The weekly Minnesotian. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn. Territory) 1852-1858, 1857-06-13

Crime in New York.
The New York Tribune thus gives
beautiful picture of the morals of that mod
ern Sodom. We suspect it is true.
Sixteen murders have been perpetrated in
this city since the LIST of April, about which
time Mayor Wood began to develop his pro-
gramme of violent resistance to the laws,
and the whole army of grog-sellers babe de-
fiance to any legal interference with their
desolating traffic. There have been at least
twice sixteen attempts at murder, beside
violent assaults and rum-hOle fights without
precedent. Ten thousand hardened and
hopeless female Outcasts swarm the streets
at night two thousand children, under the
guise of pedders, from the ages of ten to
sixteen, penetrate every public building,
store and office in the city, to beg, steal, spy
for burglars, and on their own account prac-
tlce those vices which cannot be named in
respectable language five thousand great
and small gamblers prey upon the creduIous
and the infatuated, standing all day at the
doors of their dens in Broadway, as well
known in person and pro ession as the May
or himself; ten thousand crazy, drunken,
thieving short-boys, swill-boys, killers,
roughs, and rowdies of other names, lounge
on the rum-cursed corners of the streets,
making day disgusting, night hideous, and
travel dangerous to all who can be suspected
of having respectabillty or money thous-
ands of emigrant swindlers, mock auction
GERS, lottery-dealers, policy-backer., pick
pockets, hall-thieves, burglars, wharf-rats,
area sneaks, pimps and vampires, practice
their knaveries as openly and with as little
fear of punishment as though they were en-
gagged in the most virtuous and legitimate of
human pursuits. The swell-mob of London,
| flying from the argus eyes of real police,
and the uncomfortable felons of San Francisco
expatriated by the bullet and the hemp of
the Vigilance Committee, are received here
with open arms, parade our streets under
not only the liberation but the protection
and personal friendship of the police, carry
on primary elections, and ill high places on
our nominating committees. On every hand
we have vice end crime, and splendor vice,
crime, rum and beggary. Here, IN the most
fashionable faubOury, is the Crockford's of
New York there between the palatial resi-
dences of a millionaire and divine, is the
maison de ,joie ola woman whose dress is the
most brilliant, whose equipage the most
costly, whose appearance Is the most stun
ming, of any of the gay butterflies, virtuous
or vicious, whose beauty land wealth add
glitter to the opera or sunshine to the prom
enadc. Within bow-shot of these palaces
is the other side of the world for brocade,
rags for diamonds, dirt for Johannisberg-
err, whisky for a.illionaires, beggars for
divincs, devils for Aspasias, drabs with
here and there some poor, starving wretch,
painfully enacting the "Song of the Shirt"
her besieged virtue glimmering in the MIS-
cry Of this tangible hell, like the tabled jew
ell in dunghill. And over all, we have
set of men called rulers, wrangling like hun
cry dogs for the public purse lying and
cheating for advancement plotting to over
throw all law, that they may rob the people;
and, in their influence upon our vast crimi-
nal population, rccklessly flaring their in
cendiary torches in orr moral powder-house.
The Character of Washington.
The closing chapter Of the fourth volume
of Irvng's Life of Washington, (soon to be
published contains the annexed portrait of
the Poter PatriG:
In the volumes here concluded we have en-
deavored to narrate faithfully the career of
Washington from childhood, though his early
surveying expeditions in the wilderness, his
diplomatic mission to the French posts on
the frontier, his campaigns in the French
war, his arduOus trials as commander-in-chief
throughout the Revolution, the noble sim
plicity of his life in retirement, until we
have shown him elevated to the Presidential
chair, by no effort of his own, in manner
against his wishes, by the unanimous vote of
grateful country.
The plan of our work has necessarily
carrie US widely into the campaigns of the
Revolution: even where Washington was not
present in person for his spirit pcrvaded
and directed the whole, and general knowl-
edge of the whole is necessary to appreci
ate the sasacity, forecast, enduring fortitude,
and comprehensive wisdom with which he
conducted it. He himself has signified to
; one who asplred to write his biography that
any memoirs of his life distinct and uncon-
nected with the history of the war would
be unsatisfactory. In treating of the Revo-
luton, We have endeavored to do justice to
what we consider its most striking charac-
teristics-the greatness of the object and the
Scantness of the means.
We have endeavored to keep in view the
prevailing poverty of resources the scandal
Ious neglects, the squalid miseries of all
kinds, with which its champions had to con-
tend in their expeditions through trackless
wildernesses or thinly peopled regions be-
meath scorching suns or inclement skies
heir wintry marches to be traced by bloody
foot prints on snow and ice; their desolate
wintry encampments, rendered still more
desolate by nakcdncss and famine. 1t was
IN the patience and fortituda with which
these ills were sustained by alf-disiplined
>eomanry, voluntary exies from their
homes, destitute of all the "pomp and circm
strnces" of war to excite them, and animal
ed solely BY their patriotism, that we read
the noblest and most affecting Characters
tics of that great struggle for humin rights.
They do wrong to its moral grandeur who
seek by common place exaggeration to give
melo-dramatic effect and false glare to its
military operations, and to place its greatest
triumphs in the conflicts of the field. La
ayettc showed true sense of the struggle
when Napoleon, accustomed to effect ambi-
tious purposes by hundreds Of thousands of
troops and tens of thousands of slain, sneer-
ed at the scanty armies of the American
Revolution aud its :bCasted battles''-
"Sire" was the admirable and comprehen-
sive reply, sit was the grandest of causes
won by skirmishes of sentincls and out
posts"
In regard to the character and conduct Of
Washington, we have ondeavored to place
his deeds in the clcarest light, and left them
to speak for themselves, generally avoiding
comment or eulogium. We have quoted his
own words and writings largely to explain
his feelings and motives and give the true
key to his policy; for never did man leave a
more truthful mirror of his heart and mind
and a more thorough exponent of his con-
duct than he has left in his copious ,rres
pondence. There his character is to be found
i" all its majestic simplicity, its massive
grandeur and quiet colossal strength. He
was no hero of romance, there was nothing
of romantic hernism in Els nature. As a
warrior, he was incapable of fer, but made
no merit Of defying danger. He fought for
a cause, and not for personal renown. Glad
", when he had won the cause, did he hang
up his sword, never again to take it down.
Glory, that blatant word which haunts some
military minds like the bray of a trumpet,
formed no part of his aspirations. To act
Justly was his instinct. to promote thu pub
lie veal his constant effort, to deserve the
s-affection of good men" his ambition. With
such qualifications for the Dure exercise of