Mr. Editor: In the list of "City Items" for this morning, you notice the number of beggars now thronging our streets, and very significantly ask "if any one ever heard of a negro beggar, save the blind man opposite St. Phillip's Church?"

Now really, Mr. Editor, you shold have known better than to have asked such a question. I proceed therefore to enlighten you. It is true I have not been beset by any negro asking for cold victuals, old clothes, or sixpence to buy a night's lodging. Their characteristic improvidence in a state of freedom seems not to have brought them to that pass as yet, but are you not aware that recently our citizens have been begged by these same negroes on quite a different account? Why, sir, within the last few days not less than three or four of them have come to me for funds to purchase the very legs that brought them to my door! And one of these vagrants was a minister of the Gospel too, certified as such by the man who sent him to our City to beg $600, that he might buy his own head, neck, lungs, stomach, liver, heart, and whatever else pertains to that mysterious organization, covered with a black skin? Now, sir, you have intimated by the above question that negroes do not beg. Will you retract? Yours truly.

Smith.

New York, Oct. 14, 1851,