New-York tribune., 1878-06-10
nONTNENTS

The crazy little old woman who haunted
the Court of ChanceTy in the story OF
Bleak House" carried a reticule stuffed with
what she called "documents." There were
only scraps of paper, bits of matches,
fragments of lavender leaves, and variety
of miscellaneous rubbish in this melancholy
collection, but poor Miss Flite clung to them
as the munImcnts OF an immense estate
and used to hold mp the bag with
the explanatory exclamation, " documents, Iny
"dear, documents" The Democratic party,
which is prosecuting a shadOwv claim to the
Presidency with an insane peTsistenCy that re-
minds us of Miss Elites imaginary suit for
fictitious riches, has the same regard for worth
less documents Anderson is a dreadful sort
of person to use as a witness, but then he has
letters, kilograms, memoranda, and other
written things in his pocket there Is a
wondrous virtue in pen and ink and
ignorant persons who would not be-
Heve a spoken lie, have a superstitious rev
eYence for lie in writing. "YOu see" said
Mr.. Potter Anderson may be very bad
"man. and he has the fault Of never telling
" the truth but then he is coTObOrated Icy
" the papers which he presents to the commit
tee. Documents my dear sir, documents"
And then Mr.. Potter slaps his hand down upon
the heap of forged agreements, and dubious
affidavits, and other odds and ends from the
Night Editors capaciOus pocket, and considers
the case closed.
II seems to have escaped the attention OF
the Democratic investigators that if Anderson
is utterly worthless except so far as he is
corroboIated by the documents, the dOcu-
ments on the other hand are equally worth
less except so far as they are corrOborated by
Anderson. These papers, to be Of any value,
should tell their own story without outside
Interpretation. But taken alone those which
do not prove Anderson to be "A liar prove
nothing at ALL The supposed Sherman letter.
even if authentic, contains no evidence what
ever that bears on the subject OF
investigation. The Matthews letters, stand
ing alone arc entirely empty. 1t i:
only when Anderson steps forward and
tells us that these letters refer to so and so
that such and such secret understanding
preceded them, that they properly bear not
the plain meaning which lies on their face
but some hidden meaning Ineligible to him
and to nobody elso-it is only when Ander-
son, rogue, swindler confessed peTjurer and
blackmailer holds up a bit of apparently
worthless paper and says, " Gentlemen, this is
"an lncriminating document" that the rub
bish of his budget can be made to do service
for the Democratic investigators. Thus the
documents are expected to repair AndersOn's
damaged character, and AndersOn's character
is to give lustre to the documents. But it
surely does not need argument TO show that
this is not " cOrrObOratiOn.n
In fact, cautious Democrats are beginning
to see that documents which cannot stand
alone are entirely worthless in such case as
this, and that the attempt to verify Ander-
sons testimony by means of the Interpretation
which it pleases Anderson to put upon Ander-
sons documents is blunder of which a
schoolboy ought to be ashamed. II is like
trying to reduce an equation composed entirely
of unknown quantities, or to prove theory
by the use of nothing but suppositions.