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to, and applied in every part of the Southern country. I therefore
set forth clearly the objects to be attained and the powers which the
Bureau could legally exercise, and left it to my subordinates to devise
suitable measures for effecting these objects.??

The first object to be effected was the relief of actual misery :
housing, clothing, food, hospitals, dispensaries. Thanks, however, to
good management—for which we give the Bureau all credit—but
more, we suspect, to the rapidly recuperative powers of American
society, this part of the operations to be performed was, after all, com-
paratively easy.

“The exhibit of rations and clothing furnished (says the General)
shows that the Bureau has not been a pauperizing agency. It has
not encouraged idleness and yagrancy. It has not existed for the
benefit of able-bodied beggars. The wonder is not that so many, but
that so few have needed help; that of the four million people thrown
suddenly upon their own resources, only one in about two hundred
has been an object of public charity, and nearly all who have received
aid have been persons who, by reason of age, infirmity, or disease,
would be objects of ee in any State, and at any time.”

To re-establish the labor market was a more perplexing task :

‘* The majority of planters were anxious to cultivate their land,
and their former slaves were equally anxious to earn an honest liv-
ing ; but each class naturally distrusted the other. I was appealed
to for a settlement of this great labor question. Letters from all
parts of the country vrenuape me and my assistant commissioners to
to enforce a specific rate of wages, and to exercise power in one way
or another over the laborer to compel him to work. Allsuch appeals
were resisted. Officers and agents of the Bureau were instructed to
do all in their power to remove prejudice, to restore mutual confi-
dence, and to quicken and direet ihe industry of the people. At the
same time they were cautioned against giving countenance to any
substitute for slavery. Negroes must be free to choose their employ-
ers. No fixed rate of wages will be prescribed, but the law of supply
and demand must govern.’?

A system of written contracts was introduced wherever this could
be done.

‘* No compulsion was used, but all were advised to enter into writ-
ten agreements and submit them to an officer of the Bureau for ap-
proval. The nature and obligation of these contracts were carefully
explained to the freedmen, and a copy filed in the office of the agent
approving it, for their use in case any difficulty should arise between
them and their employers. In a single State, not less than 50,000 such
contracts were drawn in duplicate, and filled up with the names of all
the parties ”

A body of evidence is adduced from the reports of assistant com-
missioners to show the working of this simple arrangement in differ-
ent localities :—

**It is confirmed by the fact that the great mass of freedmen are
now self supporting, and that many haye commenced planting and
other business on their own account. In spite of all disorders that
have prevailed, and the misfortunes that have fallen upon many parts
of the South, a good degree of prosperity and success has already been
attained, To the oft repeated slander that the negroes will not work