THE SORGHO SUCRE: A RIVAL OF THE SUGAR-CANE. We published in a former number of the Merchants' Magazine some account of this newly discovered plant, and now give the opinion of Count David de Bauregard, who transmitted the report of the French Agricultural Commission at Toulon to the French consul at Cork, in Ireland. This opinion was sent to Hon. James Buchanan, United States Minister to England, by Mr. B. James Hackett, from whom it was received by the United States Commissioner of Patents: "I hasten to forward you by this post the report drawn up by the Agricultural Commission at Toulon respecting the holeus saccharatus, an article introduced into France from China in the year 1851, by Mr. De Montigny, the French consul at Shanghai. No new feature has appeared, but I continue to think that the plant is one of the most valuable which exist; that it will yield the greatest advantage not only in Europe, wherever the climate permits the late maize to grow to perfection, but even under the tropics, where it may replace with advantage the sugar-cane, because it will there grow three crops in the same space of time as is required for one of the sugar cane, and that besides it is more exempt from the injuries of the white ant, which destroy its rival." POSTAL DEPARTMENT. STATISTICS OF POSTAGE IN THE PRINCIPAL CITIES OF THE UNITED STATES. The following is a comparative statement of the amount received for letter postage at the principal cities in the United States, during the years ending 31st March, 1853 and 1855. To make it more intelligible, the population in 1850 and the increase per cent, are also given : Post-offices. Boston, Massachusettts.... Letter postage. Inc'se 1853. $149,272 64 1855. p. c. 23 New York, New York... It will be seen that the increase on letter postage is much greater in Northern cities than in Southern. A statement of the amount of postage on letters sent to the respective offices named, and there to be remailed and sent to other offices, shows the same disparity, as follows: Recent investigations in the city of New York show, says the Washington Union, that the removal of postage stamps from letters, and then dropping the letters unpaid into the office, is practiced there to a great extent, chiefly by the lads with whom they are sent to be mailed. The stamps thus fraudulently acquired are exchanged for fruits or other refreshments, and then resold below their legal value to such as are willing to buy. One individual has thus bought from the proprietor of a single fruitstand some sixty or seventy of these stamps. Letters thus deposited, bearing no evidence of prepayment of postage, are of course not mailed; and the public, as well as those immediately interested, blame the Post Office Department because they fail to reach those to whom they are addressed. COMPENSATION OF POSTMASTERS IN THE UNITED STATES. When the commissions and allowances of a postmaster taken together (as charged in his quarterly account) exceed $500 in amount, he is required to render, with his quarterly account, an account to be called the commission account; stating on the one side the amount of the commissions and allowances, and on the other his own compensation for the quarter, as limited by law, and the incidental expenses of his office necessarily and actually incurred during the quarter. The proper vouchers and receipts must accompany the charges for incidental expenses, and must specify distinctly the several objects-whether for rent, fuel, light, stationery, &c.—and the names, ages, sex, and rate of compensation and time paid for, of each and every person employed as assistant or clerk. If the amount of the commissions and allowances fall short of the amount of the compensation and expenses, the postmaster has no claim on the United States for the deficiency; and if the amount exceed such compensation and expenses, the postmaster is required to add the excess to the balance to be acknowledged by him as due the United States on his quarterly return for the same quarter. REGULATIONS AS TO FOREIGN LETTERS. When a postmaster finds that a vessel is ready to sail, by which it will be convenient to send letters to their place of destination, he should carefully examine all such letters, and see that there are none among them destined to another place. He should then count them, and enter their number in a bill. If there are few letters, and no mail-bag is furnished for them by the master of the vessel, the postmaster may make them into a bundle like a common mail, taking care to inclose the certificate with them, and sealing the wrapper with the office seal. If a bag is furnished, the string is required to be sealed with the office seal; and if there are many letters, and no bag is furnished by the master of the vessel, it is the duty of the postmaster to furnish one, and charge it to the department. CORRECTED FROOF-SHEETS. The Union learns from the Department that the postage charged for corrected proof-sheets sent by mail is the same as pamphlet postage, in case the corrections are only those of typographical errors. If new matter is introduced by the corrections, or any notations made by which information is asked or conveyed, or instructions given in writing, the sheets are subject to letter postage. NEWSPAPER POSTAGE IN THE UNITED STATES. The Union, speaking on the authority of the Post-Office Department, says :"In determining newspaper postages, the distances are to be computed from the office of publication, and by the route over which the mail is carried, and not from the county line of the county in which the paper is published. The postage is chargeable by the newspaper, not by the sheet, and if two or more newspapers are printed on one sheet, full postage must be charged on each." MERCANTILE MISCELLANIES. CHARACTER: AN ESSAY FOR MERCHANTS. [BY RICHARD SMITH, ESQ., EDITOR OF THE CINCINNATI PRICE CURRENT.] In business transactions there is for most articles a measure of value, and the importance of property to the possessor is usually estimated by the price thus arrived at. Money is the standard legal commodity by which value is determined and exchanges effected, and the preference that is given to money over all other articles