Morning journal and courier., 1884-07-29

refuge and other institutions without funds. The embarrassment is due to the re- fusal of liquor sellers to pay the Scott tax. Hundreds of suits have been brought to com pei payment, but as these are all contested and appealed it is said that the city treasury may not be relieved for months
 It is complained that pensioners are suffer ing from device by which they are given to understand that $25 is the regularly author ized fee for procuring pension or land bounty claim. The law passed at the last session of Congress permitted an increase of the ordinary fee of $10 to an amount not more than $25, providing contract to that effect between the claimant and agent was approved by the commissioner of pensions. Some agents have sent out circulars which make no mention of the voluntary agreement which is prerequisite to legally charging a $25 fee. The commissioner now, however requires agents to use an official blank which has notice that the maximum fee is not compulsory.
 The annual report of the Portland (Maine> Civil Service Reform association speaks of the good results of an experiment in Civil Service Reform which has been tried in Port land. It appears that in 1878 a law was passed giving the marshal and other police officers of that city tenure of office depend ent solely on good conduct and efficiency The experiment, according to the report, has had this issue: The effect has been precisely what was anticipated. The police are no longer employed in packing caucuses, or in distributing votes on election day and bring ing voters to the polls. They have ceased to be servants of a party and have become the servants of the whole community answera- ble to nobody for their opinions or their votes
 The Hartford Courant very correctly says: The fact should not be lost sight of that MT. Blaine has had to run such gauntlet in his own party as no other Republican nominee for the presidency was ever subjected to. He has been three times candidate in national conventions, the last time succeeding, the first two times almost succeeding-both times the second in strength and the most fiercely opposed candidate in contests of unusual bitterness. Although he personally did not lift finger or utter 8 word in the last cam paign for & nomination, all this has left an impression upon some minds that he is more vulnerable than others This impression is not in accordance with the facts. The very violence of past and present attacks upon MT. Blaine is testimony to his strength and popularity with the rank and file of his party. It may be added that these attacks have not availed to alter the judgment of the plain Republican voters or to turn them from their purpose. They admire MT. Blaine and they believe in him, and nothing that has been said or printed about him has shaken their confidence in his integrity. They start ed out number of years ago to make him their President; and, this time, they are go- ing to do it.
 In view of the prevalence of cholera in some parts of France the sanitary arrange ments of Paris are interesting The total available daily supply of water for Paris is about 100, ,000, ,000 gallons, which, for a pop ulation of between 2,250, ,O00 and 2,500, ,000, is rather inadequate. Between 1876 and 1881 the number of inhabitants rose from 1,98S,- 900 to 2,240, ,000, at which rate of increase it will be probably 2, ,500, 900 in 1886. The sup ply of water would then be about forty gal Ions per head per diem. This is a higher proportion than Londoners obtain, but is far inferior to the supply of Marseilles, which has 190 gallons head per day. Although the cesspool system still exists in the city, the commissioners proposed in 1881 tenn porary improvement in the of metallic cesspools, containing from SO feet to 200 feet cube, to be emptied by the pressure of the air; but the cost of emptying these weekly would be enormous, irrespective of the expense of providing and fixing cesspool receptacle. The amount of household and street refuse per day in Paris is 54,000 cubic feet which is removed by six hundred carts. The rate for this ex- penditure varies from ? to IA cents per Hneal yard of building frontage, and in 1880 pro duced $520,000, the whole cost of cleansing being $1, ,060, 900. All houses in Paris are obliged to deliver the rain water and house. hold waste into the sewers, the municipality providing that every street less than 60 feet wide must have one sewer, and that streets over that width must have one sewer on each