The Sun.
London, England, 1868-09-02 00:00:00

made to the changed direction of the Gulf Stream,
and the possibility that that might have contributed
to this result. This paper was followed by two
others : On Phosphoric Acid a constituent of Butter,
by Professor E. N. Iforsford ; and on the princi-
ples of Statistics as applied to the Census, by Prof.
F. B. Ilough.
In section B papers were read on the following
subjects:—Notice of some new vertebrate remains
from the tertiary of New Jersey, by Professor 0.
C. Marsh ; the Physical Geography of the Conti-
nent of North America, by Professor J. S. New-
bery ; and the Geological Section of Ohio, by E. B.
Andrews.

The American Association for the Advancement
of Science finally adjourned on Wednesday. Its
next meeting is to be held at Salem, August 18,
18G9. The following officers were elected :—Presi-
dent, Colonel John W. Foster, of Chicago ; vice-
president, Professor Ogden N. Reed, of Columbia
College, New York ; general secretary, Professor J .
C. Marsh, of New haven ; treasurer, Professor
Flynn, of Philadelphia.

TIIE PRESIDENTIAL ELECHON.

(From the Anglo-American Times)
Iv.

Indiana has been "gerrymandered," so that the
majority of the Democrats are grouped by them-
selves in a district devoted to Seymour and Blair,
while the others are strengthened for Grant and
Colfax. There is " a ludicrous lack," as a corre-
spondent says, of symmetry in the form of some
districts, but symmetry was not what the Republi-
can party aimed at in redistricting Indiana. What
they wanted was to group the votes, so as to secure
the majority for their candidates, other considera-
tions being ruthlessly thrown over, and we fear will
be in other States besides. The word derives its
origin from a Mr. Gerry, once Democratic Gover-
nor of Massachusetts, and afterwards Vice-Presi-
dent of the United States. Desirous of perpetuat-
ing the power of his party, he hit upon the happy
expedient of mapping out the districts so as to neu-
tralize the opposing majority. All the towns about
to throw a large excess of votes against the Demo-
crats were, if possible, brought into the same dis-
trict, there to be wasted, and this skilfully
done, as the tide is likely to run one way in particu-
lar localities, neutralizes a large majority. The
district - thus " gerrymandered" would look like a
bottle of ink dropped on the paper, streaming away
in one direction, solid at another, and opening
out in an unaccountable manner at a third point.
Districts thus delineated were named after the
originator, and the verb to " gerrymander" was
added to the vocabulary. General Grant has had
a quiet time lately at Galena, Illinois, where he has
smoked the pipe of peace. Speaker Colfax remains
among the mountains of Colorado. A despatch
had been received from him dated August 6, end
of track Union Pacific Railway :—" 'We are at the
end of the Pacific Railroad, 1,210 miles west of
Chicago, and 300 east of Salt Lake. The road is
graded for a hundred and fifty miles between this
place and Salt Lake, and they are laying the track
at the rate of four miles a day. This afternoon
the rails were laid on the continental divide be-
tween the Atlantic and Pacific." We mentioned
some time since that Mr. Colfax's family accom-
panied him, for although he is a widower without
children, his mother, with the two Miss Matthews,
a niece of Senator Wade, Miss Bowles, and Mrs.
Matthews went with him. The gentlemen of the party
are Lieut.-Governor Bross, Mr. Samuel Bowles, Mr.
Matthews, and Mr. Todd, the Speaker's private sec-
retary. They met with an enthusiastic reception in Ne-
braska, and had made speeches on their way to Colo-
rado both at Council Bluffs and at Omaha. Ho-
ratio Seymour has established his head-quarters at
the Butterfield House, Utica, where the Demo-
cratic State Committee of New York assembled on
the 13th inst., and called the State Convention to
meet at Albany, September 2. Governor Seymour
was introduced at a meeting of the various Demo-
cratic Committees, and tersely expressed his con-
fidence in the success of the party at the coming
election. He had been serenaded on the 13th inst.
by the Conservative veteran soldiers and sailors to
whom be was introduced by General James
M'Quade. Again he asserted his knowledge of the
