to worship, and one of them burned. Continued threats of assassination
were made against the colored preachers, and one of them is now under
special guard by order of Major General Woods."

While I was in Louisiana General Canby received a petition, signed by a
number of prominent citizens of New Orleans, praying him "to annul Order
No. 38, which authorizes a board of officers to levy a tax on the
taxpayers of the parish of Orleans to defray the expense of educating the
freedmen." The reasons given for making this request are as follows: "Most
of those who have lost their slaves by the rebellion, and whose lands are
in the course of confiscation, being thus deprived of the means of raising
corn for their hungry children, have not anything left wherewith to pay
such a tax. The order in question, they consider, violates that sacred
principle which requires taxation to be equal throughout the United
States. _If the freedmen are to be educated at public expense, let it be
done from the treasury of the United States_." (Accompanying document No.
38.) Many of the signers of this petition, who wanted to be relieved of
the school tax on the ground of poverty, were counted among the wealthy
men of New Orleans, and they forgot to state that the free colored element
of Louisiana, which represents a capital of at least thirteen millions and
pays a not inconsiderable proportion of the taxes, contributes at the same
time for the support of the schools for whites, from which their children
are excluded. I would also invite attention to some statements concerning
this matter contained in the memorandum of my conversation with Mr. King,
of Georgia. (Accompanying document No. 29.)

While travelling in the south I found in the newspapers an account of an
interview between General Howard and some gentlemen from Mississippi, in
which a Dr. Murdoch, from Columbus, Mississippi, figured somewhat
conspicuously. He was reported to have described public sentiment in