read in your letter that 'so far as I can judge the pubic verdict of the people is that the establishment of Fort Lapwai prevented an Indian war. " It gratifies me to hear such language from an intelligent source, as my efforts for the defense of Idaho Territory have been underrated in some quarters. I wrote the strongest letters to Governor Wallace urging that a force be sent this spring from Missouri to occupy Idaho east of the Rocky Mountains and in the Bitter Root country. I shall always be pleased to receive any statements you may wish to make concerning the wants of the frontier, and they shall be taken into mature consideration.

Very respectfully, your obedient servant,

BENJ. ALVORD,

Brigadier-General, U. S. Volunteers, Commanding District.

SPECIAL ORDERS,
HDQRS. DEPARTMENT OF THE PACIFIC, Numbers 57.
San Francisco, Cal., March 14, 1864.

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2. Company H (Campbell's), First Cavalry California Volunteers, will proceed on the next trip of the steamer Senator to Drum Barracks.

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By order of Brigadier-General Wright:

RICHD. C. DRUM,
Assistant Adjutant-General.

HEADQUARTERS DEPARTMENT OF THE PACIFIC,

San Francisco, March 14, 1864.

Colonel E. D. TOWNSEND,

Asst. Adjt. General, Hdqrs. of the Army, Washington, D. C.:

COLONEL: For more than twelve years I have been a close observer of our national affairs on this coast, and during this period the agricultural and mineral resources of our domain west of the Rocky Mountains have been largely developed. The value of our possessions on the Pacific Coast cannot be overestimated. Immigration from the Eastern States will add a hundred thousand annually to our population, and already the whistle of the locomotive is heard in the streets of the capital of California, moving along the line of the great Pacific railroad, soon to stretch its iron arms across the continent and bind together indissolubly the East and the West. But in the meantime it is of paramoung importance that this remote dependency, as yet feeble in population and resources, should receive the fostering care and protection of the Government. It is not from disloyalty within our borders that we have to apprehend danger, but it is the advent of an unscrupulous foreign enemy in the State of a sister Repubic bordering on our southern frontier which causes great aprehensions. Our commerce with the Mexican States on the Pacific is rapidly growing into importaqnce. Steamers and sailing vessels are constantly plying between San Francisco and Guaymas and other Mexican ports, and should this trade be interrupted by the presence of a French fleet, and troops thrown into that country for the purpose of conquest and empire, it woud arouse the most bitter feelings of the people on this coast against the invaders.