An ungracious thing is the fault-finding with Mr. George I. Seney, because, before the late troubles in Wall Street, he gave away some two millions of money to philanthropic uses. People who never give away things seem to think that, having given largely, Mr. Seney should have rolled himself into a safe nest and remained there. It occurs to us that no man has a better right to risk his own money than the man who has acquitted himself generously of his obligations to humanity. We have seen no proof that Mr. Seney was guilty of even an irregularity in the conduct of his business, or that he is not able to meet all his engagements. * * * * * Mr. Ferdinand Ward is the most picturesque and romantic figure in the late crisis in monetary New York. His success in Wall Street, by which a poor youth laid his hands on a dozen or more millions of other men’s money, appropriately climaxed by his enforced visit to the cell formerly tenanted by William M. Tweed, is a romance of rascality; and yet no one can tell just how he succeeded in using the cupidity of mankind to blind their eyes to the plainest principles of finance. The scheme was simple enough: Loan $70,000 on securities worth $100,000. Then take the securities to a bank and hypothecate them for $90,000. To a thief the profit is just $20,000. But the genius lies in concealing the simplicity of the business. * * * * * It was not strange that General Grant was deceived by young Ward. No one supposes that the General is an acute and expert man of business. But men who ought to be acute and expert men of business—for that is their calling—were as completely deceived as General Grant. There are always hindsight philosophers and small-eyed sons of detraction to seize such an occasion as the late panic to criticise great and good men. General Grant’s vindication lies in the fact that there are very few moneyed men in New York whom Ferdinand Ward did not deceive. * * * * * The zeal with which some persons labor to make benevolence unpopular is one of the worst manifestations of human nature. Why can not the critics remember that very few men ever catch the disease of giving away large amounts of money? So uncommon a disorder ought to be given the benefit of a corner of that mantle of charity which is usually employed to cover a multitude of sins. * * * * *