was worth in Richmond twenty for one. It now commands over sixty for one. I fear that it will command even more than that in another week. Flour is worth $700 a barrel, &c.

Wednesday morning, January 11. -Colonel Carroll, the newly elected member from Arkansas, has just arrived. He tells us that you had not, when he left on the 14th of December, gotten together more than 2,500 of your reputed recruits. Why don't some of you write to us and let us know the truth? I place no reliance upon the verbal statements of any person as to the strength of armies, and shall never ask any action to be taken by the Government on any such statements or rumors. You all complain of the inaction of the Government here, and yet it cannot act prudently without official information as to the status of things there. You all must not expect us to act any more upon rumors of reputed organizations. Neither the President nor the Secretary of War will listen to us, and they ought not; nor ought any one else who has a grain of sense. Conrow, to whom I have shown this sentence, and who is a man of mighty good sense, says that there is no use in writing thus, as he knows from experience that it will not be regarded or attended to. I do hope that he is mistaken and that we may receive from you information upon which we may act without incurring the certainty of being set down as dupes or liars. The gloom thickens daily. I have this moment heard some facts as to the supply of subsistence for this army, which, whilst they do not alarm me, do terrify a great many. They would alarm me if I did not feel sure that when the utter incompetency of our present administrative officers becomes as evident to others as it is to me, measures radical and dangerous, it is true, but stern and vigorous, will adopted and be found efficacious. It is right, however, that you should know that a very large number of our people are greatly alarmed and ready to seek safety in any alliance that can be made with France or even in reconstruction. I do not, however, think that their fears are well grounded. I send you extracts from the latest papers which will give you all the news that you have not probably received or which I am at liberty to have written very fully within the last ten days to Cabell, Maclean, Parsons, and others and presume that my letters have been received by them. I have no time to write to any one else to-day, nor any more to you. Please give my kindest regards to them, to Brinker, Monroe, and, indeed, all of my friends near you. I will write to some of them in a few days. The messenger who takes this leaves this afternoon. All of the delegations desire me to express their very sincere delight that the rumors of your death were baseless. They are all friends of yours. I understand that my wife is still in Saint Louis and under military surveillance at home. I hear nothing from her directly.

Again, with the sincerest love to you and to all of my old friends, I am, faithfully, &c.,

SNEAD.

HEADQUARTERS DISTRICT OF ARKANSAS,
Washington, January 11, 1865.

Brigadier General W. R. BOGGS,

Chief of Staff:

GENERAL: I am informed by Lieutenant Colonel Clay Taylor, just from Camden, Ark., that two Federal boats are now on the Ouachita River en route to Camden to get cotton. I object to these boats coming up to