f whom were arch accomplices of William M. Tweed and were
deeply involved in the gigantic thefts of the Tweed ring. The same band
of officials gave to Mrs. Laura A. Delano, a daughter of William B.
Astor, a grant from Fifty-fifth to Fifty-seventh street, Hudson River,
at $200 per running foot, and on May 21, 1867, a grant to John Jacob
Astor, Jr., of lands under water between Forty-ninth and Fifty-first
streets, Hudson River, for the trivial sum of $75 per running foot. Many
other grants were given at the same time. The public, used as it was to
corrupt government, could not stomach this granting of valuable city
property for virtually nothing. The severe criticism which resulted
caused the city officials to bend before the storm, especially as they
did not care to imperil their other much greater thefts for the sake of
these minor ones. Many of the grants were never finally issued; and
after the Tweed "ring" was expelled from power, the Commissioners of the
Sinking Fund on Feb. 28, 1882, were compelled by public agitation to
rescind most of them.[150] The grant issued to Rhinelander in 1865,
however, was one of those which was never rescinded.

During its control of the city administration from 1868 to 1871 alone,
the Tweed "ring" stole directly from the city and county of New York a
sum estimated from $45,000,000 to $200,000,000. Henry F. Taintor, the
auditor employed by Andrew H. Green to investigate Controller Connolly's
books, testified before the special Aldermanic Committee in 1877, that
he had estimated the frauds during those three and a half years at from
$45,000,000 to $50,000,000.[151] The committee, however, evidently
thought that the thefts amounted to $60,000,000; for it asked Tweed
during the investigation whether they did not approximate that sum, to
which question he gave no definite reply. But Mr. Taintor's estimate, as
he himself admitted, was far from complete even for the three and a half
years. Matthew J. O'Rourke, who was responsible for the disclosures, and
who made a remarkably careful study of the "ring's" operations, gave it
as his opinion that from 1869 to 1871 the "ring" stole about $75,000,000
and that he thought the total stealings from about 1865 to 1871,
counting vast issues of fraudulent bonds, amounted to $200,000,000.

PROFITING FROM GIGANTIC THEFTS.

Every intelligent person knew in 1871 that Tweed, Connolly and their
associates were colossal thieves. Yet in that year a committee