The steamer Normannia ' has been lying for some days
oft New York in quarantine, having cholera on board. The healthy passengers-471 in number—were transferred to the Stonington,' but she proved unseaworthy, and they were sent in the • Cepheus ' to Fire Island, just outside Long Island, where Governor Flower had purchased a hotel for their reception. More than a thousand men and boys in the Long Island towns, however, armed themselves, and, crossing to Fire Island, refused permission to the passengers to land They also obtained from Judge Barnard an injunction for bid ding such landing. In vain was it represented to them that most of the passengers were American women and children, that the accommodation was insufficient even for decency, and that deaths might occur. They had rifles and an injunction, and they refused to yield. There would probably have been a catastrophe on board the Cepheus,' but that Governor Flower, indignant both as philanthropist and as Governor, employed force, with the usual American decisiveness. He sent a regiment to Fire Island, with orders to use their weapons ; the "armed People" fled, and the unhappy pas- sengers were escorted by riflemen in uniform to the hotel. We have commented elsewhere on the strength of the selfish- ness which everybody believes to be extinct, but must add here that educated opinion in New York entirely supports the Governor. That is to say, pity for the weak is, in New York, strong in the classes, but almost totally absent in the masses. The former fear disgrace to their city, the latter only fear, as they avowed, cholera for themselves.
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