13th. Purchasing officers will employ agents only under authorities, general or special, derived from this office. The authorities heretofore given must be renewed immediately; and in submitting applications for the retention of old agents, their names, the date of the authority under which they were employed and the rate of their compensation will be stated. When authority is asked and granted to employ new agents, whose names have not been furnished in advance, a report thereof shall be made promptly, stating who are so engaged and at what compensation. In every case such facts will be set forth as go to show the necessity for the proposed services, and the application will be forwarded through the principal officer of the district for his approval or remarks. All officers will furnish their agents with written evidence of the agency showing the object and extent thereof; and when such agency is discontinued; the evidence mentioned will be taken in and the fact reported to this office. Every officer will be careful to settle up the transactions of his own agents.

The observance of the foregoing is important in restraining abuses, decreasing the number of employes from civil life, and leading to the detection of impostors speculating in the name of the Government.

14th. All quartermasters will be held to strict accountability for any departure from these instructions and department commanders and other subordinate officers are prohibited from employing field quartermasters or agents in making purchases in violation of the same.

EMPLOYES OF QUARTERMASTERS AND THEIR COMPENSATION.

To limit the number of employes in this department, and their compensation all officers thereof will be careful to conform to the following rules:

To troops in the field the allowance shall be-

1st. To each regimental or battalion quartermaster, in addition to the quartermaster-sergeant, one wagon-master, and when the same shall be necessary one clerk; both to be detailed from the command.

2nd. To each brigade quartermaster or quartermaster attached to a division one wagon-master, and when the same shall be necessary, one clerk; both to be detailed from the command.

3rd. To all commissary, ordnance, and quartermaster's trains, one wagon-master for every ten teams, either hired or detailed; and, if hired, wages not to exceed $50 a month. When these trains exceed in number fifty teams, a superintending wagon-master for the whole will be allowed at a compensation not exceeding $75 a month.

Stations and depots.

4th. The number of employes at stations and depots will be regulated specially by this office, with reference to the necessities of each case. Officers thereat will apply in all cases to the Quartermaster-General for authority to retain old employes or engage new ones. These applications will be made in accordance with the provisions of preceding section Numbers 13. in respect to the employment of agents by purchasing officers, and when forwarded by officers in the field, will come through the chief quartermaster of the army to which they are attached.

5th. No quartermaster serving with troops, or at a depot in the field, will be allowed to employ agents, and all authorities heretofore granted are revoked.

6th. No application should embrace the name of a civilian as clerk,