Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1858-10-29
WASHINGTON NEWS AND GOSSIP

the press on the fact that he rsvsnass Of the
Post Office Department annually I'll to meet
It's expenses, evince, We regrst to have 70 write,
great lack of informatio9 concssnins the
operations of that branch 6 he publ service,
rs we'll as concerning the circumstances in-
volved in the expansion Of the population of
the United States, East and West, from the
Atlantic and Pscino sides; for, since eur settle
ment Of California, population has been ex-
banding eastward almost Is fast ~ westward,
from the Iowa, Nebraska, Kansas, Missouri,
Arkansas, and Texas frontiers The truth II,
the post is the pioneer of al intrinsic and regu-
lar Governmental relations with our new ter
ritory. The first Government agents who 90
into the wilderness are the Indian agents; next
follows the army, whose presence there is neces-
sary to secure the lives and property OF the
few of our felIow-citirens who venture into it
as trappers, travellers, or as settlers in its
dreary vastness. With the advento of the army
and such settlers, the post must 60. Congress
IL sure to order the transportation of mails for
their accommodation often directing them to
be carried Q thousand miles where 1t 10 neces-
sarily most expensive to transport them, to
accommodate communities in the wilderness
of, it may be, not more than two or three hun
dred souls in all, three-fourths Of whom are of
the classes patronizing the post least Of all the
citizens in the United States. Congress estab-
fishes such post routes and requires regular
mails to be established upon them at whatever
necessary cost. Of course the Department does
not get back from them in the way Of postage,
five per centum per annum of their expense to
it. The fault, if fault it be, 10 not that Of the
Depar tment, but of Congress.
We, however, do not conceive that the estab-
lishment of such post routes is blame worthy.
1t is absolutely necessary to our national in
terests and system Of government on the from
tier that regular communication should be
kept up with such distant interior points be-
cause it is tho duty of the Government to open
them up to settlement as fast as possible, and
also thus to accord protection to such regions |;
the regular passage of the mails to and from
them according substantial protection to them
in the means Of certain and more speedy COM
munication with them they afford. II such
sections Of our countries were without mail
facilities, Of course the Government would not
receive dollar from them from the sale of the
public lands in them for none would settle in
numbers, in these times, beyond the reach of
intercourse with the rest of the world by the
mails Thus large portion of the deficiency
In the postal revenues of the Government is,
in fact, an expenditure for the benefit of the
frontier, and for that of other governmental
interests which, sooner or later, pay it back
into the Treasury, in various ways, ten.fold
There are, of course, other causes of the appa-
rent deficiency in the postal revenues; but when
compared with this cause, they are so slight
in their effects as hardly to be worthy of con-
sideration.
STEPHEN d. DILLYEAE.-This individual
who became notorious not long since throu Oh
his newspaper efforts to excite sympathy on &C.
count of his removal by Secretary Cobb, from
the ONCE Of an appraiser at large in New York,
which, in turn, led to the exposure by Mr.
Guthrie "a secret supervisor Of such Govern
ment functionaries) of the fact that his corrupt
conduct in Office had rendered his removal i'm.
perative, is again in trouble. According to the
Pittsburgh, Pa Post, recently he and four or
i've associates undertook to set bank in ope.
ration, located at McKeesport, "a village near
that city, for which charter had been grant
ed, but up to that time no one came forward to
furnish the real money necessary to set it "agc
ing" To the end of getting the requisite funds.
Diilyeae & Co. sold to a Pittsburg bank q large
number of New York securities of some de
scription or other, and paid the proceeds Of the
sale into the State Treasury at Harrisbu for
Mckeesport bank notes, we presume, for circu-
laton. In two days it was discovered that some
S2I 900 Of the securities on which the Pittsburg
bank had advanced the money were forgeries;
whereupOn the MeKeesport bank bubble burst
Diliyeae 4 Co, certainly paid some s27 900 of
their own or other peoples good money in this
transaction; which strikes US as proof positive
that they did not know the worthless character
of the balance Of their payment For its true
character would necessarily come to light
almost Immediately after the bogus securities
left their hands; and on thus becoming known
would utterly destroy the value of their in
vestment of good money. We believe that no
one has SO far been hurt, peouniarily, by this
ugly looking financial transaction, save and
except Dillyeas d Co.
The ARNAMRNT.-The fourteen vessels of
the Paraguay expedition intended to be used
as lighting vessels, carry five eeven-inch guns
about twenty -four nine inch guns, and between
twenty and thirty bowitzers, of twelve and
twenty-four pound cslibro. The eleven and
nlne-inch guns are capable Of throwing, at each
discharge, hollow shots, the metal of which
weighs about 1850 lbs and which contains, in
the aggregate, IS pounds of powder Besides
these, there are the shrapnel and grape dis
charges from the howitzers, and large sup
ply of war rockets, &c, to be taken into con
sideration. .
Should land force be employed, two thou
sand men can be spared for that purpose, and
there will still be an effective force left on the
vessels. The howitzers can, also, be adapted
to the use of the land force, and will form eff
cient batteries Of field artillery.
SINGULAR ANSoUScEsESr.-The Washing
tss correspondent of the New York Tribune
makes the following singular announcement:
All the Central and south American Minis
ters are greatly alarmed at the Paraguay expedi-
tion,sincs It's altered desti nation became known -