New-York tribune., 1878-04-30

mean great deal, and yet be con-
strued as nothing more than the express
sion of a Jealous regard for the sacred
ness of treaties and the interests of Greeks
and Mussulmans. As leading member OF the
Cabinet, he might have said somethhs
more in regard to European Congress-
but he significantly neglected that topic'
as If he and bis colleagues Were
afraid that Russia would offer terms whicn
they could not honorably refuse. The generai
| tenor of Mr.. IIardys remarks must De 10 us
courage diplomatic efforts, and increase tiie
impression chat the British Government mas
entered on a fixed policy of hostility and ag-
| gTession.
Our London correspondents report upon the
Paris Exhibition buildings in their raw state, Is
calculated to crafty Yankee pride, unless Amer
leans are above the human weakness of hiking
| to be told of other peoples defects. Whatever
| NAV be the beauties of the Exhibition In de-
| tail, the general effect must be, 1t is shown,
! far below that which was attained at Phlladel-
phia. Instead of standing in the midst OF
great and beautiful park, the Paris buildings
are massed together in confined space; they
are low, and the interiors have been subdi-
vided in such way as to destroy all perspec-
tives; and to exhaust at once the catalogue
! of faults the ventilation seems to be bad, ana
the heat likely to be oppressive. These are the
! defects. When the frame of the Exhibition
has been clothed with beauty, we shall hear the
other side of the story.
| 1t seems that the famous skull which Brown
" of Calaveras" produced before the Society of
the Stanislaus, is emerging from the cloud OF
| ridicule in which it was enyeloped by the
famous poem. Professor j. ID. Whitney
has the skull, and believes in it, and pre-
sented the subject recently in lecture
before the Boston Natural History Society,
Brown himself being present. AS will be
seen from our report of the lecture, the skull
is regarded as af1ording strong evidence
of the existence of man on this con-
tment during the Pliocene epoch, and
long before the glacial period. But
strange to say, the relic finds little favor
either with the Darwinians or their opponents,
and tie disputes which began with its first
exhibition bid fair to be perpetuated unless
some fresh discovery decides them.
-
Judge Van Brunts decision declaring the
Board of Estimate and ApportiOnment cOnsti-
tutiOnal does not alter i'll the least, OF course,
the practical aspect of the workings of that
board. By the terms of the charter the Board
of Aldermen does exercise the power of levy
ing taxes, but this is only legal fiction.
Inasmuch as the Board of Estimate
and Apportionment can take final action
upon the estimates, and the Aldermen
must levy taxes to correspond with the
estimates transmitted to them, it follows that
the Board of Estimate and Apportionment
leyies taxes i'll fact though not in name.
| The Board therefore actually exercises power
| indirectly which the Legislature would have
had no right whatever to delegate to it di-
recty. The Board is constitutional, no doubt,
but it is none the less a violation of the
! spirit o. The constitution that four Office
| holders should levy our taxes three of the
four being the political creatures OF the
fourth.
In our Washington dispatches will be found
clear statement of a new source of danger
to the Treasury from Southern war claims.
! Under decision of the Supreme Court no
proof Of loyalty on the part of claimant can
| be rrqUired in any case which may here
after come before court, the Court
holding that President JOhnson's proclama-
| ton of December %, 1868, restoring
all rebels to their original rights un-
der the Constitution, put the disloyal claim
ant on a level with the loyal before the courts.
1t is true that at the presant time 10 war
claims can be preferred before the
! Court of Claims, the limit within which
it was prescribed they shoGla be pre-
sented having been passed; but it is
now proposed by a prominent Demo-
cratic member of the House to pass a general
law for the submission of all claims not
founded upon contracts, or of which the
Court of Claims would not now have
jurisdiction, TO that court for adjudication.
Under such bill, and under the de-
cision and proclamation referred to, disloyal
claimants would stand as well i'll the Court of
Claims as loyal claimants. The danger to the
Treasury can be more easily, imagined than
described. What does the tax-paying North
think of it