The noticeable point here is that our sailors had been tried before the 22d of October, and that the trial resulted in their acquittal and return to their vessel.  It is quite remarkable and quite characteristic of the management of this affair by the Chilean police authorities that we should now be advised that Seaman Davidson, of the Baltimore, has been included in the indictment, his offense being, so far as I have been able to ascertain, that he attempted to defend a shipmate against an assailant who was striking at him with a knife.  The perfect vindication of our men is furnished by this report.  One only is found to have been guilty of criminal fault, and that for an act clearly justifiable.

As to the part taken by the police in the affair, the case made by Chile is also far from satisfactory.  The point where Riggin was killed is only three minutes’ walk from the police station, and not more than twice that distance from the intendencia; and yet according to their official report a full half hour elapsed after the assault began before the police were upon the ground.  It has been stated that all but two of our men have said that the police did their duty.  The evidence taken at Mare Island shows that if such a statement was procured from our men it was accomplished by requiring them to sign a writing in a language they did not understand and by the representation that it was a mere declaration that they had taken no part in the disturbance.  Lieutenant McCrea, who acted as interpreter, says in his evidence that when our sailors were examined before the court the subject of the conduct of the police was so carefully avoided that he reported the fact to Captain Schley on his return, to the vessel.

The evidences of the existence of animosity toward our sailors in the minds of the sailors of the Chilean navy and of the populace of Valparaiso are so abundant and various as to leave no doubt in the mind of anyone who will examine the papers submitted.  It manifested itself in threatening and insulting gestures toward our men as they passed the Chilean men-of-war in their boats and in the derisive and abusive epithets with which they greeted every appearance of an American sailor on the evening of the riot.  Captain Schley reports that boats from the Chilean war ships several times went out of their course to cross the bows of his boats, compelling them to back water.  He complained of the discourtesy, and it was corrected.  That this feeling was shared by men of higher rank is shown by an incident related by Surgeon Stitt, of the Baltimore.  After the battle of Placilla he, with other medical officers of the war vessels in the harbor, was giving voluntary assistance to the wounded in the hospitals.  The son of a Chilean army officer of high rank was under his care, and when the father discovered it he flew into a passion and said he would rather have his son die than have Americans touch him, and at