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Rh practice as that perpetrated in this instance, they cannot be conferred with in future.

You will, of course, see the propriety of my not noticing the matter, and thereby giving it importance beyond the contempt it inspires. I think you are well enough acquainted with me to judge in future the value of any such statement.

I notice the "Herald" telegraphic reporter announces that I had a second attack of illness on Friday and could not attend the department. I was in the department, or in cabinet, from 9 until 9 at night, and never enjoyed more perfect health than on that day and at present.

For your kind solicitude accept my thanks. I shall not needlessly impair my means of usefulness. Yours truly,

P.S.—Was it not a funny sight to see a certain military hero in the telegraph office at Washington last Sunday organizing victory, and by sublime military combinations capturing Fort Donelson six hours after Grant and Smith had taken it sword in hand and had victorious possession! It would be a picture worthy of "Punch."



Thus when the newspapers announced my unexpected retirement from the "Tribune," I was not unknown to either the President or the Secretary of War.

To Mr. Stanton's letter asking me to go into the service of the War Department, I replied that I would take anything he wanted me to, and in May he wrote me that I was to be appointed on a commission to audit unsettled claims against the quartermaster's department at Cairo, Illinois. I was directed to be in Cairo on June 17th. My formal appointment, which I did not receive until after I reached Cairo, read:

On reaching Cairo on the appointed day, I found my associates, Judge Logan of Springfield, Illinois, one of Mr. Lincoln's friends, and Mr. Boutwell of Massachusetts—afterward governor of that State, Secretary of the Treasury, and a senator—both present. We organized on the 18th, as directed. Two days after we met, Judge Logan was compelled by illness to resign from the commission, and Shelby M. Cullom, now United States Senator from Illinois, was appointed in his place.

The main Union armies had by now advanced far to the front, but Cairo was still an important military depot—almost an outpost—in command of General William K. Strong, whom I had known well in New