An Infernal Contrivance

[FroinHinNew York World.l The explosión of an infernal machine, supposed to have containnd dynamite, which ocOurred iü the baggage-cflr attaohed to thé ïïew "tori elprèss; which left Philadelphia foï this eiiy Ftíday afternoon, was the subject of very .cíese but fruitless investigation by the Pennsylvania railroad officials yesterday. ï'he machine, as will bo remembered, was placed in, a large Saratoga trunk, cheeked at fhikdfelphifl, When the train, crowded with Gentennial pitsrïengers, had passed Metuchen,' some twenty miles from Jersey Oity, a loud explosión hurled the pile of trunks over the floor, and prostrated the, men in the car. Flamea ínstáütly bufst from. the pile of trunks, andL it was not until the train" stoppcd at Kahway that the fire was extinguished, The' railroad officials yestorcïay ttioft,ght it probable that the intention of the man who pnt, he JÁaehine in the trunk was to rob the passengers or cause such destmction in the baggage-car that he could claim large damages. If the trunk had been ín the lower tier of baggage the explosión would have destroyed ËJUcli whtable property, and probably wrecked the train. Tne most careful search in the car failed to reveal the check, or any portion of the trunk which was not shattered and bent. The damage to the othèr trunks was trifling, and no claims have been made by their owners. Some of them were badly söorched; atict the íoof of the car was burned, but not to any greát exThe Pennsylvania 1-ailroad officials professed yesterday to have obtained no clue that would lead to the detection of the author of the plot. They have so far cffered no reward for the arrest of the person who sent from Philadelphia to New York the trunk in which the iniernsl rtócMne wa placed. They employed a number of deíectítts to vraxk up the case, both at Philadelphia and New York, but they do not seem very confident, as the case presenta almost insurmountable difficulties. The , immenfce amount of baggage received at Philadeiphia eaoh day almest precludes the possibility of placing the houi ör time of reception of the trunk. The machine by which the contente of the trunk wa3 fired off was on exhibition yesterday at the office of the train-master, Mr. Watts, in the Pennsylvania railroad depot at Jersey City. During the day, a large number of visitors called at the office to examine it. It is a simple affáir,,rouMh in detail, Vut very well ealculated to accompíish all thát -ífois desired. The clock used resembles one of the small Oonnecticut clocks of Seth Thomas' make. and is about flve inches square. The glass face and jninutehand had been removed. On the front face just above the dial-plate was fastened a single-barreled pisto), nearly six inches in length, with a three-inch barrel. It is of a very small caliber, and was loaded with a small copper cartridge, fllled, as it is supposed, with a blank charge of powder. It was f astened to the clock a by long screw running through the hole by which the wooden buttÍ lates are attached to the pistol. The ef t-side butt-plate was removed so as to make it lie flat to the clock face. It was fmther fastened by a small piece of wcod screwedtothe eloek, which pressed iigainst the barrel Üear ílse mv.z!íe Just abdve the flgtü-e 12 On the dial" Í)late wds á sraall wooden lever, wofking oosely on a screw. This was fastened in Such a mannör that when the hour arrived at whieh it was set to' explode, the hour -hand would press flrmly agaiñst the lever, turning it so that it struck the hair trigger of the pistol. The whole machine wás then screwed to the bottom of the trïuak, with the pistol pointing upward. The trunk was filled with gunpowder, straw, cotton saturated with some explosivo, and a bottle supposed to contain dynamite. Soon after the train left Philadelphia ono of the employés in the baggage-car noticed something leaking from the trunk, which on examination proved to be gunpowder. As there was smoking going on in the car, the trunk was put on the top of the baggage, and this fortúnate discovery and the fact that the contenta did not plode account for the slight damage done. The most probable theory advanced.is that the clock was set to explode at the hour wheu the tfain arrived in Jersey Oity, and during the removal of the baggage in the depot, whsn a large number of persons would be gathered around. The fact that the train was behind time, and was about due at New York when the explosión occurred, helps bear out the tbeory. About half an houï after the train reached Jersey City, a large man with a heavy black mustache made a number of inquiries at the depot in relation to the matter, and asked anxiously whera Silpatb, the master on the train, was, and departed to visit him at his residence in Wayne street, Jersey Oity, but did not appear there. Yesterday the company s detectives were searching for him on suspicion that he might know something about the trunk or its owmer, bnt no traces of him could be fonnd. Of course this explosión recalls the contrivance by which Thomassen intended to blow up the Mosel in midocean, now nearly a year ago, in order to secure the insurance upon certaln bogus packages of goods which he had shipped upon that vessel. Thomassen's infernal machine, which exploded prematurely on the wharf at Bremerhavec, was, it will be remembered, of a different construction tuited to the use of dynamite as an explosivo. The clockwork was provided with a pegged wheel, and so set that. at such hour as the dial was set to indícate, the pegs released a heavy hammer which feil upon a fulmínate cartridge imbedded in the dynamite with which the case was fiiled. Thomassen, as appeared from the e-xamination of some effects of hisfound at the Fifth Avenue Hotel, had deliberated severa! methods of accomplishing his plan, one of them requiring the use of submarino fuse, a coil of which was found in one of his trunks. The explosión of Friday also, happily, differed from. that at Bremorhaveü, in that itwas not accompanied by the loss of life. while some 160 deaths followed the other. Whatever may have been the motives of the man who shipped that Saratoga trunk with its terrible contents, doubtless the suggestion came from Thomassen's machine. Length of service in the British army often extends beyond the limits usual in this country, Attention has bepn directed to tho case of Ooi. Henry örierbou, retired froni the Fifteenta Foot, after ij sojcvicíí oí íorty-tbree years ín the corps, six of ■(t-iiflh were possed in it in company with