Lest any might be so skeptical as to question the truth of this, the surgeons give illustrative instances as follows:

"The cases in illustration will perhaps not be inappropriate. At No. 22 Roosevelt street is a house two stories high, 38 feet deep, 18 feet wide, and with an average of seven feet between joints. In this house there are now living five families, twenty-four persons, averaging three hundred and thirty-nine cubic feet per person. There are no windows in the rear, no sewer in the street. There is an open privy vault in the yard.

"At No. 17 Cherry street is a four story house, seven feet between floors. The house is sixteen feet wide, and contains at the present time forty-eight persons. Each one has but two hundred and eighty cubic feet. There is no ventilation except through the front windows. There is no sewer, and an open privy vault.

"At No. 293 West 33d street there are sixteen rooms and sixteen familiesthirty-eight adults and twenty-two children. The sinks are all stopped; there is no water in the house; there is no sewerage and no privy conveniences, except open vaults not connected with the sewer. Over twenty cases of typhoid fever have occurred in this house within the last four months."

Now we think that those who are so much concerned for the spiritual condition of the heathen off in Africa and Asia, would do well to look at this state of affairs nearer home, and ask their own consciences, whether it would not be as pious, after all-as much in accordance with the principles of Christianity — to give their suffering neighbors a portion of the money sent so lavishly to those distant countries, in the shape of bibles and tracts. Far be it for us to undervalue the Scriptures; but the heathen cannot be forced to read them; whereas the wretched people above described would need no force, but would be grateful for the services rendered them.

The Report gives very full and apparently accurate tables of statistics. These teach useful lessons, and to those who would read them thoughtfully they are painfully eloquent. But we can only allude to them on the present occasion. We confess we had no idea that so large a portion of those arrested in this city are females. We transcribe one of the shortest of these tables and with it close our extracts.

TOTAL NUMBER OF ARRESTS IN EACH PRECINCT FOR THE YEAR ENDING OCTOBER 31st, 1864.

1,881

923 2,804 32.

109

14 123

16.

17.

1,086 Grand total

1,233 428 1,661 Different squads, 4,287 2,569 6,856 550 1,636 Detective squad, 360 87 447

.36,273 18,478 54,751

If the heathen, black or white, could only read and understand these figures, they might well tell us to look at home, and relieve our suffering fellow Christians, before we busy ourselves with their spiritual affairs. Personally we know nothing whatever of the police commissioners; they are as much strangers to us as if they lived in China. But whoever speaks the truth boldly and honestly in order to discourage vice, repress crime, and relieve human misery, will always receive from us all the aid which it is in our power to give.

The Veto of Governor Fenton against the Bill in favor of the Manhattan Gas-light Company.

In commenting, in our last number, on the spirited protest of the Comptroller of New York against the new privileges sought to be bestowed on the Manhattan Gas Company, it will be remembered that we had little doubt that the latter would succeed, in their usual way, in inducing the legislature to give them all they wanted. Those having millions of money at their command, and disposed, like the monopolists alluded to, to spend a portion of it to gain their ends, are not likely to fail in securing a goodly number of votes. In alluding to certain operations of the monopolists, which we thought ought to be prevented by legislation, as similar operations are in European countries, we remarked that, "let a bill, bearing directly or indirectly on the subject of gas, be introduced either into the State Legislature or into Congress, and straightway the president of the Manhattan Company is off to the capital to act as lobby-member." We also observed: "That the Legislature would bestow a moment's attention on any bill having a tendency to conflict with the interests of the Manhattan Gas Company, would be prima facie evidence that it was a 'nuisance.'" Our journal containing these observations had scarcely been issued when our predictions in regard to the legislature were fulfilled. That is, the legislators at Albany imitated the example of the retiring New York Common Council of 1864; but Governor Fenton has restrained the former, as Comptroller Brennan had the latter. The following are the reasons assigned by the Governor for his veto; and it will be seen that they are sufficiently cogent and satisfactory:

