official act of his administration has been performed with so much pain and reluctance. He is a man of integrity and firmness as well as of a kind disposition and a cool judgment, and while he will not suffer a single citizen of to suffer wrong, he will enforce the laws with a firm hand, and suffer none to violate them with impunity.
On my return from , I found absent on public business at Rock Island, from whence he did not return for a week after I arrived. I presented him a detailed report of my investigations, in which the fact is fully established, that neither you or your people were guilty of any violence, or disorderly, or unlawful conduct whatever; but that throughout the whole of the unpleasant scene connected with your arrest, and the ill treatment which you received, your and their conduct, was that of peaceful, law-abiding and good citizens. He is perfectly satisfied on that point.
You will recollect that when I left , we all had the impression that , the agent of , still had the writ in his possession, and it was feared that he would still make it the pretext of another attempt to seize you. But on mentioning it to on my return, he replied that we laboured under a mistake— that the writ was returned to him, and remained in his possession. This writ, then, is in [p. 2]