322 LETTERS OF A CITIZEN. 



IV. 



To the Honourable Mahlon Dickerson, Secretary of the Navy. 



SIR, 



" You will hear from me again" were the concluding words of 

 my last letter. With that letter terminated all I deemed it neces- 

 sary to say, in a connected form, in relation to your extraordinary 

 instructions to the naval board. In following up the train of 

 your official doings, though I may now be compelled to take a 

 somewhat wider range, I shall, nevertheless, endeavour to adhere 

 closely to the text and closely to you. 



On the 10th of May, 1836, the bill authorizing the expedition, 

 in despite of all your efforts to defeat it, passed both houses of 

 Congress, and receiving, as it did, the cordial sanction of the 

 president, became the law of the land. No one anticipated fur- 

 ther difficulty. If you, however, entertained honest convictions 

 against the utility of the enterprise, or apprehended the good it 

 might do would be purchased at too dear a rate, you had a fine 

 opportunity of enforcing those convictions while the bill was -under 

 deliberation ; and that you did thus exert yourself, with an energy 

 which you have seldom, if ever, manifested in the discharge of 

 your official duties, was apparent at the time to every observer. 

 But when, as I have stated, the whole matter was settled by Con- 

 gress, no person anticipated any further opposition from you. 

 Your duty then became simply an executive duty ; and whether 

 the expedition was upon too large or too small a scale, whether it 

 would cost one hundred thousand or five millions of dollars, were 

 contingences for which you were not responsible, in which you 

 had no official concern, and about which you had no right to 

 trouble yourself. 



May and June passed away, and no step had been taken by 

 you to put in train the preparations for the expedition. Fifty days 

 had thus been lost. You now began to speak plainly, and to 

 hold the language that twelve months would be necessary to 

 complete the outfit. Yes, sir, twelve months was the period you 

 named, and this, be it remembered, was before you could have 

 foreseen any of the difficulties to which you have since ascribed 



