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THE

COLORED ORPHAN ASYLUM.

HE visitor to the "Reservoir" or the "New-York Crystal Palace" will recognize immediately in their neighborhood the edifice pictured in the above engraving, and, if the day is pleasant, his ear as well as his eye will be attracted by the jocund gambols of its little black inmates, amusing themselves with gymnastic pranks in its ample playgrounds. A more interesting charity does not exist among the numerous and truly generous provisions for the afflicted, in our city. We need hardly say that it originated in a Quaker heart. Its foundress was, we believe, Anna H. Shotwell, its present indefatigable advocate and secretary. Associating with herself a few friends, she began its scheme in much feebleness, but has lived to see it become one of the most vigorous charitable institutions of our metropolis. One of its reports details its progress. Anna Shotwell and her associates, it saysSoon found the circle of generous sympathy enlarged, new friends gradually were enlisted, and the sum of $2,000 was obtained, mostly by small subscriptions. Near the close of the year 1836 twenty-two managers were elected, some of whom still officiate, and five gentlemen were chosen as an Advisory Committee. A Constitution was adopted, as well as a set of By-Laws,

and the managers now began to turn their at-
tention toward hiring and furnishing a suitable
house; but after a search of three months, in
the spring of the year, when tenements to let
were abundant, the pursuit had to be relin-
quished from the existing prejudice against
color-owners resolutely refusing the use of
their property on any consideration the mana-
gers could offer, preferring their buildings should
remain unoccupied rather than be applied to shel-
As an only
ter these helpless and afflicted ones.
alternative, and by the coöperation of their advi-
sers, a purchase was finally decided upon, of an
old but pretty white cottage, shaded by two
horse chestnuts, appropriate, as was thought, in
size and location, affording a well-spring of
enjoyment to cherished hopes. Property at
this time was commanding prices far above its
intrinsic value, and the enormous sum of $9,000
was required to place the building in the pos-
session of the managers; to effect which, the
Trustees of Lindley Murray's Charitable Fund
subscribed $1,000, to be added to the amount
already obtained, and a mortgage of $6,000
was given on the premises.

A promise of $500 from the Manumission Society towards education authorized the formation of a school, to which neighboring children might be invited. A room was accordingly fitted up, and forty scholars were soon found in attendance, whom the managers instructed by

turns.

The utmost caution was used in the admission of orphans, supplies for their table being obtained from interested friends. little girl of four years old was at first intro

One

duced, others soon followed, and, as their numbers increased, the managers discovered that the means of support were proportionably provided; and up to this time it may truly be said, 'The barrel of meal has not wasted, nor the cruse of oil failed.' At the close of their financial year, being seven months from the opening of the house, with a family of twentythree children, their current expenses were found to have been $234 03. On visiting the Alms House at Bellevue about this period, the colored children were found collected in a cellar, under the care of a man of intemperate habits, who was also at intervals deranged. At other times they were crowded together with degraded adults, in a miserable building, but illy adapted to promote health, comfort, or enjoyment. Under these circumstances the managers selected seven of these, for whom they provided a happy home; but most of them were subsequently found to be incurably diseased.

An Act to incorporate the Society was obtained from the Legislature in 1838.

Ascertaining that William Turpin, of this city, had left in charge of two trustees the sum of $6,000 for the support and maintenance of colored persons; that several years had clasped since the death of the testator; and that no appropriation was decided upon, the infant Asylum presented its claims through their friends and advisers, William F. Mott and Robert C. Cornell, (the latter since deceased,) and although several other applicants came forward, a final decision was made in its favor. Applications were made to the Common Council, several successive years, for a grant of land on which to erect a new building. To the persevering efforts of their advisers, William F. Mott and William Kelly, the managers are mainly indebted for the valuable site now in their possession, consisting of twenty lots of ground on Fifth-avenue, between Forty-third and Forty-fourth-streets. After carefully digesting their plans for a building of one hundred and forty feet front, varying from forty-two to fifty feet in depth, arrangements were speedily entered into for its erection. A gift of $5,000 from a friend of the Institution, $6,000 from the Manumission Society, $1,000 from the Murray Fund, $1,000 from John Horsburgh, and many smaller donations, amounting to $7,000, covered the original cost of the building and expenses on the grounds. In the spring of 1843 the children were removed to their new home, and the Report of this year is expressive of gratitude and praise for the seal of His blessing, which a kind Providence has set upon this work of faith.