"I am also constrained to withhold my approval of an act to amend section two of chapter 543 of the Laws of 1855, entitled, 'An Act to increase the capital stock of the Manhattan Gas Company of the city of New York.' This bill proposes to repeal, for a period of two years,' the clause of the act of 1855, which limits the charge the Manhattan Gas Company can make against the consumers of gas to a price not exceeding $2.50 per 1,000 cubic feet. I do not find that any person solicited this act except the stockholders of the Manhattan Gas Company, and the argument used in favor of this legislation is the alleged inadequateness of the compensation consequent upon the enhanced values of material and labor. If this declaration was justified by the facts, I should be as reluctant to admit its validity as in the parallel case presented by the plank-road companies of the State, the horse-railroad companies of the counties of Albany, Rensselaer and Erie, and by the New York Central Railroad Company. The general reasons, having reference to time and circumstances, which led me to VOL. XI.NO. XXI.

13

withhold my signature from the bills providing for the relief of these several corporations, are mainly applicable to this measure, and prevent my approval thereof. It is possible, even applied to this case, they would have still greater force, for the additional burden which would be authorized by this act would fall upon many thousands, all of whom have been subjected to the same enhanced costs, many of whom have made the same sacrifices to the necessities of the day, and cannot well afford to pay the price now charged, and must labor many weary hours by artifical light to gain even a subsistence. This latter class of persons constitutes, I suppose, a considerable portion of the consumers of the Manhattan Gas Company, and if that corporation was obliged, through causes which have alike affected almost every interest during the past four years, to supply light to them at the cost of production for a short period, it would not be a greater hard ship than many of the pursuits of industry and the investments of capital have endured, and which have not obtained legislative relief. Is not this plea of nonremuneration applicable to its condition for a short period only? While this bill has been before me for consideration, the price of one hundred and eighty dollars per share has been offered for the stock of this Company, according to the report at the Stock Exchange in the city of New York. A company which can obtain a premium of eighty per cent. on the par value of their stock must have had a gratifying past financial history, or a prospective prosperity, even under the restrictions imposed by the Legislature of 1855. I cannot, therefore, consent to give my sanction to an act to increase the pecuniary welfare of an organization whose prosperity is thus substantially affirmed, and which so largely affects the mass of population in one of the necessaries as well as comforts of life."

This is creditable alike to the good sense and integrity of the gover nor. It is pleasant to have even two public officers who are proof against the temptations offered by unscrupulous wealth to betray public confidence and sacrifice the public interests. Let us hope that these two stern rebukes will prove a useful lesson to those unprincipled and heartless monopolists.

Cape Cod. By HENRY D. THOREAU, author of “ A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers," "The Maine Words," &c., &c. 12mo. pp. 252. Boston: Ticknor & Fields, 1865.

We have seldom read a book of sketches with more pleasure than this. It is fresh, graphic, and attractive; nor is the reader merely pleased in its perusal; he is also instructed; for the author intersperses even those of his sketches thrown off in most haste with interesting scraps culled from quaint works on biography, travels, natural history, &c. Thus, for example, in speaking of oysters, he gives brief extracts from different writers in support of the theory that they have no power of locomotion. He scarcely alludes to any place through which he passes, that has ever attracted the attention of any other writer, to which he does not apply an apt quotation. He does not merely tell us, in an off-hand, easy way, that a town or village was settled at a particular time; he also tells us who and what they were that settled it; and if there be anything remarkable their history, we are let into the secret in the same quiet, unostentatious way. Thoughtless persons seek to depreciate this kind of writing, because, as they say, it is not all original; forgetting that it often costs more time to find one of those extracts, brief as they are, than would be sufficient to write a dozen pages of the kind said to be 64 original," simply because it has nothing in it but the twaddle of the writer.

The great mistake is to be ignorant of the fact that they are really the most original writers who pay most deference to the opinions of others worthy of that distinction. Addison, Swift, Voltaire, Bayle, and Macaulay are never so eloquent as when they are commenting on some sentiment or opinion taken from another writer, and even when that writer is far inferior to themselves. We are glad to see so lively and successful a writer as Mr. Thoreau attempt to show that a book may be very pleasan and at the same time contain a good deal of information, vastly more pleasant than those inanities which pretend to do nothing more than amuse.

