The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1858-01-22
Another Touchstone Turned Up-Mr. Richard
Ycsd0n Under the scaIpeI.


station kept professional fools whose business it
was to divert their masters by the utterance Of
absurd speeches and the commission of ridicu-
lous acts-to play the fool, in short, in return
for their victuals and clothing. The practice
is still continued in many parts of the world
though under a different name. Your modern
jester does not wear cap and bells; 1t is only
by seeing and hearing him that you perceive
he is a fool. The planters of the South-merry,
good tempered, easy going, wealthy men-are
peculiarly fond of keeping this class of people
round them; fellows who will sing, or shout, or
tell lies or carry parcels, or do any dirty
work, and who are satisfied to accept in return
any broken meats that are going.
We are anxious 10 herald to the world merit
of all kinds, and we hasten therefore to pro-
claim the rising qualities of Mr.. Richard
Yeadoa of the Charleston Courier, of Charleston,
South Carolina, as the most likely TOuchstone
of any who are now cringing for the broken
victuals on the tables of Southern planters
This Richard Yeadon is not wholly unknown
in this meridian. During the last Presi-
Dental canvass, it may be remembered
that the public sense of delcacy and
decency was grievously shocked by the pub
LEGATION of certain low, mean ISLANDERS about
the private life and family relations of Col
Fremont The stories were 80 base that no
one-it seemed-with the soul of sculliOn
could have stopped to utter them. They proved
to have come from the fertile imagination of
Mr. Richard Yeadon, of the Charleston Courier,
South Carolina. They were clearly brought
home to him. 1t light have been expected that
man convicted of such outrageOusly mean and
foul work would have sought his thirty pieces
of silver from his employers, and retired either
to hang himself (Which would have been the
best thing to do) or to hide his miserable head
in some wilderness Mr. Richard Y01on has
not yet hanged himself; on the contrary, he
edits that dirty little paper called the Courier, at
| Charleston, and hires persons from Mercer
street and the Five Points in this city to send
him from hence what lying gossip they can pick
up in oyster saloons, over drunken orgies,
| against us and the New YORK HERALD.
| But the editing of this paper does not absorb
| Mr.. Yeadon's intellect We perceive from
| pamphlet which has been handed us that he has
delivered an address on "The Influence of
| the Union on the Institution of Slavery" be-
fore the young men of Erskine College at the
last commencement. When the mans masters
come to know that he has sent his pamphlet
abroad, he will be likely to catch it.
Literary correctness is trife, though
we might perhaps expect it in the orator of
College commencement. 1t is evident that Mr..
Richard Yeadon's knowledge even of grammar
is on q par with his knowledge Of decency.
We see, at the beginning of his Grafton, that he
speaks of himself as united in the grateful office
Of honor and incense'-whatever that may mean );
that his object is " to impress the deductions Of
reason seven in an era Of probing political in
qiry marked by earthquake throes, which are
ominous Of CONFUSION" 1--WE should think they
ought to be, if they were anything of earth
quakesD he proposes to combine the didactic
a5th The rhetorical to unfold IN the t,cofold light
of history and the constitution, the federal cha
"a tide" which is the result Of principle
| q. 47;) of "an extent of wealth, happiness and
greatness outstripping Imagination in its rapid
advance toward contamination" Up. 4S0 Of
| Northern faithlessness, which clouds the hea-
ven with portents and jars the land with
throes;" of "a lovely auditory" whom he seems
to think he has bored, &c, &c. But it is too
much to expect grammatical accuracy or lite
rary excellence from the gentleman. We
should be happy to compromise for common
| sense.
And here we come to the point of the dis
course. That point is that the influence exer-
cised by the Union upon the institution Of sla-
| very has been to strengthen, confirm, and spread
it; that the South has been a steady gamer
by all the compromises, all the fght, all
the negotiations which have been had
with the North that whereas formerly, the
South was poor half settled country, with an
institution pointedly condemned by the fathers
of the republic, and barely tolerated by the
constitution, now 1t is rich teemng with mig
| gers and cotton, having been built up by the
Union, and having extorted concession after
concession from the North until even the Bible
and the Supreme Court are made to go for
slavery, and slave dealers are admitted to be
quite respectable. This, we say is the purport
| and gist of the Grafton of Mr.. Richard Yeadon,
| of Charleston; and If such sentiments have ever
been expressed before in any periodical but the
Nc,c York Tribune or by any orator but Wendell
Phillips and his colleagues, we are not aware
| Of IL.
| Mr.. Richard Yeadons idea is-you see what
capital thing the Union is, and how IL has
enabled us SoutherDers to humbug and outwit
the NortherDers; therefore, my friends, let US
20 for the Union. If Mr.. Richard Yeadon is
allowed to talk in this way by the rich men
who have him in their charge, we must stop abus-
ing Lloyd Garrison and Theodore Parker. If the
South have really swindled the North as Rich
ard Yeadon says il has, il is high time that the
account we're squared; and the Kansas question