During the winter of 1847 fifty-six children were visited by measles; and although the disease was subdued, with but one exception, yet many of those who were attacked, being of scrofulous habit, were peculiarly susceptible to pulmonary diseases, to which a number of them fell victims. During this calamity, the managers felt required to exclude from admission scrofulous patients, which at times was peculiarly trying. The beseeching look of one little girl, who, with her brother, was denied admission, led to efforts for the establishment of the Hospital, which now holds a conspicuous posi

tion in the establishment, being appropriately fitted up, and well adapted to the comfort and restoration of the sick. Thus, amid trials and vicissitudes, have the managers been enabled firmly to rely on Him who, with an unerring eye, discerns the end from the beginning.

John Horsburgh left, in 1849, a legacy of $5,000 to the Institution, and had given at various times during his life about the same amount. This legacy was appropriated toward the erection of the Hospital.

Since the establishment of the Hospital, children are admitted who are not likely to become permanent inmates and have no contagious disease. This increases the list of deaths, but smooths the pillow of many a little sufferer.

The following are the statistics of the Institution for the last year, as stated in its Fifteenth Annual Report:

Admitted since the opening of the Asylum, 574 Number of children at date of last Report, 176 Admitted during the present year, boys

38, girls 27, . .

.

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241 201

Under care during the year, Present number, boys 120, girls 81, Number of children in the Asylum under eight years of age, eighty.

The Colored Orphan Asylum may be considered a counterpart to the Nursery at Randall's Island, and our city government has recently made an appropriation for it. No colored children are, we believe, found now at the Island. to both of these interesting institutions will, we think, be inclined to consider the former as in all respects the most satisIts inmates appear happier factory.

Visitors

than the poor little creatures at the Nursery. The latter are gathered from a wider field of degradation perhaps; they look degraded and battered, as if they had once been the sport of demons. If you look at them, as they stand in rows in their schools, you will observe that at least every alternate one has either some disease, or distortion about the eyes or forehead. They have everything good in most comfortable abundance, and they seem to try-God pity them-to make themselves happy in their school exercises, military drills, &c.; but there appears to be an indelible stamp of degraded remembrance on their very brows. The little urchins at the Asylum, on the contrary, retain the light-heartedness of their race, and its good-heartedness too. If there are happy children anywhere, they are there. Go and see them, if you wish a pleasant sight.

THE MISSISSIPPI BUBBLE.*

HE personal character and and

THE

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intimately connected with the great scheme of the years 1719 and 1720, that a history of the Mississippi madness can have no fitter introduction than a sketch of the life of its great author, John Law.

John Law was born in Edinburgh in the year 1671. His father was the younger son of an ancient family in Fife, and carried on the business of a goldsmith and banker. John was received into his father's counting-house at the age of fourteen, and for three years labored hard to acquire an insight into the principles of banking as then carried on in Scotland. had always manifested great love for the study of numbers, and his proficiency in mathematics was considered extraordinary in one of his tender years. At the age of seventeen he was tall, strong, and well made; and his face, although deeply scarred with the small-pox, was agreeable

He

JOHN LAW.

contrived to gain considerable sums. After he had been for nine years exposed to the dangerous attractions of the gay life he was leading, he became an irrecoverable gambler. As his love of play increased in violence it diminished in prudence.

in its expression, and full of intelligence. | some abstruse calculation of chances, he At this time he began to neglect his business, and, becoming vain of his person, indulged in considerable extravagance of attire. He was a great favorite with the ladies, by whom he was called Beau Law; while the other sex, despising his foppery, nicknamed him Jessamy John. At the death of his father, which happened in 1688, he withdrew entirely from the desk, which had become so irksome, and being possessed of the revenues of the paternal estate of Lauriston, he proceeded to London, to see the world.