character of the services, having given more than
15,000 commissions to officers. He does not ex-
plain what has become of the other thousand,
16,000 being the number he had announced before.
I pledge myself," said Mr. Seymour, "in
whatever station I may be placed, to struggle for
the restoration of that Union for which you have
periled your lives in the contest of arms ; and in our
struggle for constitutional rights we are strengthened
in our convictions of duty by the fact that a majority
of our soldiers uphold us in this political contest."
The most active of the four appears to be General
Blair. He made a speech at St. Joseph, Missouri,
when, in allusion to what General Sherman had said,
he assured the crowd they should not be insulted by
him by being called " fellows," or with the advice
to throw a man into the river who differed from the
sentiments expressed, as he understood had recently
been done by a distinguished military gentleman.
His adversaries assumed too dictatorial a tone to-
wards the people. " They denounce me as a revo-
lutionist—say that I wish to inaugurate another
rebellion, because I say it is time for the rule of the
bayonet to be checked. The people of the State of
Missouri and of the whole country are tired of being
bound to obey the dictates of their military com-
manders. We believe it is time for the will of the
people to be carried out. This will be done. (A.
voice—" We'll fix that in November.") Yes, we
will settle that in November, and we will do it
peaceably by the ballot." He went on to state that
" if the fragmentary Congress and the carpet-bag-
gers acting under the Rump are allowed they will
degrade the white man below the negro. Against
this iniquity the people have risen in their might
everywhere, from Maine to California, and have by
their votes said they will not have this negro su-
premacy kept up in this country. They will not be
shaken in this purpose to turn aside the bayonet
that is still kept pointed at the throats of the white
men of the South. Neither will the Radical party
in its hopeless minority be able to defeat the will of
the people. I feel an abiding confidence in the suc-
cess of the Democratic party of to-day, because it is
right." General Blair was on his way to Wash-
ington to consult with his family as to the future.
On the 13th instant a Democratic mass meeting to
ratify the nomination of Seymour and Blair was
held at Faneuil Hall, Boston. There were more than
4,000 people inside, and about 5,000 outside, who
could not obtain admission. Colonel Charles G.
Green presided, and spoke a few words on the
bright omens of the future. Josiah G. Abbott made
thespeech of the evening. He defended the Tammany
Convention, saying that Joe Brown, of Georgia, a
worse Secessionist than Wade Hampton, Forrest, and
the others, was heartily welcomed by the Radicals
at Chicago. Of course he dwelt on Republican ex-
travagance, their efforts to perpetuate their power,
regardless of the patient and suffering people. E.
C. Bailey, of the Boston Herald, also addressed the
meeting, urging with vigour the necessity of a
change in the administration of national affairs.
His remarks were confined to the financial question
and were vociferously cheered. Remarks were also
made by James A. Keith, Charles Levi Woodbury,
ex-Mayor IVightman, T. J. Gargan, P. A. Collins,
and others.

The riot we reported last week in Richmond,
Virginia, arose from some incendiary speeches by
Hunnicutt, wherein Seymour and Blair were de-
scribed as rebels, desirous of re-enacting Slavery,
which would be the result of Democratic success,
and be followed by a massacre of the negroes. The
blacks, thus aroused, resolved to prevent Democratic
meetings; and, after cutting down a Democratic
flag, they attacked a Conservative ratification meet-
ing, hurling bricks at the speakers ; but the whites,
being prepared, drove off the assailants, mortally
wounding one negro, and slightly wounding
several more. in Raleigh, North Carolina, a dis-
turbance resulted from an attack on a De-
mocratic procession, which was only prevented
from being serious by the Governor's precau-
tions. General Grant, in reviewing some troops
at Denver while he was in Colorado, found that
the soldiers carried a Seymour and Blair banner,
and ou his way back to Galena, when he arrived