I send you the last declaration of exchange and some copies of correspondence.

Respectfully, your obedient servant,

RO. OULD,

Agent of Exchange.

P. S. -It may be well enough for me to mention to you that the Yankees contend that every prisoner must be reduced into possession and delivered at one or the other place named in the cartel. The only exception they make to this is where there is an agreement to the contrary between the commanders of two opposing armies. After long protest against this position, but in vain, we have been compelled in self-defense to adopt the same rule. Therefore (with the exception of a portion of the Vicksburg garrison) all officers and men who have been released on parole without having been reduced into possession and delivered at City Point or Vicksburg are absolved from their paroles and are entirely free to enter into service. The Yankees have advised me that they do not consider such paroles binding when given by our men. Our people, therefore, can have no uneasiness in entering into service. The portion of the Vicksburg garrison excepted from this rule will be found by consulting Exchange Notices Nos. 6, 7, and 8. These notices inform you who are exchanged. All officers and men of the Vicksburg capture not embraced within either of those notices are not exchanged. Their paroles are binding. No other parole, when the party was not reduced into possession and delivered at City Point or Vicksburg, is binding, unless an agreement to the contrary was made between the commanders of two opposing armies.

RO. OULD.

SURGEON-GENERAL'S OFFICE,

Washington City, D. C., June 3, 1864.

Honorable E. M. STANTON, Secretary of War:

SIR: I have the honor to report the Lincoln General Hospital in this city has been designated at the request of the Commissary-General of Prisoners for the reception of rebel wounded.

Upon the arrival of large numbers of wounded it has been impossible in all cases to distinguish the prisoners from our own men, but at the earliest possible moment after reaching hospitals a careful examination is made and they are then transferred to the Lincoln Hospital.

In a few cases the nature of wounds and condition of the prisoners render their transfer impracticable at the time, but the invariable rule in this and other places is to collect them in one hospital as soon as it can be done.

The diet table, medical supplies, and surgical treatment are the same in all U. S. general hospitals.

Very respectfully, your obedient servant,

JOS. K. BARNES,

Acting Surgeon-General.

FORT LAFAYETTE, New York Harbor, June 3, 1864.

Colonel WILLIAM HOFFMAN, U. S. Army,

Commissary-General of Prisoners, Washington:

COLONEL: I have the honor to acknowledge receipt of circular modifying the ration to be issued to prisoners of war with regard to the