124: LEAVES THEY HAVE TOUCHED. 



Elizabeth Town. If you think this mode, oi' one similar to it, will 

 answer the purpose, you will carry it into execution and try the 

 eifect. Previous to seeing your letter to General Hand, I had heard 

 that there was some uneasiness in the Company stationed at Wyoming, 

 and had determined to relieve it. You will therefore order up a 

 relief as soon as the troops are clothed. I have no new instructions 

 to the officer who is to go upon the command. He will call upon 

 Captain Mitchell for those given to him and follow them. You may 

 give him this general caution, to confine himself to his military 

 duty and avoid intermeddling in the politics of Pensylvania or Con- 

 necticut. I am. Dear Sir, yourmost obt. servt., G.Washington." — 

 Col. Dayton. 



The great contest was drawing to a close. Winners as well as 

 losers were becoming somewhat weary of it, as we may perhaps 

 partly gather from the letter before us. Washington was aware 

 •that negotiations for peace were likely soon to commence. He knew, 

 nevertheless, that it was politic to maintain to the latest moment a 

 due preparedness for all issues. 



I might give a few words from the hand of Bishop White, the 

 first Anglican bishop in North America, consecrated at Lambeth in 

 1787 ; their subject matter, however, would be imimportant. 



I exhibit the MS. signature — Abraham Lincoln ; but I do not 

 transcribe the document to which it is attached, that being simply a 

 Military Commission, cancelled. It was "given" at Washington 

 on the 27th of Ju.ly, 1861. The autograph of the Acting Secretary 

 of War, Thomas A. Scott, likewise appears thereon. 



