New-York tribune., 1885-02-18
have been voted to pay for suitable buildlns
for the entire Library of Congress.

Much comment is heard in conversation IN
regard to the prevalence of pneumonia. IN
ouiries at the Bureau of Vital Statistics show
that the popular conjecture IS right that INC
disease prevails more widely now tnan Is usuai
in New-York at this time OF year, ana that
more cases of it are fatal Tho severely colu
weather is of course responsible for this state
of things, and so long as it lasts the only wise
thing for old people and delicate persons to do
is TO stay closely in the house and take no risK
of exposure.
IL requires a good deal moro confidence in
the police than experience. justiiies to go about
in the evening with a bundle of valuable Sc
curties and to expect to reach ones destination
unmolested. 1t is cOurting just the fate that
befel one of the directors of the Murray Hill
Bank in Third-ave. on Monday evening. The
attack upon him recalls the days when gar
roting was frequent in this city, although the
quickness with which the police got upon the
track of the assaiants shows the superiority OF
the detectives of to-day.
The evidence to show that the man Burton,
who is charged with dynamite crimes in Eng
land, does not make out SO strong n case
against him as his own conduct. He manifests
abjcct terror at his situation, which an innocent
man would hardly show, no matter how nerv-
Gus he might be. In connection with Burton
and Cunningham, the English authorities np-
pear to have forgotten the fundamental prin-
ciple of Justice, that man is innocent until he
is proved guilty, and they have refused the
lawyers for the defence access to the prisoners.
1t is difficult to conceive on what grounds this
harshness can be excused
The report of the Tenement House Commits
sion, made to the Legislature yesterday, con-
tains many interesting facts which ought to be
of service in framing laws to meet the evils OF
the present tenement-house system. what
those evils are has already been thoroughly
made known through the columns of THE
TRIBUNE. It is to be hoped that the commits
sion will carefully prepare for the Legislature
all the bills it regards necessary to be passed,
so that they may be entirely effective. One
thing necessary will be a reduction in the bur
dens of taxation, so that rents can come down.
Then poor people can afford TO live III more
than one room.
None of the great ocean steamships which
sail regularly to this port from Europe have
been lost in the recent heavy gales on the North
Atlantic, but some of the vessels calling here
irregularly the "ocean tramps," are missing.
The Coniston, from Liverpool to New-fork
in ballast, has not been heard OF since
December 81. She had no passengers on board,
but The crew of thirty is probably lost. Sailors
livos have always been held in light esteem,
but when the navigation laws of this country
and England have been shaped into something
like what they ought to be, there will be "A
clause somewhere which will prevent the send
ing out of vessels so generally unseaworthy as
these ocean tTamps are.
1t was a mistake to assume that the French
actually captured the Chinese city of Langson
because a dispatch from Paris the other day
that the French flag tloated over 1t.
Later accounts show that the place was evacu-
ated and burned before the French troops came
I'M This accounts for the absence of putf5