Meanwhile the public indignation had been growing stronger daily. On the 4th of September, 1871, a large and harmonious meeting of citizens, without regard to party, was held at Cooper Institute. At this meeting it was resolved to compel an exposure of the frauds practised upon the people, and to punish the guilty parties; and committees were appointed, money subscribed, and the best legal talent in the city retained for that purpose. A reform movement to carry the November elections in the interest of the citizens and tax-payers was inaugurated, and the power of the courts was invoked to put a stop to the further expenditure of the city funds. The popular sentiment was too strong to be mistaken, and some of the leading officials, and several journals which had previously supported the Ring, took the alarm and entered the ranks of the party of Reform. The Democratic party of the State repudiated the Ring, and it was plain that the Tammany ticket would be supported only by the lowest classes of the city voters. The members of the Ring were now thoroughly aroused to the danger which threatened them; but, true to their corrupt instincts, they endeavored to meet it by fraud. They appointed a Committee of Aldermen to act with the Citizens' Committee in the investigation of the alleged frauds, and then withheld from them all evidence that could be of service to them. The Comptroller's office contained not only the accounts of moneys paid out, but also the vouchers for all sums expended, properly signed and sworn to by the parties receiving the money, and these vouchers constituted the principal proof of the frauds. On Monday, September 11th, the city was startled by the announcement that the office of the Comptroller had been forcibly entered during the previous day, Sunday, and that the vouchers covering the principal transactions of the Ring had been stolen. It was a bold deed, and was so thoroughly characteristic of the Ring, that the public at once attributed it to that body. The Ring on their part endeavored to produce the belief that the Comptroller had stolen the vouchers to screen himself. Mayor Hall immediately wrote a peremptory letter to Mr. Connolly, asking him to resign his position as he (the Comptroller) had lost the confidence of the people. Mr. Connolly was not slow to perceive that the Ring were determined to sacrifice him to secure their own safety, and he declined to become their victim. He not only refused to resign his position at Mayor Hall's demand, but set to work vigorously to discover and bring to light the persons who had stolen the vouchers. To have stolen the vouchers himself, or to have countenanced the robbery, would have been worse than folly on the part of the Comptroller. It would have damaged him fatally with the citizens, who were disposed to deal lightly with him if he would aid them in getting at and punishing the villainies of his former confederates.