Democrat and sentinel. [volume] (Ebensburg, Pa.) 1853-1866, 1864-11-30
New York Correspondence of the London
Morning Herald

Morning Herald.
AS this letter will not return in a
! printed form to the United States before
the Presidential election will have taken
place, it will do no harm, where harm
light otherwise possibly be done, to give
the history of one of the most extraordi-
nary hoaxes that ever agitated the literary
world In the beginning of the spring of
the recent year pamphlet was published
in this city bearing the novel and rather
barbarous so far as pronunciation goes,
title of s. Miscegination." The ostensi-
BILE object of the work was the advocacy
of the mixing and incorporation one with
another of all the races upon the Ameri-
can continent, but particularly the white
and black and it was gravely put forth
as embodying the only practical solution
of that q,nesttO reaIta, the disposal of the
negro Although the theme discussed
with such apparent solemnity is not sa-
worry one, the book was very clevcrly
written, and was full of scientific facts
and learned quotations. which gave it an
air of great plausibility. Several very
large editions of the work were sold in the
United States and eventually it found its
way across the water, was reprinted by
Irubner & Co, and received prominent
comment in several English literary Jour-
nails Among others the Westminster Re
oae,C noticed the book with a great deal of
gravity, and spoke of it as being very
curious work. The conclusions at which
the author arrived were, you will remem-
Der, perfectly logic;l-;ffording another
Cf bn ft,.lt "a
oftcniimcs very poor common sense.
The real importance TO be given TO the
work consists in the fact that 1t was writ
ten by two young gentlemen connected
with the newspaper press ct New York,
both of whom are obstinate Democrats in
politics, and was got up solely with the
of committing, if possible, the orators
and essayists of the Republican party TO
the principle it enumerated, that of the
complete social equality by marriage, of
the white and black races. The authors
of Z. Misceeination,'' keeping in view the
intense dislike for the negro prevalent at
the North. and employing the arguments
of the Republicans, deXtrously managed
TO make it appear that an amalgamation
or misccgination of the two races was not
only desirable, but inevitable. In order
to familiarize themselves in 4 degree with
the subject, they crammed" ut the
Astor Library, quoted Pritchard, Draper,
and other leal med authorities, and, finally
produced a work which, while being to
appearances really what it professed to be,
had for its true object bringing the Re
publican party into conflict with the
strong anti-negro prejudice existing in the
North The tone of the work through
out is high ly philosophical and now that
this exposure is made, the satire and irony
running between the lines will be appre-
ciated in the United States, probably in a
much higher degree than in England.
The machinery employed TO get the
hoax into circulation and before the peo-
was very ingenious. Before it was IS
! sued proof copies were sent TO all the
! leading Abolitionists, male and female, OF
| the country, from Senator Sumner and
! Secretary Seward down TO Abby Kelly
| Foster. the be crinolincd Abolition rainier.
MANY of the har-beained spiritual me-
! diums of the land-and there are a score
/ or more of these ctherial individuals III
/ cvcrv Northern vilIage-were furnished
! with advance ShcctS Oh the WORK, anu I'LL
umediums'' - and more material minded
| Abolitionists were requested TO furnish
their views upon the subject to the author
/ That bait was swallowed with avidity.
Letters poured in upon the manufacturers
! of the hoax from all manner of queer
people, announcing in the great majority
/ of cases, radical conversion to the
g grand and noble theory" o. miscegina-
ton. Albert Brisbane, the leader of the
Fourierites in the United States, accepted
the new doctrine with certain qualitica-
| tions.
Mr.. Parker Pillsbury, brilliant hight
of the Abolition clique, was perfectly de-
lighted with the idea indeed, SO lar did
his enthusiasm carry him that he advoca-
ted dissolution of the marriage compact
between such white men and women as
could not agree, and their intermarriage
with blacks Mrs. Lucretia Mott, the
venerable Quaker lady a woman yielding
a decided influence in her sect also gave
in her adhesion to the doctrine while
Mrs Sarah Nj. Grimke and Mrs Ameli;
h. Weld were enthusiastically il favor o
it. S. r. Fiske, one ol the editors of th'