He was now very young, very vain, good-looking, tolerably rich, and quite uncontrolled. It is no wonder that, on his arrival in the capital, he should launch out into extravagance. He soon became a regular frequenter of the gaming-houses, and by pursuing a certain plan, based upon

Great losses were only to be repaired by still greater ventures, and one unhappy day he lost more than he could repay without mortgaging his family estate. To that step he was driven at last. At the same time his gallantry brought him into trouble. A love affair, or slight flirtation with a lady of the name of Villiers, exposed him to the resentment of a Mr. Wilson, by whom he was challenged to fight a duel. Law accepted, and shot his antagonist dead upon the spot. He was arrested the same day, and

Miss Elizabeth Villiers, afterward Countess

Condensed from Mackay's Popular Delusions. of Orkney.

brought to trial for murder by the relatives of Mr. Wilson. He was afterward found guilty, and sentenced to death. The sentence was commuted to a fine, upon the ground that the offense only amounted to manslaughter. An appeal being lodged by a brother of the deceased, Law was detained in the King's Bench, whence, by some means or other, which he never explained, he contrived to escape; and an action being instituted against the sheriffs, he was advertised in the Gazette, and a reward offered for his apprehension. He was described as "Captain John Law, a Scotchman, aged twenty-six; a very tall, black, lean man; well shaped, above six feet high, with large pock-holes in his face; big-nosed, and speaking broad and loud." As this was rather a caricature than a description of him, it has been supposed that it was drawn up with a view to favor his escape. He succeeded in reaching the Continent, where he traveled for three years, and devoted much of his attention to the monetary and banking affairs of the countries through which he passed. He stayed a few months in Amsterdam, and speculated to some extent in the funds. His mornings were devoted to the study of finance and the principles of trade, and his evenings to the gaminghouse. It is generally believed that he returned to Edinburgh in the year 1700. It is certain that he published in that city his Proposals and Reasons for constituting a Council of Trade. This pamphlet did not excite much attention.

In a short time afterward he published a project for establishing what he called a Land-bank,* the notes issued by which were never to exceed the value of the entire lands of the state, upon ordinary interest, or were to be equal in value to the land, with the right to enter into possession at a certain time. The project excited a good deal of discussion in the Scottish Parliament, and a motion for the establishment of such a bank was brought forward by a neutral party, called the Squadrone, whom Law had interested in his favor. The Parliament ultimately passed a resolution to the effect, that, to establish any kind of paper credit, so as to force it to pass, was an improper expedient for the nation.

Upon the failure of this project, and of his efforts to procure a pardon for the murder of Mr. Wilson, Law withdrew to the Continent, and resumed his old habits of gaming. For fourteen years he continued to roam about, in Flanders, Holland, Germany, Hungary, Italy, and France. He soon became intimately acquainted with the extent of the trade and resources of each, and daily more confirmed in his opinion that no country could prosper without a paper currency. During the whole of this time he appears to have chiefly supported himself by successful play. At every gambling-house of note in the capitals of Europe he was known and appreciated as one better skilled in the intricacies of chance than any other man of the day. It is stated in the Biographie Universelle that he was expelled, first from Venice, and afterward from Genoa, by the magistrates, who thought him a visitor too dangerous for the youth of those cities. During his residence in Paris he rendered himself obnoxious to D'Argenson, the lieutenantgeneral of the police, by whom he was ordered to quit the capital. This did not take place, however, before he had made the acquaintance, in the saloons, of the Duke de Vendôme, the Prince de Conti, and of the gay Duke of Orleans, the latter of whom was destined afterward to exercise so much influence over his fate. The Duke of Orleans was pleased with the vivacity and good sense of the Scottish adventurer, while the latter was no less pleased with the wit and amiability of a prince who promised to become his patron. They were often thrown into each other's society, and Law seized every opportunity to instill his financial doctrines into the mind of one whose proximity to the throne pointed him out as destined, at no very distant date, to play an important part in the government.

