required, and shall also furnish to them every accommodation and facility, including the service of clerks, for making a thorough examination, and shall give them all information required by them upon the subject thereof.

3. The Commission will commence its duties at New York, then adjourn to Philadelphia, Cincinnati, Saint Louis, and Louisville, successively in the order named, and will make a report to the Adjutant-General at the completion of the inspection of each depot.

By order of the Secretary of War:

E. D. TOWNSEND,

Assistant Adjutant-General.

CIRCULAR
WAR DEPT., PROV. March GENERAL'S OFFICE, Numbers 7.
Washington, D. C., March 22, 1865.

The attention of provost-marshals of this Bureau is called to the duty required of them by the proclamation of the President hereunto annexed. Special reports, setting forth all the facts, will be promptly made to this office of every arrest made under this order.

JAMES B. FRY,

Provost-Marshal-General.

DEPARTMENT OF STATE, Washington, March 14, 1865.

The President directs that all persons who now are or hereafter shall be found within the United States who have been engaged in holding intercourse or trade with the insurgents by sea, if they are citizens of the United States, or domiciled aliens, shall be arrested and held as prisoners of war until the war close; subject, nevertheless, to prosecution, trial, and conviction for any offense committed by them as spies, or otherwise, against the laws of war.

The President further directs that all non-resident foreigners who now are or hereafter shall be found in the United States, and who have been or shall have leave the Untied States within twelve days from the publication of this order, or from their subsequent arrival in the United States, if on the Atlantic side, and forty days if on the Pacific side of the country; and such persons shall not return to the United States during the continuance of the war.

Provost-marshals and marshals of the United States will arrest and commit to military custody all such offenders as shall disregard this order, whether they have passports or not, and they will be detained in such custody until the end of the war, or until discharged by subsequent orders of the President.

WILLIAM H. SEWARD,

Secretary of War.

COMMONWEALTH OF MASSACHUSETTS, EXECUTIVE DEPARTMENT, Boston, March 23, 1865.

To His Excellency ABRAHAM LINCOLN,

President of the United States, Washington, D. C.:

SIR: I have the honor to submit for your consideration some suggestions which have been forced upon my attention by the peculiar

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