The fact is that the agents of the Associated Press and a gang around the Federal Capitol appear to be organized for the purpose of magnifying their idol.
And if such men as those who composed the railroad convention in this city do not rebuke such a practice as that perpetrated in this instance, they can not be conferred with in future.
You will of course see the propriety of my not noticing the matter and thereby giving it importance beyond the contempt it inspires. I think you are well enough acquainted with me to judge in future the value of any such statement.
I notice the Herald telegraphic reporter announces that I had a second attack of illness on Friday and could not attend the department. I was in the department, or in the Cabinet, from nine in the morning until nine at night, and never enjoyed more perfect health than on that day and at present.
For your kind solicitude accept my thanks. I shall not needlessly impair my means of usefulness.
Yours truly, Edwin M. Stanton.
C. A. Dana, Esq.
P.S.—Was it not a funny sight to see a certain military hero in the telegraph office at Washington last Sunday organizing victory, and by sublime military combinations capturing Fort Donelson six hours after Grant and Smith had taken it sword in hand and had victorious possession! It would be a picture worthy of Punch.
Thus, when the newspapers announced my unexpected retirement from the Tribune, I was not unknown to either the President or the Secretary of War.
To Mr. Stanton's letter asking me to go into the service of the War Department, I replied that I would attempt anything he wanted me to do, and in May he wrote me that I was to be appointed on a commission to audit unsettled claims against the quartermaster's department at Cairo, Ill. I was directed to be in Cairo on June 17th. My formal appointment, which I did not receive until after I reached Cairo, read thus: