New-York tribune., 1872-09-17


II. Brewster was in full life, no Trustworthy
lawyers were to be found, interposed to secure
the debt. "I came on" says he, to Phila-
"delpbia TO see what could be done to secure
this claim, or any part of it, out OF the
assets of Mr.. Yerkes. j found he had made
"vOluntary assignments Of what property he
:" had left to lawyer in this city, and dis
covered that before his failure he had given
"preference to large number OF banks and
bankers in this city-some of your very first
bankers-and some of the largest and most
powerful corporations in this city, the First
National and the Kcnslngton Banks, and
Mr.. Drexel. | knew if I went into Court
"of Bankruptcy and instituted proceedings
"against Yerkes, to force these people, that
"vould be fought at every STEP"
'These people," are sound banks in Phia-
ddphia and Gen. Grants intimate friends the
Messrs. Drexel. Whether it ended IN ferkes
being declared bankrupt we do not know,
bat certainly itIdid in his being convicted OF a
larceny of the city funds, and going to the
Penitentiary, where he now is, corresponding,
as Mr. Swope says, in the most friendly c0nh-
dence with Hartranft, two letters being pro-
duced or rather parts of them, OF as recent
date as July and August last. If we are not
misinformed, Yerl1es was convicted before one
of the best of Philadelphia's Republican judges,
and when a new trial was solicited, it was
refused by a court of which nearly every
member is of the same politics with the pris-
oner and Gen. Hartranft. Yet it is OF this
| formal and solemn adjudication that ex-Attor-
new General Brewster says, it was a trick
" and plot of foul conspiracy" This is the
perplexed and tangled state of things, such as
exists in no other State IN the Union, unless
il be South Carolina, on which SwOpe sheds
ghastly light.
We have hardly left ourselves room to say
word of attorney General Benz min Harris
"Brewster," though he well deserves it, socially,
professionally, morally, intellectually. Let us
observe, in the first place, he is not "Attor-
" ney- General though he once was, having
given place, Sc inUitO to another gentleman OF
the same name, which fact may account for
tbe bitterness with which throughout he
aludes to Gov. Geary, who just now seems
10 please nobody. Certainly he does not Mr..
Brewster. The ex-Attorney deals in strong
rhetoric but reading his speech with as much
desire to be enlightened we regret to say at
( the end of it we find ourselves no wiser than
at the beginning. lie adduces not one word
of proof GlicOnde.
"These things that ! tell you,n said Mr..
Brewster. are facts within my personal
knowledge, and it is because |, of all men
in the State, am the man best qualified to
testify to their truth, that l appear before
won tonight. 1t is because / know that
these charges against Gen. Hartranft are
chase and wicked calumnies and diabolical
Giles. that have felt it to be duty which
al owe to the people of this Commonwealth
" to come forward and expose them"
And " these things" he tells, amount liter
ally to nothing. No proof-no semblance OF
evidence and no allegation on the great points
at issue, and which have been over and over
again presented - especially, not one word
about the stock k-jObbng letter of the 9th OF
March. 1870, and of the Attorney General, who
ever it was, who took 4" the starch out" OF the
disreputable speculation in which Hartranft
was then indulging. With very ill-mannered
| fling at Mr.. Greeley, " the speaker concluded
" by drawing a parallel between the career Of
"Gen. IIartranft as a brave and patriotic de-
fender of his country and his opponent, Buck
alew, who had done nothing all his life but
follow the trade of n professional politician,
" who was an ally of the Southern slave
holders before the Rebellion, a Copperhead
" and apooGst for treason during the Rebellion,
g" and who had now joined an infamous coalition
&" to restore the Rebels and the Democratic
party to power"
These words about Shareholders and re-
bellion and apology for treason have a brave
sound, and show the changes which time
works. If, anterior to the war, Slavery and
slave-catchers had an earnest, Jealous advos
| cate it was Mr.. B. II. Brewster, and on the
nth of january 1861, he was the enthusiastic
orator in support of resolution which ran in
these words: "That in the deliberate judg-
ment of this meeting the dissolution of the
Union by the separation of the whole South,
ga result we shall most sincerely deplore,
"may release this Commonwealth from the
bonds which now connect it with the Con-
4" federacy, and would authorize and require
" its citizens, through Convention to be as
"sembled for that purpose, TO determine with
whom their lot shall be cast, whether with
" the North and East, whose fanaticism has
precpitated this misery upon u.s. or with our
" brethren OF the South, whose wrongs we feel
"as our Own, or whether Pennsylvania shall
" stand by herself, ready when occasion offers
to bind together the broken Union, and
resume her place of loyalty and devotion"
Mr.. Buckalew never went as far as this, and
we commend, since Mr.. Brewster has thrown
down the challenge, the contrast to the Re-
| publicans of PENNSYLVANIA.
| ANSUERING d FOOL ACCORDING TO HIS
FOLLY.