Louis XIV. died in 1715, and the heir to the throne being an infant only seven years of age, the Duke of Orleans assumed the reins of government, as regent, during his minority. Law now found himself in a more favorable position. The tide in his affairs had come, which, taken at the flood, was to waft him on to fortune. The regent was his friend, already acquainted with his theory and pretensions,

The wits of the day called it a sand-bank, and inclined, moreover, to aid him in any

which would wreck the vessel of the state.

efforts to restore the wounded credit of

DUKE OF ORLEANS.

France, bowed down to the earth by the extravagance of the long reign of Louis XIV. The finances of the country were in a state of the utmost disorder. The national debt amounted to three thousand millions of livres, the revenue to one hundred and forty-five millions, and the expenses of government to one hundred and forty-two millions per annum; leaving only three millions to pay the interest upon three thousand millions. The first care of the regent was to discover a remedy for an evil of such magnitude. The measures adopted, though they promised fair, only aggravated the evil. The first and most dishonest measure was of no advantage to the state. A recoinage was ordered, by which the currency was depreciated one-fifth; those who took a thousand pieces of gold or silver to the mint received back an amount of coin of the same nominal value, but only fourfifths of the weight of metal. By this contrivance the treasury gained seventytwo millions of livres, and all the commercial operations of the country were disordered.

A Chamber of Justice was next instituted to inquire into the malversations of the loan-contractors and the farmers of the revenues. Tax-collectors are never very popular in any country, but those of France at this period deserved all the odium with which they were loaded. As soon as these farmers-general, with all their hosts of subordinate agents, called maltôtiers, were called to account for their misdeeds, the most extravagant joy took possession of the nation. The Chamber of Justice, instituted chiefly for this

From maltóte, an oppressive tax.

purpose, was endowed with very extensive powers. It was composed of the presidents and councils of the parliament, the judges of the Courts of Aid and of Requests, and the officers of the Chamber of Account, under the general presidence of the minister of finance. Informers were encouraged to give evidence against the offenders by the promise of one-fifth part of the fines and confiscations. A tenth of all concealed effects belonging to the guilty was promised to such as should furnish the means of discovering them.

The promulgation of the edict constituting this court caused a degree of consternation among those principally concerned, which can only be accounted for on the supposition that their peculation had been enormous. But they met with no sympathy. The proceedings against them justified their terror. The Bastille was soon unable to contain the prisoners that were sent to it, and the jails all over the country teemed with guilty or suspected persons. An order was issued to all innkeepers and postmasters to refuse horses to such as endeavored to seek safety in flight; and all persons were forbidden, under heavy fines, to harbor them or favor their evasion. Some were condemned to the pillory, others to the galleys, and the least guilty to fine and imprisonment. One only, Samuel Bernard, a rich banker and farmer-general of a province remote from the capital, was sentenced to death. So great had been the illegal profits of this man-looked upon as a tyrant and oppressor of his districtthat he offered six millions of livres, or $1,250,000, to be allowed to escape.

His bribe was refused, and he suffered the penalty of death. Others, perhaps more guilty, were more fortunate. Confiscation, owing to the concealment of their treasures by the delinquents, often produced less, money than a fine. The severity of the government relaxed, and fines, under the denomination of taxes, were indiscriminately levied upon all offenders; but so corrupt was every department of the administration, that the country benefited but little by the sums which thus flowed into the treasury. Courtiers and courtiers' wives and mistresses came in for the chief share of the spoils. One contractor had been taxed, in proportion to his wealth and guilt, at the sum of twelve millions of livres.

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