loses is as
clearly put. Though a factory has been established,
which furnishes employment to a certain number of
citizens, it does not follow that such employment
must benefit either the country or the indi-
viduals. In the presence of a great emergency,
when whole classes have been thrown out of em-
ployment, it may be necessary to set aside the rules
of political economy, and furnish work without
regard to its productiveness or necessity. No
country can, however, habitually sot aside these
laws without increasing the evils it seeks to alle-
viate. In other words, there is a ceaseless
danger in fostering manufactures for which a coun-
try has not a physical capacity, because the ten-
dency is to train hands and lead individuals to
rely on a craft artificially supported, and thus rest-
big on a false foundation, which may at any time
give way, leaving them iu the air. As the United
States have not arrived at that stage which makes
it even a temporary boon to labour to rest any indus-
stry on a false foundation, we cannot suppose that
these Threa,tworks are beneficial to the hands em-
ployed. The question of gain thus becomes narrowed
to the proprietors. It may appear absurd to assert
that a man who receives 300 per cent. on his capital,
has not made a judicious and lucky investment. Yet
it may be so. Those who embark money in
fostering industry not suitable to the country in
which they live rest their capital on the same false
foundation as the worker does his labour. Un
doubtedly in such a case as the Willimantic Thread

works the prudent capitalist can replace from his
enormous dividends the sum he has employed,

and thus if the pleasing phantom vanishes, remain as
he was before. Experience, however, shows that
few men act thus. He has stepped into a fortune,
and he assumes the position in society to which he
considers his judicious investment has elevated him,

and henceforth commences the career of anxiety
and worry which all must in some degree experience
whose position rests on an insecure basis. The

labourer, after a probationary period of suffering,
can turn his hand to another employment ; his
capital remains, although his peculiar handicraft
may have disappeared from the industries of his
country. But not so the capitalist, whose
money sinks into the quicksand on which he has
placed it, never again to be seen. Dreading this
result, he becomes a frantic Protectionist. His mind

is imbued with one idea to such an extent that a

proprietor of the Threadworks may have persuaded
himself that the prosperity of the United States rests,

not on Protection generally, but mainly on the spe-
cific and ad valoremduties piled upon theßritish fabric
which enables him to realise so enormous a return,

The arguments of such a man are amusing to those
who know better than himself how his mind has r e-

ceived the bent. "To elevate the lowest on the

rung of the ladder, and to bring up the masses,

ought to be the object of a commonwealth. Mann.

factures most tend to elevate labour, as a strong

demand raises wages, and enables the workman to

secure his fair share of profits. Protection is the
only means o.e. establishing manufactures on a perma-
nent basis. Therefore, the object of a Republic, in the

- -
interest of its poorer citizens, ought to be to protect

- -
industry." So arguing he puts his 300 per cent. in

his pocket soothed with thecomfortable doctrine that

he is a true patriot, working for the interest of the
toiling masses. This is, indeed, a royal road, and
when he is jostled on it by a rude Free-trader, we
cannot be surprised at the bitterness with which he
resents the obstruction. Great Britain is the

country whose competition he fears ; and it is there-

fore against Great Britain that the Protectionist
arguments are mainly directed. Unfortunately for
England, the tone unwisely expressed by her press
has enabled him to assume that her attitude during
the rebellion was unfriendly; and this has been

so resented by the United States that a weight has
been given to arguments they would otherwise
not have possessed. Is the country, he asks, to
destroy her manufactures to benefit those of our

English enemies who will use the very strength
derived from our folly to injure us. Thus
he backs his arguments by an appeal to pre-
judice, which, alike in nations as in individuals,
often over Sways reason and judgment. The League

sums up in theso words : " Protection" finds

antagonism everywhere ; ' Free Trade' believes
in the harmony of all interests ; Protec-
tion' sets nation at variance with nation ; Free
Trade' is a peacemaker. Protection' believes in
the necessity of guarding labour against the tyranny
of capital; Free Trade' teaches that labour and

capital are natural allies, necessary to one another,
and that but for the ill-judged interference of Go-
vernment, they would work in harmonious co-ope-
ration to their mutual good."—An9lo-American