that compose property or the basis of wealth, renders it easy for the possessor of the former to secure anything real or personal that may be desired. Thus everything of a material nature is regarded as liable to change of ownership-all are saleable and purchaseable commodities; and it is for this reason that property is of itself not sufficient to secure to the possessor peace or happiness. Although there is, to a certain extent, a connection between mind and matter, there are some things peculiar to the former, which are not subject to the control of the latter, and these are essentially necessary to happiness. Without them life proves a burden, and the possessor incapable of enjoying anything, however well calculated it may be in itself to secure temporal enjoy. ment. Their character being, as remarked, essential to happiness, and not being obtainable for money, they are exceedingly precious; still, in many cases, the slender cord by which they are held is often trifled with, and few realize their full importance until they have permitted them to depart. Among the features to which we have referred, the reader will readily discover CHARACTER as standing most prominent. This, to a man of business, and indeed to every person, is as dear as life itself-and cne that should, therefore, be guarded with as much care as the other; sometimes people, who are devoid of a good character, become possessed of wealth, and the latter secures for them, in many cases, a position in society to which they never could have attained if compelled to rely for promotion on merit. But this at best is but a forced position, and the respect rendered in such cases, proves merely nominal. The place is held entirely by the strength of dollars, and in the event of this failing, the feelings of contempt that were previously suppressed, are manifested without restraint; and even if the money-power should continue to the end of life, the memory of the characterless man would be buried with his body, and his epitaph, if written at all, would refer to one whose absence could not be lamented; or its sentiments, if otherwise expressed, would be in keeping with the principles upon which in life he was respected. But feelings of genuine respect can only be rendered to the man whose character is unstained. Such respect as is awarded to the possessor of an unspotted character is not purchaseable, nor does it require a pecuniary effort to command it. As well might a human being lift his voice in derision of nature, when arrayed in all her splendor, as attempt to withhold respect from an HONEST MAN. To the latter nothing in the world can be compared; such a character approaches nearer than anything else to the perfection of the Creator, and it therefore tends to secure to man that unalloyed happiness enjoyed by the father of our race when in his perfect state. Character should therefore be, as already remarked, carefully guarded. No amount of prosperity can compensate for a character lost in the pursuit or acquirement of wealth. Yet how few, comparatively, succeed in so guarding it; and how many sacrifice it for that which cannot in any degree compensate for it. Stand aside from the bustling scenes of business for a few years. Mark the young man as he enters the arena of mercantile life. He commences with buoyant hopes and pure intentions; but as he falls in with what are termed the "customs of trade," he begins to compromise that strict integrity with which he commenced the world, and step by step he descends, and finally he emerges from active life with a character deeply spotted, and a mind terribly barrassed. To avoid this end requires a purity and steadfastness of purpose, and apparent sacrifices in the beginning and throughout the entire course of business. The grasping desires and avaricious propensities peculiar to the age are the main difficulties in the way of sustaining a good character. These evil features lead men to cast not only their property but their standing into the scale of chance, and in such cases if both do not disappear together, the latter rarely rises. Business may be conducted on strictly correct principles, but this can rarely be done under the influence of an insatiable desire for wealth. This is the great besetting sin of business men. It induces them to misrepresent in selling, to deceive in accordance with the various unhealthy customs of trade, which countenance a departure from the rules of strict integrity, and tolerate stealing on a small scale in almost every shape, except that of extracting money directly from a customer's pocket. There is but little difference, morally, between stealing direct and selling wood for merchandise, or taking advantage in any way of parties whose confidence may induce them to trust their interests or property to the care of another. Yet in almost innumerable shapes the latter is practiced, and so general have these practices become that, as already intimated they are, by common consent, classed among the customs of trade. But custom can never make wrong right; and in the practice of such acts it were unavailing to refer for justification to the course of others. To sustain a GOOD CHARACTER, therefore, the man of business must be unyielding in his opposition to everything wrong, whether contrary to, or in accordance with, the rules tolerated by custom or common permission. COUNTING-ROOM EDUCATION. In looking over the life of Alexander Hamilton, by Dr. Renwick, says our cotemporary of the Philadelphia Merchant, we were struck with a just acknowledgment made by the distinguished writer respecting the influence of counting-room education. It is seldom that literary men have a favorable word to say of the initiatory department of mercantile life, and all who have read the introduction to Hawthorne's "Scarlet Letter," have met a good specimen of the severity with which day-book and ledger life can be treated, as though it were adverse to everything dignifying and noble. But in the Life of Hamilton, by Dr. Renwick, we have an admission no less remarkable than just. It appears that in early age Hamilton's father became embar rassed in his pecuniary matters, and the son looked about him for self-maintenance. A