his fathef , tfre late Iiieut Col. W. Grierson, who joined tte regiment as Captain in August, 1804. Thus father and sou served in the regiment iijTvrard of aeventy-two years. StlCiÖÊ Aud How lo Prevent It. [Fiom the London Satilrday Review.J ïfc hos ofííin been said of people iiighüf infeine, whö cOmmít or attempt suicide, tiiaí ihéy aíe moved by unreasüning selfishness or vuïiit;. ÏWen vanity might, and we venture to tiaüíí wfrtild, be in many cases overborne by the reollection that suicide is miirder, and that thíí person who ootnmits it will be treated after dóáíli rtS { felon - hls body buried without Christiaü fite9j his family dis graced and his property !rst to them,The man who oould make and sign & f?isposition of his property with the intentioh of suicide clearly in his mind would be more deteifnine4 on eelf-destruction than certainly a half of {le peison who at present commit the dreadful ace. It has not, we believe, been denied by medical mèn that the homicida! mania is frequently feetJWned by the fear of punishment. But, as tLe 3aw it at present worked, many cases occur in wïtic.h the maniac cooíly counts upon the immunity which will attend his crime. The samC feslíng may work upon suicides. They may, and ño doabt often do, know and believe that under no ciíCuHstances will the old law be brought to bear üpön their case. Among recent examples there.is a' large proportion in which the suicide, however insane upon the one point, was perfectly sane upon everything eise, asd there being no restraining thought in the feaf cf legal consequences, has been left to coinmit eeifmurder as an act affecting hiinself alone. There are many men to whom disgrace pears worse than death. Sucli a feelng is not uncommon even among those whose intellects are onsiderably disordered. Stealing, adulterj?. bVwphemy are quite impossible to many a máfi ttiho wll yet commit suicide. The idea of hurting aliother is of ten more repugnant than that of hurtilig one'a self. Th?re are many with wiiom a consideration of the injury done their families would opérate powerfully as a deterrent, even more powerfully than the desire to grátify the suicidal impulse. Passion is thus controlled, and t-he man who would stick at no crime to attaln an end where his own longings are concerned, is yet held back by the consequences his rashness may bring upon those whom he loves, or even those with whom he wishes to stand well. It is not possible to believe that if every intelligent suicjde - that is, everf suioide whose intellect has only fftiled oñ the One poiat - couldbe shown, whether by atgrimeñt or by Tritnessing the experience of that his erime would be punished by social disgrflcë, he might not be induced to hesita t-e, and, as in all diseases, time gained would be life saved. The impulse is cften transient. 1 strained for a sufficient period, it dies I out, and every consideration, legal or moral, whicfi can be used for its restraint should be diligently sought out and employed. Half a dozen verdicts of " feio de se " would have a stronger influence, we are convinced, upon iatending suicides, and would iiave a greater effect upon the annual number of cases than any medical treatment whatever. Cost of Railroads. Nothing haa been more effective in developing the resouröes of nationa than railroads, and throögh eo other means has the percentage of loss oí capital been so great. We gather sonïc f ets in this conneetion from a recent numlior of Prazer's .Magazine, which f acts, in their f magnitude añd eharac'ter, can scarcoly fail to astonish even edtvated readers. Tho rapidity with which mo'ncy has been borrowed on railway enterprises is most astonishing, and, notwithstanding revulsious, reneWeá oxitbursts of zeal in new projeets have follovred in quick succession. As recently as 1845 the total capital sunk in railways throughout the world was only about $670,000,000, of which Great Britain hadspent some $320, 000, 000, and Amefica $90,000,000. At the present time the railways of Great Britain alone represent a nominal outlay of nearly $3,280,000,000, and those of the United States $3,800,000,000. Besides these sums Frunce has spent about $2,000,000,000, Germany about $1,100,000,000, and Russia about $1,250,000,000. Many other foreign countf ies have thus pledged the national eredit for, nominaliy at least, the same kind of " works of public utility" toan enormous extent, and hencs the national debts of Turkey, Austria and Hungary. Egypt, Italy, Spain, and of various petty semi-barbarons South American republics, of the empires of Brazil and Chili, have been swollen prodigiously. What the total pledges of credit in the world may amount to, r what amount of savings may have been locked up in corporate enterprises, it would be almost impossibla to say, just as it is impossible to reckon how far the aggregate figures represent money spent and how far mere paper ; but the national debts of the world are now swollen almost as much as the credit of separate enterprises and corporations. The principal countries of Europe owe about $17,500,000,000, exclusive of the unsecured paper currencies and homo debts, ansí all other national debts which come within the cognizance of civilization may be valued at about $5,000,000,000. Those huge and rapidly accumufeting obligations are not, it is true, due by ftny means exclusively to the spread of industrial enterprise, Austria, Spain, Italy, Prance, the United States and Kussia having contracted large national debts in the prosecution of wars and conquests, but for the purposs of tho stock-broker it is much the same whether the " securities" he deals in are based on industrial undertakings or commerce, or are mere loans necesstated by a national bankruptcy or an ambitious war. His business is to buy and sell and get gains out of these bits of paper, and it is of the essence of that business that quantity shpuld have weight with him, not quality. And of quantity it canaot be donied that the modern stock-broker has enough. - Philadclphia Ledger, One of the many characters of San Francisco is "Jack the Grabber." Jack moors his boat close to ships discharging cargo at the wharves. His boat contaiue hooks and grapples, specially devised for bringing up substancos from the bottom. If a vessel be discharging coal, Jack's hooks will fish up all tho lumps that drop into the water while in transitu from the ship to the wharf. I{ an angler drops his poeket-book in the water( Jaqk is the man to ftud it fj kim. He is fid io mftfee a good Uying.' '