The national era. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1847-1860, 1858-12-23
PENSION OFFICE.

Bay and Puget Sound Companies.
PENSION OFFICE.
Mr. Commissioner Whiting reports that the
business of the Pension Office is up to date. and
q material reduction of clerical force will soon
become necessary.
During the past year, 209 army invalid pen
sions have been added to the rolls the aggre
gate of whose yearly stipends is SI8775; the
! allowances of 30 have been increased in the
further sum of $l,386, and the whole number
of pensioners of this class now on the rolls in
all the States is 1916, requiring the annual
sum of $446, 1858. The claims of / survi-
wing Revolutionary soldiers have been allowed
and FIVE have had their stipends increased One
| hundred and fifty-two claims have been allowed
to widows of Revolutionary soldiers, for the ag-
gregate annual sum of 1854 .O6, and thirty-ive
have had their pensions increased in the further
sum OF $2,O70.35 per annum. The number of
Revolutionary soldiers yet alive and drawing
pensions is 253, and the number of widows of
deceased Revolutionary soldiers is 42O9.
The annual amount required for the former
$l4,724.29 and for the latter, 1894, 49, IS.
The number of Revolutionary soldiers whose
deaths have been reported during the year is
lO4 and of the widows, 624.
One hundred and eighty-seven claims have
been allowed to widows and orphans of the
army, whose yearly pensions amount to $I3,924
The whole number Of this class now on the roll
is ,345, and the pensions amount to the sum
of$lO7, O2922 per annum. The whole number
OF army pensioners now on the roll under all
the acts is 10, 723 and the sum of their stipends
$9O2, 7O0.29. Thirty claims have been allowed
to lnvalIds OF the navy, requiring 81 1850 per
annum, and thirty-two for widows and orphans
of deceased naval officers, &c, requiring the
annual sum of $6,696. The whole number of
navy pensioners now on the rolls is 992, whose
pensions amount to the aggregate sum Of
Sl3O,5l0 per annum. The entire amount paid
during the year ending the Both June, 1853,
for the army and navy pensions, exclusive of
the haltpay pension claims adludicated by the
Third Auditor of the Treasury, and of what are
termed unclaimed pensions, was 81, 49,, $685..
Under the act Of June g. 1853, renewing and
continuing for life, or during widowhood the
halt-pay pensions previously granted to widows
and orphans for the limited period of five years,
54l claims have been allowed. involving the
Immediate payment of $45 OBI Is, and S44.O87
annually thereafter. The whole number of
claims to be allowed under this act is estimated
to be not less than 5000. The report asserts a
saving to the Treasury of $ll8,G70.2O during
the past year, as the result of the Secretary's
decision to discontinue the practice, pronounced
ny tHC AIlOIHC1 OeneTdl 10 pc llle9dl, OF paving
to the children of deceased Revolutionary sol
ders and their widows the pensions they might
have drawn, but did not claim, during their
lifetime.
The whole number of bounty-land warrants
issued during the year is 1855, which re-
quire f. acres of land to satisfy them. This
added to the quantity reported last year, makes
the whole amount of public land granted by the
United States for military services 62,739,362
acres. The number of bounty-land claims on
the suspended files, under the acts of l847 and
1855, which may or may not be established by
further evidence, is about $4,000.
1t appears that 398, $3.50 acres of bounty land
is yet due to officers and soldiers of the Revolu-
tion and to soldiers in the late war with Great
Britain, which, if claimed cannot be awarded
unless the time within which the warrant must
be issued be extended, which the report recon-
mends.
Numerous frauds under the bounty land laws
have been detected during the past year. cover
ing 10000 acres. Four of the perpetrators
have been convicted and sentenced; one has
escaped punishment under the statute limiting
prosecutions to two years after the commission
OF the offence, and thirteen others, against whom
indictments have been found, await trial. Be-
sides these, 1t is inimated that strong suspicious
exist against other parties, against whom the
evidence is not yet sufficient to Justify legal
proceedings.
The whole paid for pensions in money
and land, estimating the land at : / rs per acre,
is, up to this date, $l68, 1902.
HORSE RACING AT A DIsCOUYT.-It is not
many years since dueIing received its death
blow by the simple eXpedient of a protest signed
first by two individuals, then by a few of their
friends, shortly afterwards by hundreds of the
aristocracy and middle classes, and then pub
hshed and circulated. And now a duel is
never heard of in any part of England, and
scarcely even In France. Success in this case
arose out OF the mature state of the public mind
on the subject; and if there is in our day
similar rlpeness regarding horse-racing. such
means might be expected again to succeed.
That there is at least progress in this whole
some direction, we may infer from the decay of
the saturnala that used annually to be common
at some OF the seats of this popular sport
Doncaster, Tor example, so farfamed for its
race-course and Its racing history, cannot now
muster sufficient company in the evening for
ball, and serious apprehensions are entertain
ed that the annual meeting will be given up
" a cousummation which many of the respect
able inhabitants think deyoutly to be wished"
This age Is less frivolous, in some respects,
than the last; and even where pure religion has
H''i0 lAhuOhCo, tuere Is Stlu progress toward
something higher and nobler than the pursuits
that once satisfied society.
The death of Mr.. Asheton Smith, a noted
fox-hunting millionaire in Wales, has lust call.
ed forth well-written article in the Times,
pointing out the folly and the unworthiness Of
the life led by one who, with numerous good
ana amlabe qualities and immense material
wealth, was content, till fourscore, to occupy a
place among his fellow-men, without having Sc
riously devoted himselfto any one object in the
world, save the pursuit of foxes. The Times
expresses here, as it generally does, the public
sentiment of thepeople of England.
The Detroit Advertiser gives new method
of computing interest on any number of dollars
at SIX per cent, which appears simple. Sepa-
rate the right hand figure by a point, and the
figures on the left hand of this separate point
will be the interest in cents for six days-the
figure on the right of the point, dectnaaLs of
cent. Multiply the whole amount by fue, to find
the interest for thirty days, and this sum by two
for sixty days, three for ninety days, DC. For
an 1haro f do, 4han CIV tolra fhaf G.