unadjusted and a war of several years’ continuance with the savage tribes of Florida still prevailed, attended with the desolation of a large portion of that beautiful Territory and with the sacrifice of many valuable lives.  To increase the embarrassments of the Government, individual and State credit had been nearly stricken down and confidence in the General Government was so much impaired that loans of a small amount could only be negotiated at a considerable sacrifice.  As a necessary consequence of the blight which had fallen on commerce and mechanical industry, the ships of the one were thrown out of employment and the operations of the other had been greatly diminished.  Owing to the condition of the currency, exchanges between different parts of the country had become ruinously high and trade had to depend on a depreciated paper currency in conducting its transactions.  I shall be permitted to congratulate the country that under an overruling Providence peace was preserved without a sacrifice of the national honor; the war in Florida was brought to a speedy termination; a large portion of the claims on Mexico have been fully adjudicated and are in a course of payment, while justice has been rendered to us in other matters by other nations; confidence between man and man is in a great measure restored and the credit of this Government fully and perfectly reestablished; commerce is becoming more and more extended in its operations and manufacturing and mechanical industry once more reap the rewards of skill and labor honestly applied; the operations of trade rest on a sound currency and the rates of exchange are reduced to their lowest amount.

In this condition of things I have felt it to be my duty to bring to your favorable consideration matters of great interest in their present and ultimate results; and the only desire which I feel in connection with the future is and will continue to be to leave the country prosperous and its institutions unimpaired.

JOHN TYLER.

SPECIAL MESSAGES.

CITY OF WASHINGTON, December 8, 1843.

To the House of Representatives of the United States: 

I transmit herewith a report from the Secretary of the Treasury, exhibiting certain transfers of appropriations which have been made in that Department in pursuance of the power vested in the President of the United States by the act of Congress of the 3d March, 1809, entitled “An act further to amend the several acts for the establishment and regulation of the Treasury, War, and Navy Departments.”

JOHN TYLER.

WASHINGTON, December 12, 1843.

To the Senate of the United States: 

I transmit herewith to the Senate, for their consideration in reference to its ratification, a convention for the surrender of criminals between the United States of America and His Majesty the King of the French, signed at this place on the 9th day of November last by the Secretary of State and the minister plenipotentiary ad interim from the French Government to the United States.