New-York tribune., 1874-01-14


Boston harbor Forts Winthrop and Independence
are substantially finished. The fort on Dutch
Island. in Narragansett Bay is of about as much
use as il IT were in the Florida Channel The fort at
W,Ilett's Point will be- IN connection with Fort
| SCHUYLER n very important work IN the event
of the Government succeeding In deepening
the channel by He'll Gate to the extent OF 80 feet
II that is done it will in his Judgment reverse the
foreign commerce of New-York, and bring IT all
| through Long Island Sound, past He'll Gate to the
East River, allowing such shDs as the Great East
ern and the largest ships of the world, to come
through Long Island Sound In that event, the
heavy iroD-ciad fleets of England could come
through the Sound and We would have to have
fort at Wotts Point bnt at present. and until that
is done, he would not spend cent on it. At Fort
Hamilton no expense Is needed. Fort Tompkins
ought to he finished. Battery Hudson he knew
nothing about Fort Delaware, in the Delaware
River, is tower III the middle
Of the rveA and he should think
it war substantially finished. On Fort hcfenry and
Fort Foote he would spend money. 1t
would Ike a waste of money to spend it on Fort
Washington. God only knows" he said, what
want a fort there for. No iron-clad ship get
up the Potomac River. We can hardly get vessels
drawing 13 feet of water up the river" Fort Mon
is finished On Fort Moultrie no money should be
spent. GoTI sumter hnU1iu sJdbu ab % ihOnuincht.
No mcney should be spent on Fort Pulaski. 4 small
appropriation should be made for Fort Taylor at
Key West. No more money should be spent on Fort
jackson or St Philip and San Francisco harbor
ought to be pretty well fortified by this time.
Gong the estimates Of appropriations for the
next year. the General thought that the most OF
them could be dispensed with. In regard to the
necessity of having the entire coast defended by
Notifications, Gen. Sherman said the building of
railroads, whereby 5,000 10000, 1900 men may be
picked up and thrown from point to another
with great rapidity and with absolute certainty,
takes away from the country all fear of invasion by
any nation on earth. We do not fear now
the landing on our coast Of the armies of
any people The only object of fortihcations the
seaboard is therefore to protect some rich city like
New-York or Boston, which is very tempting TO an
enemy like England, that might dash in, lay the city
under contribution, and get out before we could
wake up We do not fear the Decentralization on our
coast at Baltimore at Pensacola in North Caro-
lima, OF any enemy as we did in 1912. Nothing of
that kind can now happen. There Is no remote ap-
prehension of IT. Therefore he would cease tins
extraordinary expenditure of money at every
little place where schooner, a brig, or an
ordinary ship III. and ! would only
guard tthe most important harbors Of refuge and
those great cities which alone can tempt foreign
enemy TO make an attack on our coast" The I'm
provements in modern artillery have been negatived
Ill great measure by the greater dranght of water
that ships carrying large ordnance have. The Chan-
mel Fleet of England cannot single port OF the
United States, except possibly Newport k. j. The
vessels which carry these heavy guns cannot ap-
proaeh coast within range. There is not one
such vessel that can come into New-foTk harbor.
ARCHITECT MULLETTS EXTRAVAGANCE.
BUILDINGS ERECTED IEGhkDLEss OF TnE LIMIT AS
10 CosT-DoUBLE THE AMOUNTS AUTHORIZED
EXPENDED ON IHE NEw-YoKK AND BOSTON
rosI-oFFICEs.
lBY TELEGRAFB TO THE TRIBusE.l
WAsHIKGIoS, Jan. 1a--The way IN which Con
gress is constantly bafed by the Supervising Archi
tect in its attempts to prescribe limit TO the cost
of the pubic buildings, was explained by Messrs
Dawes and Beck to-day. Il appears to make no diff
ference how strong prohibitions Congress may insert
in the law the Architect puts up structure to suit
his own ideas, no mater what the cost may he. The
New-York Post Office was cited az an example. The
law provided that u should not cost more than
3 600 900 and that no money should be spent until
estimates and contracts had been made within this
figure. Mr. Muliett went on TO erect a build
ing that was an architectural mOnstrosity on
account of its insufficient hight. Then Congress
had TO authorize the addition oil another story.
This the architect held to remove ali restrictions
TO the cost anG he Eas already spent S5.7y4.0OO on
the building The Boston Post-Otfce the cost of
which was liked by law at 81 100000, has absorbed
S276S.G0O. remedy for ths abuse was proposed by
MI Randall III the shape of a penal statute, impos
inc a fine for exceeding the amount of authorized
expenditure. This was offered amendment to
the Naval bill Oh which the debate somewhat inap-
propIiately There is talk of puttng il Oh all
the Appropriation bills.