The Carbon advocate. [volume] (Lehighton, Pa.) 1872-1924, 1888-04-21
BrOadbTim'S New York Letter.
,necial TO the CARRoN ApvocATE.

DlUuuul I'LL D NUW lUlA uullUl'
Special to the CARBON ADVOCATE.
The curtain falls this week upon the lives
of two men who on Monday last stood in
dicted for two of the gravest offences
known to the criminal law. Lives far apart
it is true, having no seeming connection,
yet both ending in the same plea, notte
prosecuted by the providence OF God. Jacob
Sharp is dead, and when the lightning's
fash announced the fact through the city,
there was sigh of relief in certain legal
quarters and an exclamation of Thank God,
the worst is oyeri To me there is some
thing inexpressibly pathetic about this old
mans death; and in this faithless age of
quarrels and separations and divorces, his
dear old faithful wife stands forth like a
revelation. There was little left about
Jacob Sharp to charm man or woman /;
persecution had soured him, disappoint-
ment, ingratitude and disgrace had filled
his heart with bitterness and grief; disease
had done its fearful work and had sapped
the fountains of his life; old age with its
weakness and infirmity had suited even
love and hope; old friends had vanished ;
men whom he had helped to place the power
deserted him in the hour of his dlrest need.
In the midst of the gloom OF this dark,
hopeless night one face shone out like an
angel of light,-a face which hoyered DER
his couch in his long and weary sickness,
which beamed with JOY at the hope of re-
turning health, which shared uncomplain-
ingly the ignominy of his prison bars and
reioiced with him on his freedom from
captivity, and when death came, like an
angel Of nercy, she was still by his side and
she pressed her pallid lips to his as with
the last faint exclamation of "Maber' upon
his lips he yielded up the ghost. 1t is said
that In this world of ours there is an inevi-
table law of compensation from which
there is no escape; for every good thing we
have there is a penalty to pay, and COM
pensation for every evil and Ill that we
suffer. Jacob Sharp found his compensa-
ton in his wife. The Scribes and Phari-
sees fed from him affrighted. An offense
which had been sanctioned by precedent in
State and national councils for hundred
years was magnified in Importance to
crime without name. The pulpit thun-
dered forth its anathema and mighty
press howled out its malediction; all the
goody-goodies who by lucky chance had
escaped the penalty of their crimes raised
their hands In holy horror as If no such sir
had been heard of since the creation oi
man. He became the target for all sorts Of
ruffians and prosecutors who hoped in his
ruin to profit b. his downfall. The colossal
fortune which he had piled up with sc
much care was rapidly vanishing; health
was gone, prison bars hemmed him around
death was not far off, and in his last agony
it seemed as If his dying scene would bt
passed in convict's cell. Everything else
was gone, but there still, thank God, was
the Mabel of his early love, the Mabe
whose hand he clasped before the
altar in his young manhood's prime, ano
who swore to cherish him iu sickness anc
in health, and in the fulfllment of her oatt
abandoned her beautiful house, horses, car
riages, servants, wealth, all, and there
stood till death claimed him, faithful
among the faithless to the last.
On the seventh day November last, t,wher
the result of our municipal election wa'
announced, 1 then ventured the prediction
that Jacob Sharp would never see the in
side of States prison. That prediction II
now fulfilled; 'nor steel, nor poison, malice
domestic, foreign levy, nothing can toucf
him further" l would not make light o.
so grave an offence as bribery, crime
which saps the foundation of all govern
ments. But Jacob Sharp was the creature
of time and circumstance. He found thu
government of the city of New York in thu
hands of a set of thugs and thieves who
were placed in that exalted position o.
trust by legal voters of the city. A grea
public improvement was needed and thest
men blocked the way, hungry for plunder
Jacob Sharp gave them their price and 60
his franchise. Then the whole desperate
crew who had been defeated in sharing tn,
plunder suddenly became frightfully virtu
Gus, and all of them in thunder tones de
manded the blood of Jacob Sharp. Such
bitter and pitiless storm of Yituperation
deDunciation and abuse as followed hin
for two years past, has seldom fallen to tn,
lot of man; and the only wonder was, a
his advanced age and with his broker
health, that he survived for single hour
But all that is past now, the end has COM
for him and with 1t rest and peace. New
York rides gaily up and down Broadwa.
glad TO profit by the work of the maste
genius, now so sorrowfully eclipsed. The
Doodle road, loaded with so many maledic
| tions, pays more money into the cit,
treasury than all the other railroads in tn
city put together. The men who sharei
his crime and gold, with few disgracefu
exceptions, are either in exile or in prison
He heeds them not, now his trial
finished, nole prosecuted by the providenc
of God.
From the darkness and gloom and sol
row of this sad picture, like bright bea
con light through night of cloud an
storm, stands out his wife, grand exampl
of exalted womanhood, of pure devotion
OF wifely honor, of heroic foItitude, of uI
selfish and undylng love. Her reward wa
in knowing that he to whom she ha
pledged her maiden faith long years age
even when borne down to the earth b
disaster and disgrace In the last morts
agony of parting life, turned back VIII e
| R.oIf ha ~ do al .
breath once more his darling Mabel
name. Wherever wifely honor is prized
wherever motherly love is cherished, wher
purity, devotion aud faith are honore
among men, there will the n anne of MabC
Sharp be enshrined as an example G
American womanhood.
Another life closed this week in darkness
and tears-that of Senator Bob Hart, o.
old time minstrel-known later on as tn
Rev. X. II. Sutherland, a distinguishe
Baptist Evangelist, who died in a sma
hotel on the west side of the 10 Rn by hi
own hand. When after violent spre
some years ago, which brought him I
deaths door, he professed religion and be
gan to study for the ministry, 1t is but jus
TO his old associates In the profession VIII
had been connected with him most Of hi
life, and who knew his weaknesses thorough
ly, to Say, that they took no stock what
ever in his so-cAlled conversion, and mos
Of them felt that his return to burnt cor
and tambourine and bones, was merely
question Of time. Several times during hi
term of eVangelization certain evidences Q
weakness cropped out which filled hi
friends with grave anxiety and alarm, an
were precursors Of the calamity which .
suddenly overlook him last week. A it'll
over a year ago, while carrying on revivI
in the New England States, he was plcks