Morning journal and courier., 1884-02-06

everything appertaining to his art, greatly enjoyed life. Among his peculiarities, says MT. Thompson, was his faith in the sustaining power of nails. experimsnted for him and found two ten penny nails sustained two thousand pounds before they broke. He worked without regular drawings, made but rough sketches and orally explained or carefully detailed in writing every minute point. So clear was his perception that nothing escaped his vision. He boastsd that he kept no books and his accounts and memoranda were apparently scattered in confusion. Yet at 8 moments notice he could lay his hands on anything wanted. His faculty of impressibility, of making people do what he wished or believing what he stated, was extraordinary. T think" said Deacon Stephen Twining, father of the present professor and deacon, Eff MT. Town should tell us the Center church was made of marble we should have to believe him."
 Tragedies of the Sanctum.
 Closing Scenes fn the Life of Some New
 York Editors.
 IFron John swintons Paper.I
 There has been widespread grief among the newspaper men of New York over the tragioal ending, few days ago, of the life of Wood, the "Great American Condenser" of the Sun, by shock and exposure through fall ing into the ios-beund river at midnight.
 The tragedy of his death brings to my mind g score of other tragedies of the ssnctunl that have cast lurid light over the years of my career upon the press of New York. J, will tell of few of the more notable of them without going far back in my memory.
 The first editor of tho New York World, which was started as an orthodox religious paper, was MT. Spaulding, grave, taciturn man of large frame and powerful intellect. When the World fell into financial straits and threw religion overheard, about 1863, MT. Spaulding took place upon the editorial staff of the Times, under Henry J. Raymond, whose first assistant then was; and there he showed himself to be the boIdest master of political invective ever known on the Areri- can press. To recruit his health, he made a voyage to New Orleans, but on an excursion up the Mississippi his boat met with ill luck, and he was cast on a deserted bank of land where he almost starved to death. The first I knew of his return to New York was at a very late hour of one night, when, being on duty in the editorial quarters of the Times, a ''whistle up the .pipe'' from the publication office, and message that Mir. Spaulding had muttered my name hurried me down stairs. found him prostrate on his back upon the stone flooring, evidently struck by paralysis, and entirely unconscious. In few moments he caught my voice, and began stammering out Latin words, disjointed quotations from Virgil, Horaoe and his other favorite authors, occasionally pressing his head with his hands, and breaking into sert of wild laugh. It was after midnight by the City Hall clock when left his side, hastened over to the old New York hospital, then in Broadway, rang up the young doctor in charge, who agreed to take him in, returned to the Times with a stretcher, called down four competitors, who lifted the prostrate man from the floor, and accompanied them back to the hospital where I saw him placed safely upon a cot under 8 doctors charge. It was half an hour of the time for going to press when got back to the editors sanctum, and if the editorial columns of next days Times were short or otherwise imperfect, the reason is now for the first time told. Though MT. Spaulding was over fifty years old, he had been married but few months before, and in the morning I telegraphed to his young wife, then in one of the to Wns up the Hudson river, who ap- peared at the hospital in a very few hours. She tended him devotedly during the days in which he could not be removed from the cot, and then had him taken to her fathers country homo, where he soon afterward bowed his head in death. In this tragical way ended the life of the firsi editor of the New York World, man of great soul and honest purpose.
 Even more tragicsl was the closing scene, in June, 1869, of the life of Henry J. Ray mond himself the distinguished founder and editor of the New York Times. He had been at the Times office on the afternoon of the night in which hs was found dead. and in- quired for me; but happened to be engaged elsewhere in work which he had put upon me, writing criticism of Woolsey's s.Reform Against Nature" " then just published. Leav- ing word that he desired to see me as soon possible, he left the office in Lis usual cheery mood, took dinner ct his house in Ninth street, and then went to a political meeting. But little is known of his subse- quent movements until after midnight of that day (June 18), when his wife, who was drawn down stairs by hearing noise, found him lying dead at the door of his house. In the midst of great career in the press and in politics, his life ended in tragedy never yet cleared up. In the very early years of my manhood, Mir Raymond had given me my first opportunity on the press by inviting me to his paper, and during the ten years that preceded, included, and folio we'd ths great war for abolition Cor from 1859 to 16G9) when I was his daily associate, he proved himself to be the most amiable of men, as he was one of the most accomplished editors.
 But set out to tell with the fewest words the tragedies of 8 score of New York editors of my acquaintance, in a single column, and already I find 1t nearly full.
 The tragedy of tho death in madhouse of Horace Greeley, the founder and editor of the New York Tribune-who has not been shocked by the story of it?
 The tragedy of the death of the venerable poet, William Cullen Bryant. editor of the Evening Post, who fell before my eyes under sunstroke in the Central Park five years ago, was told in this paper of Dec. 30.
 ,Ir- r., summer of last year, death struck my asso- oiate, Wm. O. Bartlett of the Sun, man of great mind and great heart.
 The tragedy of the death last September of the iovial Hugh J. Hastings, the editor of tho Commercial Advertiser of this city, was caused through shock which he got when his carriage came in collision with an express wagon.
 How suddenly and grievously ill December last fsll William T. Clarke, editor of the New York Star, the good and talented man, who had so often thought it his duty to assail me for the deeds thet did under the highest sense of duty.
 The managing editor of the New York Herald during nearly the whole of the life of tho elder Bennett was Mir. Hudson, who came to tragical end in the Massachusetts town of Concord, few years ago, through being crushed by railway train.
 Time fails me to tell of the lesser lights 1 Chase of the Herald, Ned Seymour and Mills | of the ;Times, Adams of the Sun, and how | many others What a line of tragedies of l the sanctum is unrolled before my eyes!- tragedies which have shocked my spirit every | year since first stood, as 8 stripling, within ! the innermost circles of the daily press of | New York.
 The tragedy of poor Doc Wood is the l latest on the roll.
 P W Rarretk T., TT Frishia end xv;fa ond |