MISCELLANEOUS.

1. Tenth Annual Report of the Insurance Commissioners of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Part II. Life Insurance. Boston: 1865.

2. Sixth Annual Report of the Superintendent of the Insurance Department. State of New York. Albany: 1865.

THERE is a good deal that is interesting in these reports; and not to a few, or to any one class, but to the public at large; since there are now scarcely any who have not to do with insurance in one form or other. Those who have not ships or cargoes to insure, have houses; those who have not houses, have furniture; those who have not furniture, have clothing, books, or paintings; and those who have not sufficient of any worldly goods to render it worth their while to insure them, have wives, children, or mothers, for whose benefit they want to insure their lives, if only for five hundred dollars.

Thus it is no longer only business men or wealthy men who are interested in insurance. Those who dislike business of all kinds, and even consider it degrading, are as ready to avail themselves of the benefits of insurance as the most experienced merchants. But precisely because this is the fact, the utmost caution is necessary in order to avoid imposition and fraud; for the simple reason that much as the numbers who secure policies in one department or another are increasing, those who want to issue such policies and get the premiums, are increasing in a still larger ratio. In other words, however great is the demand for insurance, the supply is still greater; and whenever this is the case in any business, some party must suffer.

If the supply of garments in the clothing market is larger than the demand, unprincipled tailors will be apt to use "shoddy," so that they may attract customers by selling cheaper than their rivals; and the probability is that they will succeed for a time, because, unfortunately, there are so large a portion of the public who have not sufficient understanding to see until imposed upon, even more than once, that a spurious article is not cheap at any price. But to be defrauded of the price of a coat, a pair of boots, or a hat, even for the twentieth time, is a small

inatter compared to the loss sustained by being defrauded of the amount paid regularly for years-perhaps for the length of a whole life-to an insurance company. If, then, it would be better to pay thirty dollars for a coat to an honest tailor, than to pay only five dollars to the dishonest one, still better would it be to pay an honest and responsible insurance company one thousand dollars for a policy, than to pay one of the opposite character twenty dollars.

It was not until we had carefully weighed these facts that we undertook to discuss the subject of insurance in the National Review. Short as the time is since we commenced to do so, insurance was comparatively new in this country to the general public. What was known about it was, in general, favorable, because most of our companies were honest and reliable; and those of the opposite character were only beginning to be found out. Having studied the working of the system in the principal countries of Europe, become aware of the fraudulent practices of persons calling themselves underwriters, and witnessed some of the deplorable consequences of those practices, we thought we should do some good by putting the American public on its guard in time. Americans had, indeed, already suffered at the hands of fraudulent underwriters; but the instances of this kind were so few that the general public had full confidence in all our insurance companies. The organs and defenders of the speculators were, therefore, able to make a very plausible show of injured innocence on the part of their clients when we published our first articles on Insurance Quackery; and, of course, in proportion as they could make the speculators seem honest and honorable, they could make us seem either very ignorant or very malicious. They tried both in turn, and no doubt succeeded in the minds of a certain class.

But every succeeding Report of the insurance commissioners and superintendents of those States of the Union in which most business is done in insurance, adduces new evidence of the truth and accuracy of our statements; we have such in each of the reports now before us; evidence the legitimacy and force of which none can pretend to question. The commissioners of Massachusetts have labored under a difficulty somewhat similar to our own. They know that the grossest frauds are perpetrated under the name of insurance; they know also that it is difficult to make the public understand the fact, and accordingly they show from the best authorities what is the experience of England, on whose systems of insurance ours are modelled. "We have heretofore alluded," say the commissioners, "to the abuse of life insurance in the country where it originated, and in which alone it has approached anything like maturity. But never till now has it been possible to characterize that abuse as it deserves, without seeming to contradict the best authority in regard to the facts, and consequently without running the risk of being discredited. The examples, however astounding or atrocious, would be regarded as excep.