In answer to the resolution of the House of Representatives of the 3d of February last, requesting the President “to require a competent, experienced military officer of the United States to execute the duties of an Indian agent so far as to repair to the Red Cloud Agency, and, in his discretion, other Sioux agencies, with instructions to inquire into the causes of” the exhaustion of the appropriation for the subsistence and support of the Sioux Indians for the present fiscal year; “as also his opinion as to whether any further and what amount should be appropriated for the subsistence and support of said Indians for the remainder of the current fiscal year,” I have the honor to transmit herewith the report of Lieutenant-Colonel Merritt, of the Ninth Cavalry, who was charged by the Secretary of War with the duty of making the inquiries called for by said resolution.

U.S.  GRANT.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, March 24, 1876.

To the Senate of the United States: 

In further answer to the resolution of the Senate of the 7th of January last, requesting to be furnished “with a statement of the number of military arrests made in the Territory of Alaska during the past five years, together with the date of each, the charge on which made in each case, the names of the persons arrested, and the period and character of the imprisonment of each in that Territory before trial or surrender to the civil authorities for trial,” I have the honor to transmit herewith the report of the Secretary of War.

U.S.  GRANT.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, March 27, 1876.

To the House of Representatives: 

In further answer to the resolution of the House of the 6th of January last, with regard to certain expenditures and employees in the Indian service, except those on duty in the office of the Secretary of the Interior, etc., I have the honor to transmit to you a supplementary report received from the Secretary of the Interior, respecting and explaining a clerical error to be found in that portion of the statement of the Interior Department which relates to the expenditures of the Board of Indian Commissioners, and to ask its consideration in connection with the papers which accompanied my message of the 3d of February last.

U.S.  GRANT.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, March 27, 1876.

To the House of Representatives: 

I have the honor to transmit herewith a communication received from the chairman of the board on behalf of the United States Executive Departments, containing in detail the operations of the board and setting forth the present embarrassments under which it is now laboring in the endeavor to conduct the participation of the Government in the Centennial Exhibition, and showing very clearly the necessity of additional funds to carry out the undertaking in a creditable manner.

U.S.  GRANT.