Fowler, Edward L. Baker, and Roswell E. Goodell are to furnish the necessary hands for weighing and issuing at their own expense.

Eighth. No member of Congress, officer or agent of the Government, or any person employed in the public service, shall be admitted to any share herein or to any benefit which may arise therefrom.

The Military District of Illinois includes the whole State, except the cities of Alton and Cairo.

In witness whereof the undersigned have hereunto placed their hands and seals e above written.

NINIAN W. EDWARDS,

Captain and Commissary of Subsistence.

JNO McGINNIS, JR.

EDWIN S. FOWLER.

EDWARD L. BAKER.

ROSWELL E. GOODELL.

HOUSE OF DELEGATES, February 8, 1864.

His Excellency JEFFERSON DAVIS,

President Confederate States of America:

SIR: I owe you an apology for failing to send you a copy of the resolutions of the General Assembly, the original draft of which Lieutenant-Governor Price and myself had the honor of submitting for your perusal.

The delay has been caused by a misapprehension of our clerk. You will find them inclosed.

I am, with great respect, your obedient servant,

HUGH W. SHEFFEY,

Speaker House of Delegates.

[Inclosure.]

Whereas, it is understood that negotiations for the removal of obstacles to the exchange of prisoners of war mutually held by the belligerents have been broken off, and so remain, in part at least, as is believed, on account of objections personal to the party selected by the United States Government as its agent of exchange taken by the Executive of the Confederate States, and, while no difference of opinion exists among the people of those States as to the character of certain past acts of that officer, which have rendered him justly obnoxious, nor as to the President's course, having been dictated by a zealous regard to the public sensibilities, yet we are unwilling to attach to these exceptions, however just, and importance grave enough to be balanced against those vast and overruling considerations of humanity pleading against the condemnation for such a course to hopeless and indefinite bondage of the thousands of our gallant sons now pining in distant and loathsome prisons, and of the families of those devoted patriots to the bitter grief of separation which, while it cannot shut out all knowledge of their sufferings, yet leaves them in suspense as to the extent or duration of them, while it denies all means of administering mitigation or relief: Now, therefore, be it

Resolved, That, in the opinion of the General Assembly of Virginia, the character of the agent employed by the Government with which we are at war to represent it in negotiations touching the exchange of prisoners should not impose an insuperable barrier to carrying on such negotiations.