New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1857-12-30
have made Of the scoendrcly taxations Of this city
they should teach US the utter necessity Of every
citizen taking part in politics if the name Of Liberty
ia To suryiye the cruel assaults made its nature

ia In suryye the cruel assaults made on its nature.
|
| II possibly an open question whether or not
| the commander of an American man-Of-war should
b qualified to write the English language with
nestness, or at least with propriety. There may
| he no very intimate connection between grammar
| and guns, between the subjunctiye mood and sub
! lection, between victory and verbs; but, at the
| same time. when missives from our bold Chlef
| Mariners are to become matters Of record are to
90 down to posterity are to be transmitted to for
egn cabinets, for the sake of keeping the language
| pure, it would be well if the shade Of Murray
would like sweet little cherub perch itself alOft,
to take care of the writers below to shower upon
them syntaxical inspiration. and Ia hurl, at inter
vals leaves from the grammar which tormented our
childhood down the cabin stairs, and directly upon
| the cabin table Many British heroes whose BRAY
cry cannot be questioned even by those who assert
Mary, Queen Of Scots made their marks
with their thumbs, being ignorant Of the ele-
| CANT art of chirography. In modern times. poor
Sir Charles Napier, who has hard luck Of it, after
fighting vaisntly in his early years should have had
some small grammatical angel at his elbow, when
be was seduced by spunk and ardent spirits into
writing to the newspapers. And in still more mod'
ern times, if Capt. Chatard had but sent his de.
mands TO Gen. Walker in parsing shape, who
knows that William would not have passed. and
instantly to have surrendered to the Captain, thus
enabling him to bring the elephant to this country,
and to bother by the presentation of his pOnderous
prize, the present suffering rulers Of this Republic.
Walker, having written for the newspapers, was
not to be taken down by brOadside of bad gram.
mar; and, in short, the arch .flbuster being more
dexteyOus in composing leader than in being
leader-in scribbling than in stOrming-in inditing
than in lghting-conceived profound contempt
for Capt. Chatard, whose grammar, to speak in a
considerable way OF it, is Of the forlornest aud most
miscellaneous sort. In such tempestuOus mo-
mcnts, when the red eye Of war is giving most por-
tentous winks; and the proper people are fixing
the guns; and no end of drums are beating to quar-
ters and the powder-mOnkeys are rehearsing the
preliminary antics; and all is bellicose; and the
Captain is in the cabin reading, to his immense
justification, the first Message of james Buchanan
how, in the name Of propositions and pronouns,
We to have letters of AddisOnian finish Some of the
finest challenges ever delivered in this pugnacious
world have been wanting in rhetorical polish Thus
(to quote from the history Of the P. R,) when Big
Ben sent to Small Sam, the champion of the Light
Weights, mortal challenge, it was couched in
the following terms: 'If 50 be you ever dares
"to show your ugly mug vch l has frequently
pounded, in my presence, Is the chap that will
"dO you brown, vich am veil able to do" En-
phstic, certainly, but not correct. SO, the same
may be said of Capt. Chatard's communications
with the prize-elephant just drawn by our Admin
stration. Explicit, we admit them to be, but we
We cannot take much pride in them as evidences Of
the efficiency of our school system.
Nobody can expect ga fighting old Commodore,
I" a rum old Commodore to be well up i'll literary
matters. Our first impression was, that Capt.
Chatard was educated in the Normal School of this
city but subsequent research proved that although
our judgment was correct quoad his STYLE it could
not be correct quOad his age. But then, We always
supposed that these old and gramrnarless salts car
ried with them an amanuensis or private secretary
or body clerk (or by whatever name the officer
may be callsd) whose duty it was to retOuch the
epistolary efforts of his SUPERIOR and to reconcile
the verbs TO their nOminatve cases. When
Caesar Dodge went to Madrid, he carried with him
a celebrated linguist, " to do the Spanish" "WhO
sis to do the English ," asked a witty cotem-
porary. 1t may soon be an important question, in
view of the late correspondence, who is to do the
English in the navy? With our usual kindness,
We recommend Joel I. Headley esq, for the post
of grammatical head of the Navy Department.
1t is always pleasant to behold our fellow cfea-
lures jocosely airing themselves under adverse
circumstances; and, therefore, We cannot blame
the poor, forlorn flibusters when they advertised
for Tutor Wanted" to be employed on board
of the Saratoga. They might have been more civil,
but they could not have been more sarcastic. STILL
il must be admitted that those who win have the
best right to laugh although by virtue of this very
axiom, Walker may be in broad grin at the
moment of this writing. The guns of the ships
were more potent than the grammar of the pri-
Yates.
Whether or not William Walker will be obliged
TO put up in Washington, placard inscribed
Tutor Wanted" We cannot say. He may,
however. offer large reward to the man who will
tell him whether the Administration is for him or
against him, OF whether Mr.. Buchanan in these
stirring times has any decided opinion upon any
subject whatever.
The tax levy as voted on Monday evening BY the
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