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.]

Several times since commencing to write these recollections, I have hesitated in the work on account of the doubt in my own mind as to how they would be received by my fellow citizens who should chance to read them; whether the readers would not be inclined to dismiss my declared intention of giving an unvarnished account of agency matters, so far as I knew them, as quite out of the common order of human nature, and therefore improbable, and fall back upon the more natural assumption that my recollections were prompted by a desire to vaunt my virtue as an exceptionally honest Indian agent.

But, as hereinbefore stated, my appointment was wholly unexpected and unsought, and the principal purpose I had in view, and which determined my acceptance of Mr. Rector's offer, was the curiosity to know the true inwardness of a business which had gained for its operators the bad reputation generally applied to them, of "blank voucher artists."

I think, however, a fair perusal of what is here written will show that I have not gone beyond the probable truth, or been actuated by any desire to write down anybody below what the facts warrant. Rather it has been my purpose to state the facts, as respects persons, and let the reader draw his own conclusions.