Cleveland daily leader. [volume] ([Cleveland, Ohio]) 1865-1873, 1865-11-02
Especial Correspondents of the LsADEa.l

VIII
up the ~Proteet-SIr Morton Pete,
America, and the new Hat, etc.
Especial Correspondence of the LsADER.1
Riding at her anchor in the North river,
New York, is the good steamship Cont
mental. This is the vessel designated to
take a cargo of ladies to Washington Ter
ritory, where there are said to be ten
thousand men waiting for wivesl As
might be expected, the ship and its cargo
attract much attention throughout the
country, and many old maids and dashing
widows are on the tip-tOe of expectation,
making arrangements for a trip on the
"vasty deep" Large numbers have Sc
cured a passage in her, and are looking
forward to a long and prosperous voyage.
That the voyage will be long enough no
one doubts, for they expect to sail round
South America and Cape Horn. Some
seventy men with their families will go
out in this ship, but the rest of the cargo
will be made up of single ladies, from five
to w hundred having already secured a
passage in her. These ladies are not all
from the large manufacturing cities of
Massachusetts,, or even the East, as many
suppose, but some from nearly every loyal
State, North and West. The cry of the
men on the Pacific coast has been heard,
and the women of the Atlantic slope rush
to their rescue. 1 look upon the ship as
a second Mayfower, and regard these
women as pioneeresses. 1t is nosmall
undertaking to leave home, where cluster
all the charms of refined and civilized So
ciety, to voyage half way round the world,
reaching h~ospitable shores at last, and be
welcomed by ten thousand pairs of out
stretched masculine arms, the owners of
which are dying lin the common accepta-
ton of that term,) for wives. But the
balance of power between the sexes must
be maintained, and if there is a scarcity of
women in Washington Territory the
crowded markets of the North must sup
ply the demand. Thus a redistribution of
the x will take place, and the course
of true love run smooth again, for, after
all, what is life without a wife? Since the
war we are told there is a great dearth of
men in the South. Many a sweet mag
nolia or orange blossom of that sunny
land is "born to blush unseen" and "waste
its fragrance on the desert air." if some
political reconstruction = humanitarian
Beecher, johnson, or Andrew does not
take the matter in hand and export a ship
load of old bachelors.
The room in the ship Continental is al
ready engaged, and she will leave her port
in a week or ten days. Several ladies
from Ohio have taken passage. The very
fact that the ladies SO eagerly accept of
any chance which holds out to them the
prospect Of lettering their condition,
should teach us that they do not enjoy at
home that remuneration for their labor
which is adequate to their support. Women
are no more eager for husbands than men
are for wives. know about the only idea
they are educated to, is that thOy must get
married at all and every cost. A husband
Is their only means of support-they must
either catch one, or drag through life, from
hand to mouth, barely able to keep body
and soul together-never able to crafty
all the higher longings and aspirations
they may have for the requirement of
knowledge or the qualification of other de-
sires. l do not speak of those fortunate
young ladies who have wealthy "paps,"
and go to boarding-school, and namby-
PANTY it through life the rest of their
days. Thisis not the class which seeks for
employment in Washington Territory,
and the DEGREES of Providence. This earth
is stocked with selfish human beings who
have but few thoughts, or care but little
for the welfare or interests of others less
fortunate than themselves, so long as they
are supplied with every individual com
fort. Too true, the world sets a value on
a purse, rather than his real worth
and honest, v%irtuous poverty must stand
uncovered and shivering in tho cold, while
gilded vice rolls by in jeweled ermine.'
Think of a body being obliged to write
like this!
l cannot imagine of a more delightful
cargo to have charge of than the one in the
hands of Mr.. Mercer. After they are well
through the first attack of that saa-siek-
ness EhiAh---est OF them are sure to have,
the evenings will slip by on butterfly
wings. My only fear is that Mr.. Mercer
viii go out of the way for the sake of pro-
longing the voyage.
O%neevening last week Miss Anna Dick
insQn lectured at the Academy of Music
In Brooklyn. Having a stage ticket" 1
took my seat very near the fair speaker
and watched her with much interest. The
title of her lecture was H!Home Thrusts,"
and she took for her particular th6tht tbs
education of girls, and the rights and du-
ties of wives. Her lecture was simply a
re-hash Of Gail Hamiltoh's New At166s-
piere," spiced a little, a Ia Dickinson. But
1t is likely few in the Academy had ever
read the book, SO, it was all the same to
them, and they eheered accordingly. Miss
Dickinson does not think we'll of Mr.. Mer-
Ger, and his "wOman enterprise. Posi-
bly, she never saw himl She is of the opin-
ion that he might bein better businessman
hawking ladies round the world to sell, as
If marriage was a woman's sole object
and aim in life; as if old maids were not
rs respectable as cross, soir, dried-up, old
bachelors She doesn't like the idea of ]
women running across the continent to !
get a husband. She secuted the notion $
That a bachelor remains single because he !
chooses to, while an old maid is Obliged I
TO be one, not having had the opportunity S
to wed. She affirmed that men were rs g
often disappointed as women, and said that G
ihe had not forgotten she was young her Q
elf ONCE. There is d little inconsistency. r
he said, in the statements of Mr.. Mercer. U
lie publishes that the ladies will be fur D
llshed with employment in Washington
Territory and paid four dollars a week in o
.old, butthose who prefer can teach school, c.
here being large numbers of children p
couldn't understand how so many P
,hildren came on the Pacific euust when q
are no women therel The audience u
greed with her that this twas a mystery. 81
From late files of English papers IL
7hieh have come to hand | notice that m
ne English people are somewhat surprised p
t the attention we are showing our Eng q
sh visitors. One of these papers saws:
Sir Morton Peto, and the party of gen.
emen travelling with him in America,
'metimes known as the capitalists are
much attention. Their doings u
re reported bytelegraph, a party of news ar
aper correspondents follows them, the er
aiding, papers contain long editorials on M
subject, many clever speeches are be- fl
g made about che good feeling which ex- in
IS between the two countries, and the an
has been magnifed into one of much lif
Importance ca