THE LIFE AND DEATH OF THE LATE JAMES FISK.

Hawke's Bay Times, Volume 19, Issue 1250, 16 February 1872, Page 2

THE LIFE AND DEATH OF THE LATE JAMES FISK.

[FROM THE NE"W ZEALAND HERALD."! Fkom the United States we have news of great social derangement in several of the Southern States. James Fisk, jun, or Colonel Fisk, as lie has latterly been designated in New York papers, has been shot by one Edward Stokes. The deceased, reputed one of the wealthiest men in the United States, was prosecuting a Miss Mansfield and her paramour, Edward Stokes, for an attempt to " blackmail" him. The Grand Jury found a true bill against Stokes, whereupon he proceeded to the New York Central Hotel, and shot Risk. The whole transaction is one of the most repulsive that we have read of. Fisk wa» a man who avowedly had amassed wealth by the most flagrant mean*. He was accused of suborning the Bench, purchasing Hie State Legis-* lature, and manipulating the Erie railroad stock in aueli a way as to secure dishonestly millions of dollars for himself and associates. His evil fame was in every mouth in the civilised world. Very recently his operations created the gold panic in New York, and the ruin of hundreds of thousands of innocent persons. His career appeared to l>e without check. He was too big for the meshes of the law ; and although several of his accomplices are held to bail to take their trial for plundering the New York municipality, he escaped. One of these men, Jay Gould, is trustee under his will, "to give effect to his labor of love, of carrying out all his projects in regard to public improvements." Fisk had been a ** friend " of Miss Mansfield ;—one of those women whose leading position is possible only in the United States. She had formed a more recent "friendship" with Stokes, and Fisk alleged that they had conspired to extort money from him. Doubtless, the charge was true. Stokes would not abide the slow process of law to vindicate himself; and on learning the finding of the Grand Jury, he lay in wait' for Fisk, and wounded him morta.ly. Stokes, it appears had had money transactions with Fisk, which were unsettled at the date of the murder.

The murderer was arrested, and forthwith FKk became a popular idol. His bedside was thronged by an admiring multitude. His looks were carefully note.l, his sighs recorded, and his slightest word religiously treasured. Many ladies visited his corps* 1 , although orders had been given to admit only relations. Indeed his wife, '"frantic with grief, 1 ' plays a very subordinate part in the great bisk drama. She had, apparently, only a trifling personal interest in him. He was the darling of the people. As dming hi* life he was execrated for his meanness and crimes, in his death the tickle multitude attributed to him the highest virtue. 'His noble qualities " are seriously spoken of, and a savage demand is made for the blood of his murderer. Altogether, one can hardly imagine so shocking a picture of American maimers as that which is unconsciously drawn in. the Ki-k tragedy telegrams. As his crimes were beyond the law, so his punishment dispensed with legal forms ; and his executioner, like himself, was a man who had trampled on every social tie.

The New York World says that "in the act may be seen in its most accurate type the spirit of those marital minders, which disgrace our pretentions to civilisation, and, whacevei miserable results this wretched business may have, it will have a beneficent result if it enables men who cannot see that murder murder when perpetrated under the specious plea of upholding the sanctity of marriage, to appreciate the same crime when per-pettated with the view of consecrating concubinage. " Here let us take our leave of Fi--k, and while we do so, we desire to express a hope that his murderer may not be permitted to evade the legal consequences of his act.