The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1870-08-02

SEhAN NbuAA w O0A W.
who insist upon imputing to democratic in
stitutions all the beneicent results that have
sprung from vast area and sparse population.
But MIR. Ruskin has told us so much in his
former works, and even in his present lee
lures, that if not invariably new, has been
not only true but beautifully expressed, and
full of healthful morality: so that adverse
criticism in his case must always be over
balanced by gratitude. Sharp judges may
soy of him that he knows not logic, and that
be is even at times absurd; but there are few
writers of our generation in whom we can
sooner overlook weakness in the application
of the laws of reasoning or more easily for
give occasional absurdity.
HANDCUFFS AND HISTORY.
From the N. Y. World.
A mild controversy is in progress in a sister
city On the interesting subject of manacles.
A correspondent of the Philadelphia Age, who
is described, no doubt Justly, as a respectable
person, whose testimony is to be relied on,
alleges that when, at the outbreak of the
civil war, the Federal army took the field it
carried with it a vast quantity-some 10000
of handcuffs; and that the manufacture of
the article continued to be a very profitable
ranch of industry among our ironmonger-
ing neighbors. To this the Press, always
ready in the cause of manacles, replies:-
"a Democratic contemporary asks, with mysterl-
u uuu HgDOOlAtIbdl llOlIOlf why u hupptus bndl "a
large contract for handouts appears in the Govern
ment accounts during the war. We can tell him.
They were purchased to use in enforcing the draft,
and the expense of buying them and the necessity
of using them are, like most other war expenses,
directly chargeable to the Democratic party"
1t is not easy to determine which, if true,
is the most discreditable to America the
Democratic allegation or the Republican
gloss. We recollect distinctly hearing (but
in our simplicity We thought it a vile Rebel
SANDER that on the battle field of the first
Manassas were found, amids unopened
champagne bottles and untasted sandwiches,
a vast number of shackles for hands and feet.
It was a new element of war. 81 went on
the field of battle the next day" wrote an
eminents.man-a civilian from Warrenton-
with ice and medicine and wine to minister
to the Northern wounded, who, l thought,
might be neglected, and there I found guam
titles of new handouts scattered on the
ground And so this story, which we once
doubted, now turns out to be true. We have
heard of an army terrible with banners, but
never before of a host horrible with hand-
cuffs. In speaking of Bunker Hill our good
friend Bancroft, before he turned Republi-
can, said: ''The gloom in the quarters of the
British was deepened by the reflection that
they had fought, not against an enemy but
against their fellow-subjects and kindred; not
for the promotion of civil or religious free
dom, but for the supremacy of one part of
the empire over another" But he does not
record that ''loyal" Boston men went out to
frolic on the field of blood, or that with the
drum-tap of Pigot's advancing British grena-
diers was mingled the clink of the manacles
forged for the limbs of Prescott, and Putnam,
and Warren.
But "No," says he of the Press; "we admit
the handouts; only they were purchased, not
for rebels but for our own conscripts-for
recalcitrant Dem %ocrats. This makes the
matter worse, and explodes instantly the
whole theory of Northern popular enthusiasm.
Handouts by retail-for sporadic mutiny-
we can comprehend, for every provost mar
shall ashore and master-at-arm at sea has a
few on hand, but this purchase by Wholesale
this contract system in Pennsylvania-to be
applied, not to captured enemies but to our
own reluctant recruits, is something
unparalleled out of Mexican history, and
we should not credit it but for the
high and 'loyal' source whence the story
comes. This superfiuity of gives was not,
however, without its uses. Passing by the
horrid possibility that the Pennsylvania iron
dealers may actually have furnished the chains
that may have been put on our prisoners at
Andersonville and the Libby. we are quite
aware that a remnant of these 'jewels" came
later into play, when a helpless, feeble old
woman was brought into court at Washing
ton chained by the order of Holt and
Hunter, and again when the browning infamy
of the war was perpetrated at Fortress Mon
roe by Halleck and his ~soulless subordinate.
Handouts, Halleck, Hunter, and Holt-his-
tory will hardly suffer this charming ~allitera-
ton to pass out of mems minds.
PERILS OF EPISTOLARY LITERATURE.
From the Wheeling Hnteuigencer,
1t is recorded among the sayings of some
wise man that the pen is mightier than the
sword. 1t is also more dangerous than the
sword-not perhaps to him against whom il
is welded, but to him who Yields it. It is
one of the things not TO be rashly touched.
Many q poor wight has been s~elf-impaled on
it, only to wriggle there in hopeless ridiculo-
sity the balance of his days. More trouble
has risen to plague mankind from singing
ink than spilling blood; and, indeed, most OF
the blood split in modern wars has been due
to some unlucky blunder on paper. See how
all Europe has been agitated for a week by q
little memorandum jotted down two years
ago in Berlin by a fellow named Benedict.
OF all the uses made of the pen the episto-
larry is the most ~perilous. Who ever wrote a
letter that did not some day rise up in judg.
ment against him? How many men have
been ruined by a single epistle. III Henry
Clay had not written a certain letter about
his views on the tariff, he would nave been
elected President some twenty-six years ago.
If he had been elected there wouldn't have
been any annexation of Texas or any war
with Mexico; and perhaps the whole current
of events for these twenty-sIx years would
have been changed. How many a politician
has found himself ruined by some unfortunate
letter, sure to be resurrected just when he