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and are incapable of taking care of themselves, it is a sufficient an-
swer that their voluntary labor has produced nearly all the food that
has supported the whole people, besides a large amount of rice, sugar,
and tobacco for export, and two millions bales of cotton each year. .
It is not claimed that this result is wholly due to the care and over-
sight of this Bureau, but it is safe to say, as it has been said repeat-
edly by intelligent Southern men, that without the Bureau, or some
similar agency, the material interests of the country would have
greatly suffered, and the Government would have lost a far greater
amount than has been expended in its maintenance.”

A large scheme has been entertained of making over to the Bu-
reau all ‘‘abandoned” lands: ‘solely for the purpose of assigning,
leasing, or selling them to refugees and freedmen :’? but before this
could be carried into effect, an order of President Johnson stopped the
proceeding, and directed the restoration of ‘‘abandoned ”? property to
its former owners, on their exhibiting pardons or taking certain oaths,

‘Something has been done in this direction, however, by the bold
measure of opening for entry, by colored and white men, without dis-
tinction, all the public lands in the States of Alabama, Mississippi,
Louisiana, Arkansas and Florida. Next toa proper religious and
intellectual training (says the General) the one thing needful to the
freedmen is land aud a home. Without that, a high degree of civili-
zation and moral culture is scarcely possible.’

‘This is a thoroughly American opinion. It is by no means that
which prevails in the governing class of West Indian society.

The subject of the progress of education among the colored people
is but slightly touched on, having been treated at length in former
reports. As to keeping order among them, and affording them pro-
tection against injustice, ‘*‘ the methods pursued have differed accord-
ing to circumstances.”?. . .- In all important cases, where civil
courts existed, they were firstresorted to ; but when such courts would
not admit the testimony of negroes, nor treat them as equals before
the law with whites, appeal was made to military tribunals, or under
the Civil Rights Bill of 1866 to the United States Courts.

‘* Tt is estimated that more than 100,000 complaints were heard
and acted upon by the Bureau officers in a single year. The reports
of murders, assaults, and outrages of every desvription were so numer-
ous, and so full of horrible details, that at times one was inclined to
believe the whole white population engaged in a war of extermination
against the blacks, But careful investigation has proved that the
worst outrages were generally committed by small bands of lawless
men, organized under various names, whose principal objects were
robbery and plunder. . . . Noone can tell what scenes of violence
and strife and insurrection the whole South might have presented
without the presence of this agency of the Government to preserve
order and to enforce justice. Several officers and agents haye been
severely wounded, and some have lost their lives in this service.”

Such, and so successful has been the Institution which has done
its best to keep the peace and to establish free industry in the South
during the last few years. It is impossible not to feel regret and mis-
giving at the prospect of its dissolution. Such an intermediate au-
thority between ex-masters and ex slaves seems to have been the ye
thing demanded by the crisis, And we wish we could be satisfied

,