Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1881-08-22

Persons leaving the city for the summer can
have THE STAR mailed to them postpaid for
fifty cents per month, and the address changed
rs often as desired.
The condition of the President is precariOus
but by no means hopeless. There is marked
Improvement to-day over yesterday. and of
course continuance of the conditions which
produced this change for the better would soon
place the patient out of danger. There are con-
tingencies, however. which may arise at any
time and again turn the scale the other way.
In brief, there is still much ground for hope that
the worst has been passed. Neither the ply
sicans nor any one else can so nicely calculate
the chances as to change doubt in this case to
certainty.
Reasons grow plentier every day for bel1eving
that Leo Hartmann, the notorious nhilist, is
not now and never has been in this country.
Whether the personation of him here by another
Individual is only huge joke, got up to see how
far it can be carried, or whether it has been done
for his protection and to distract his pursuers
from his real abode and purposes is not clear, but
it is pretty clear that the so-called Hartmann now
in the United States is either fraudulent pre-
tender, or an accomplice of the real assassin and
his friends, sent here to play part
What THE STAR has along been saying about
the advantages of cheap railway fares, as well
to the railway companies themselves as to the
travelling public, is abundantly borne out by the
history of the subject in Great Britain. When
parliament, after long and hardly contested
struggle, compelled the railway lines in the
United Kingdom to carry passengers in special
or workingmen's trains at fair rate of speed.
for a fare of halfpenny Zone cent of our cur
rency) per mile, the managers of the roads pro-
tested that they would all be ruined, and that
the action of parliament was little better than
virtual cOnfscation. But what has been the
result? At the present day nearly three-fOurths
OF all the passenger traffic of the principal Eng
lish lines is on these half-penny or parliament
fary trains, as they are called. For obvious
reasons, too, they are the most profitable part
of the passenger business done by the roads.
Or course, it is not necessary to point out the
advantage they have been to the travelling pub
lie, and especially to the wOrknigmen, for whose
benefit they were inaugurated.
As things go. it is perhaps not surprising that
our street railway companies should refuse to
pay their taxes, decline to remove the dust and
filth they deposit in the streets, and disregard
generally the rights and comfort of the public.
world over, and people do not wonder at it,
But that our well paid District authorities should
sit idly down and permit these impositiOns to be
practiced day after day. week after week, month
after month. and year after year is indeed amaz-
Ing One would suppose that self-respect and
pride OF position would induce little energy on
the part of these officials or if that were not
incentive enough, that fear of losing their place
and the fat salary and personal consideration
which 20 with it would spur them to action Occa-
sOnally. Nothing. however, seems to be power
full enough to stir them from the strange lethargy
that holds them in its paralyzing embrace. Has
the first named consideration no weight with
these gentlemen? Do they feel 80 strongly en-
trenched in their snug position that there is no
danger of the second contingency taking place?
Every day the sad truth is becoming more and
more plain that parental authority and the
sweet influences of home are losing their hold on
the rising generations of the present period. To
say nothing of petty offences of all kinds con-
stantly being committed by the young it is
significant fact that in several of the most shock
Ing of the recent notorious criminal cases only
minors are implicated. or those who have but
lately reached the point where legal personal
responsibility is supposed to begin. The mystic
rious shooting of young Louderman in st. Louis
few days ago turns out to be the work of
group of four or five youngsters, the oldest of
whom was not more than sixteen years of age
while of all the actors so far connected directly
or remotely with the New Haven mystery the
oldest have only lately attained their majority
These, though the most prominent are by no
means isolated cases of the kind. There must
be some explainable reasons for these constantly
iIny
are they' Undoubtedly the vile masses of flash
literature flooding the country in every direction
ana at all times have their influence in debasing
the mind and cOrrupting the morals of the young:
but that agency of itself is not sufficient expla--
nation of the prevalent wckedness Are par
ents of the present day as watchful over the
young as their parents before them used to be?
DO they look after the inclinations associations,
and recreatiOns of their children as closely as
they shOuld' The answer from the criminal
records is in the negative. What reply can the
heads of households themselves make?
III seems 10 be an open question whether the
reported discovery of the late A. T. Stewards
remains is regular sell an advertisement
for one of the so-called New York detective
arencies with the odds a little in favor of the
latter theory.
The widow of the late Asa Packer owns four
Of the Thousand lsles-a property which was
bought Tor $50, and is now valued at S1OO 600
Ihe effect and probably the purpose of this
paragraph. which has been going the rounds Of
the papers for several weeks past is to lead the
public to consider islands in the st. Lawrence
"a good purchase. So they may be; but not to
the extent indicated. nor without considerable
Outlay afterwards. The fact is that the Packer
islands have been enhanced i'm value solely BY