situation was secured for him in a commercial house in St. Croix, and he entered the counting-room of an eminent merchant. He advanced so rapidly in the acquirement of the knowledge of business affairs and the tact of good management, that while very young most important trusts were committed to his keeping. But mercantile affairs did not suit him, and those fine abilities which he afterwards displayed were permitted to find a fitting sphere of rapid development. Means to pursue classical studies were furnished him, and the world knows that one of the ablest and most influential minds of America was that of Alexander Hamilton. Dr. Renwick says: "We cannot, however, but consider his early introduction to the business of a counting-house as having a favorable influence on his subsequent career. The habits of order and regularity in a well conducted commercial establishment are never forgotten, and are applicable to every possible pursuit. Nor is the exercise of mercantile correspondence without its value in a literary point of view. To those with little previous education, or who have not an opportunity of improving themselves afterward, this exercise may communicate no elegance of style, but where the use of language has once been attained, the compression of thought and conciseness of expression on which merchants pride themselves, give a terseness and precision of diction which those educated in any other profession can rarely equal" Now this is high praise, coming as it did from within the walls of a college. It is a broad view of counting-room education, and suggests many ideas that it would be well to dwell upon. Too many minds, especially those inclined to literary pursuits, regard the counting-room merely as a sort of magician's retreat, where the art of changing the dollar into a double eagle is taught and learned-where the faculties of the mind are trained into a sort of dray-horse business, and what is learned there has to them no more connection with any other portion of life than the blotter has with the prayer-book. They see the clerk, his pen and ink, his invoices and his books, his letters, and they deem the copying-press a capital invention to break up the monotony of the pen-and-ink life of the poor drudge. As to the training of the faculties, the development of habits of order and regularity, the stern discipline of the moral powers, the aids afforded to induce a ready, clear, concise expression of what must be said, and kindred matters-these are all overlooked, and they must be indebted to some discerning and comprehensive mind for any means of seeing how a counting room education may exert a "favorable influence" on any subsequent career. We have frequently been struck with the rapid advances made by those who have left mercantile life for the bar or the pulpit, attributable only to the tact by which they were able to seize opportunities promptly-tact developed in the counting-room, where emergencies sometimes stir a man's soul as no college examination or trial sermon ever roused up human nature. Much of the results of which we have been speaking depends on the aims with which the counting room is entered by the young man. If the young man goes in as to a treadmill, only a treadmill will he find. He will shirk everything beyond the simplest routine of prescribed duties. The boundary of his vision will be exceedingly limited; and instead of seeing in him the promise of the intelligent, influential, and honored merchant, you behold almost certain evidence that he will never attain to anything beyond the narrowest conception of mercantile life, and will furnish a good model for the satirist who hates everything like Commerce, because it suggests the possession of money, which he has not. It is a good sign of the times that so increased and improved have become the facilities for preparatory commercial education. Commercial institutes and colleges are increasing in all our large cities. In these the young man finds his ideas of countingroom life radically changed. He discovers that the more accomplishments he can carry to the desk, the better the promises of true success; and instead of the old notion of confining attention to book-keeping and penmanship, we have now, in these educational establishments, professors and lecturers on commercial geography, commercial law, political science, &c., and such an education is imparted as impresses the student with the great fact that no enlargement of his mental acquirements can fail to be of use to him in the long run of mercantile life. We are beginning to bring back the ancient idea of the merchant when he was deemed the paragon of accomplishments, furnished with all forms of knowledge, and holding himself bound to acquit himself nobly not only in possessing a comprehensive knowledge of the little world about him, but also of the greater world, with all its diversities, bringing from afar knowledge that poured the best light on things near. Every day the ideal of the true merchant is increasing in dignity and attraction. The almighty dollar" is no symbol of him; but treaties, laws, courtesies, and amenities, binding discordant nations and peoples in bands of amity, making the interests of Commerce far better for man's regard than the fortunes of war. And however we be hold the confusion of war now impeding the progress of mankind, it is to the merchant that we owe the most potential influence to preserve peace where it is now enjoyed, and to hasten the end of wars where they are raging. STICK TO A LEGITIMATE BUSINESS. Well directed energy and enterprise, says the Merchant, are the life of American progress, but if there is one lesson taught more plainly than others by the great failures of late, it is, "safety lies in sticking to a legitimate business." No man-merchant, trader, or banker-has any moral right to be so energetic and enterprising as to take from his legitimate business the capital which it requires to meet any emergency. When a crowd of creditors stand vainly waiting for their dues, it is little comfort to them to be told "Well, one thing must be remembered, and that is, the money has been wide spread to aid important enterprises !" The old maxim-" Be just be |