The Philo-Dramatic Society gave their eleventh
entertainment at the "Polygraphic Ilan" on the 28th
ult., before a fashionable and enthusiastic audience, the
performance commencing with the farce " Retained for the
Defence," followed by the drama " The Wreck Ashore,"
and concluding with the farce " The Unfinished Gentle-
man." The pieces were placed upon the stage effectually,
the dresses and accessories were really capital, the per-
formers wore well up in their different parts ; and all
contributed, in a greater or less degree, to the real success
of a very clever amateur performance.
STEEFLECRiBB FORFEIT LlST.—Faithless Sarah's forfeit
is paid.

MISCELLANEOUS NEWS,

(From the Anglo-American Times.)
On the 21st November Congress met at Wash-
ington, when the President was enabled to ignore
its existence, as legally, the first Monday in Decem-
ber is the date on which the Session commences.
He refrained from transmitting his Message till
then, and Reports from the Heads of Departments
could not of course be received. Practically there-
fore there was no business before the House, al-
though the attendance of members was large.
Speaker Colfax presided at the Representatives,
where the Impeachment Committee was called on
for its report, which it promised on Nov. 25. An
unsuccessful attempt was made by the Democrats
to have the loyalty of the Tennessee members in-
quired into, as were those from Kentucky, some of
them being accused of having served in the Confe-
derate army. Mr. Brooks, who was the Democratic
spokesman, considered it unfair that while Ken-
tucky Congressmen had been excluded on a charge
of sympathy with the Confederacy, Tennessee mem-
bers, who had actually served against the United
States, should be admitted. In one instance only
did he prevail ; the excluded delegate having been a
Major in the Confederate army, though he has now
swung round to Radicalism. The House then ad-
journed till Friday. In the Senate the Hon. Ben
Wade presided, with his head rather battered from
his recent fall. Business commenced, as usual, by
Mr. Sumner's bill to make negroes and whites equal
in the District of Columbia. Senator Edmonds, of
Vermont, introduced the following joint resolution,
which was ordered to be printed, and is to be called
up on au early day :
" Whereas, the public debt of the United States
was, except when specialiy otherwise provided,
contracted and incurred upon the faith and credit
of the United States that the same would be paid
or redeemed in coin or its equivalent, and whereas
doubts have been raised as to the duty and pro-
priety of discharging such debt in coin or its
equivalent, it is therefore--
"Resolved, by the Senate and House of Repre-
sentatives of the United States in Congress as-
sembled, that the public debt of the United States,
except in the cases wherein by the law authorising
the same other provision was expressly made, is
owing in coin or its equivalent, and the faith of
the United States is hereby pledged in payment
accordingly."
It is thought that this resolution will be carried
by a large majority in both Houses, and the fall in
the price of gold indicates, we believe, its favourable
reception.
If the Message of the President does not absorb
Congressional attention, there will be a great fight
between the advocates of contraction and inflation.
It is believed that in the house the inflationists are
in a majority, and the Senate is doubtful. The
West strongly advocate more money, and will op-
pose Secretary M'Culloch's scheme of contracting
the greenback currency. He desires an imcrease of
his present power in this direction, while his oppo-
nents propose to abolish the law under which he
is enabled to absorb greenbacks at the rate of
$4,000,000 a month. This subject is more closely
associated with repudiation than is at first sight
apparent. Let any one begin to tamper with his
capital to meet his ordinary expenditure, and he takes
what may prove to be a fatal step on the road to
ruin. It is more pleasant to meet expenses by
" doing a little paper" when credit is good, than
to retrench, to dismiss servants, sell horses and
carriages, and take a downward step in the social
scale. Yet such a course may be the only true so-
lution of a grave difficulty. Contraction means
not only a national, but an individual retrenchment
throughout the States ; inflation is the seeming
prosperity a man has who is living on his capital.
The true financial friends of the United States dread
the Representatives shying at the bog they have to
wade through ere they reach sound financial
ground. " What is the use of sticking in this
mud ?" says the horse, who has pleasant clover
pastures inviting him on this side. " That grass
may be very pleasant to eat," he is answered ;
" but it will destroy your constitution. You will
be blown out and burst." The position is a
trying one, for the bog is plain enough, but the
other evil, remote and obscure. Secretary M'Cul-
loch is, however, painfully alive to the danger ; and
it will not be his fault if Congress overrules his
opinion. The plan he proposes is sketched in the
report which has reached this country through the
cable.

