Year: 1872

duQ Is JuSt WudC Ey6ClQCQ0 mas OOQe.


The Muddlo In Local Politics.


The oldest inhabitant of this goodly city
would have very little advantage over the new
est arrival from the Fiji Islands or far Ujiji if
he attempted to comprehend the state of city
politics just now. The nominal approxima-
ton of tenets of political faith between the
great parties all over the Union has had q very
unsettling influence in the city. Where the
difference amounts really to question of the
reliability of individuals to carry out such and
such policy it is not wonderful that the hu-
man apex of every little political pyramid feels
at liberty to hoist whatever banner he pleases
over his head Old times are changed old
party lines gone. The Hon. Dead Rabbit of
the Five Points grasps in his dewy fist the fat
hand of his quondam enemy, Black Radical
Esq, of the Custom House. The Chevalier de
Bourbon lets his long, lank locks float grace
fully in the breeze that is waited from the
worthy pair, as he scowls upon
the smiling faces of General War Democrat,
Citizen Copperhead and Mister Abolitionist
Sorehead, who are locked in loving embrace.
When these typical personages are cut
ting up such antics how must it be with
the thousands who for quarter of CEN
tury have voted the straight ticket and
now have no straight ticket to vote? How,
above all, must it be with that highly respect
| able and intelligent class who are not particu-
lar which side they are on, so it be paying
and winning one? For men of mind there
is rare chance, and they improve it by
declaring everything that is is wrong. In
the higher grades of sIeaders'' things are
arranging themselves quietly, because all the
national and State conventions have spoken;
but in the lower strata the banner of person.
ality is flung to the winds. and every half
block has half dozen candidates each
for the Assembly, for Alderman and Assist
ant Alderman, without whom the country will
go to perditon. The Mayoralty, in its pres
ent condition, is like a solitary clam in
basin of chowder, with forty hands snatching
at it. O'Brien must have it. even if
Grant is reelected John Kelly must have it,
though Herman should ride to Albany on q
huge majority; Havemeyer must have it
whether the whole Seventy Solons scald their
fingers or not in clutching at it; Comptroller
Green must have it if anybody can be found
to give it him. Look at the Congressional dis
tricts Colonel Roberts rides down mail-clad
through the new Fifth to find General McMa-
hon gathering the citizens into little knots,
teaching them disaffection, and waging run
ming fight with the REGULARS" as his unfortu-
nate friend Lopez did in Paraguay; and the
regulars aver with the same prospect ahead.
Warm work certainly in the Fifth. Roosevelt,
finding himself killed off by the apportion-
ment, resigns himself unto his fate. Cox,
seeing his future in the old Sixth marred in
the same way, saves himself as Congressman
at Large, with what real result November will
tell. Brooks, ousted, too, from his old ground,
makes vigorous dash to the east and hopes
fairly to visit the national capital regularly for
some time to come. Smith Ely, Jr., will ride
in upon q district south of Mr. Brooks, if
Thomas j. Creamer and other obstacles do
not overturn the buggy of his hopes. Fer
nando Wood will march with accustomed
dignity Zone cannot say "run" in his case)
in the Ninth district and the ''unterrifed"
fear that the enemy will capture the rest
Reform is the war cry all round, and it is put
to the tune of so many old party songs, all
played at once, that Gilmore should not
neglect it in his next Panjandrum. The effect
is overpowering. 1t is consoling to think that
few weeks will settle the chaotic condition Of
things somewhat, when the Convention cure is
dealt out in small doses from the Battery to
Harlem. Until this is effected, from beer
saloon to groggery, from thirsty morn till
fuddled midnight, from strikers club to
policeman's club, the phantasmagoria Of
seething municipal microcosms may be ex-
pected to exhibit labyrinthine involution
impossible to disentangle into its primal
elements of pretences, professions and uproar,
or their apparently antithetical, sinister con-
geners of addition, division and silence. Let
| us wait.


The sucz Canal and It's Heavy Tolls.


The arrival in this port of the steamer Glen
gartney, with a cargo of tea from China, has
created considerable interest in commercial
circles Apart from the fact that the Glen
gartney is the first arrival by the Suez route