my winter's campaign, for I have left that with a proper backing I could have effected greater result. I am sure it may yet be done, and I am willing to try ti, but I confess it is an eperiment, and that I am not sure, in the present condition of things, you are able to afford to make it at once. Still, when I look on the picture before me here, I feel that the war had just as well, and better, be carried on over the mountains in Kentucky as to be carried on here. If there, a reserve would only bring us back to this country; if here, a reverse will be very nearly fatal, for it will pass to our enemy many of the most material interestsof the country, as lead mines and salt-works, and cut off the railroad communication with the Valley of the Mississippi. Why then place the prize next the heart, when it can be as well placed at the extremity of the body where an errant shot will not be fatal? Ihave in a former letter to your placed before you one mode of campaign in Kentucky, and only asked 2,000 cavalry to make it successful in part. I did not hear from you and the force did not come; of course I concluded you did not approve, or could not lend the force required. I proposed to try in with 5,000 infantry combined with 1,500 cavalry, according to a dispatch to the Adjutant-General.

Now that force cannotg effect the purpose, because the enemy has some 7,000 or 8,000 already at Pikeville, and meditates a speedy movement into Virginia. He knows just as well as I do what force I have and where it is. I should not be surprised to hear any day that he is in thirty miles of this point and in full march upon the railroad or the salt-works. I have asked for re-enforcements, stating that his clumn is to be 12,000 men, coming from the head of Sandy, and is intended to co-operate with General Rosecrans from his base on New River. I found that my leteers asking for men had found a shelf in the Subsistence Bureau of the War Department, and that the Secretary was not conscious I had written at all. if the facts are not known how can the remedy be applied? I feel that I have done all I can in giving the information in the proper quarter as to what is going on and what is wanted to meet the exigencies of our situation. I, however, think it due to you, before I yield to what I deem great neglect ofme, to apprise you of the condition of affairs in my front and in this part of the country, and to suggest to you privately and confidentially, as I now do, the remedy required.

It is plain the war will be carried on in this part of Virginia if it is not kept in Kentucky; plain that it had better be kept in Kentucky than to come so near the main communications between the different parts of the South and West. To attack or defend this part wants the force to manage 12,000 men. It is easier to overcome 8,000 now at Pikeville than to drive out 12,000 in sixty or thirty days from this time; easier to keep these people in order than to rearrange them to loyalty after they have been disturded and tempted.

Suppose the armyover in Kentucky. They must employ heavy detachments to face it, and, I am sure, if we would detach from the Southern invasion the way to do it and the place to strike is at the weakest point of the enemy, and that is in Eastern Kentucky. I can move a column into the State so as to keep away from the Sandy, after it has been once cleared, and the enemy must come from the Ohio or the railroad. He will want force, and will be in an enemy's country while moving from that base if the people have half a chance. I do not take any control here, because I suppose I am in the geographical limits of some other commander. I hope thatif the Government looks to me for any duty in this quarter of Virginia you will cause me to be advised