Mr. Robinson, one of those rowdy Democrats
who spring from the hotbed of New York, has in-
troduced a resolution in the House of Representa-
tives, charging Charles Francis Adams, American
Minister at St. James's, with neglect of duty in
refusing to interfere on behalf of American citizens
arrested and tried in the United Kingdom. A com-
mittee of investigation is demanded, with a view,
if the facts justify the course, to impeach the Mi-
nister; and the President is desired to recall Mr.
Adams by the Atlantic cable as the speediest method.
Copies of correspondence on the arrests and trials
are also called for. It is a singular fact that the
party who received British support and sym-
pathy is that which has always displayed the
most bitter and unreasoning hostility against
England. The Democrats derive a large measure
of support from the Irish, and in return aid
Fenianism. On the other hand, they received all
the assistance the Southern oligarchy could give,
and therefore sympathised with the rebels, The
complications in which England has become in-
volved by the piratical acts of cruisers obtained in
English ports, is in some degree due to them, yet
they are prepared to fasten on England the conse-
quences, at the same time that they tender aid in
fostering a rebellion in the United Kingdom, and
endeavour to cover the agents employed, by the
open protection of the United States. This is the
party, with Mr. Johnson at its heat, that com-
manded the sympathies of the well-informed Eng-
lish press.
The Alabama Convention still in session rejects all
counsels of moderation, and goes in for the extreme
of disfranchisement and proscription. To the list of
the disfranchised are now added those who will not
swear to support negro suffrage. The members have
voted themselves $8 a day, and the same amount for

each twenty miles they have to travel to and from the

capital, and in payment have appropriated funds

set apart by the Alabama Legislature for the in-
terest on the State Debt, although the method of
paying the members is provided by the Reconstruc-
tion Acts. The friends of the negro express great
disappointment at this sample of African legislation,
and have been constrained to admit that the present
experiment is a failure. Ere long similar constitu-
tional conventions will be in session in other States,
and unless greater wisdom prevails in their coun-
sels, there will be a speedy end of such Assemblies.
As anticipated, the House of Representatives has
repealed the tax upon cotton grown after the pre-
sent year. The feeling was almost unanimous, and
the evidence conclusive against it.
It was announced that Mr. Horace Greeley had
been nominated United States Minister to Austria,
and that the Senate had confirmed the appointment.

We were somewhat surprised at this -news, as
Horace Greeley had declined the appointment last
year, when Mr. Motley's resignation, and Mc-
Craeken's insolent report to the President were dis-

cussed. Mr. Greely had not only declined, but pub-
lished the grounds for his refusal. These have in

no way changed, and we presume that if Air. Greeley
last year refused the promotion, that this year, cir-
cumstances remaining the same, he would refuse it
again. By a telegram eent from New York, on
Thursday, we learn ho had refused it, but one would

have supposed that his name would not have been

submitted to the Senate unless his sanction had been

first secured.

Judge Shipman made some excellent remarks
when opening the United States Circuit Court at
llartford, Connecticut, in his charge to the Grand
Jury touching the cases of defalcations of bank offi-
cers about to be tried :

"There are," he said, "men of good social standing,
who are raised by their salaries above want, and are ro-

moved from many of the temptations which assail those in
the obscure and humble walks of life. To fail to punish
them when they deliberately violate their trust and plunder
those who have relied on their integrity, while at the same
time the more ignorant and degraded offenders against law
are visited with its penaltioa, shocks the moral sense, and is
a bitter mockery of justice. It renders property inse-
cure, encourages fraud, and removes those wholesome
checks which elundd guard and Imo, others from