not supposed to be favorable to the enterprise, and who, during the political contest of 1860, had been the chairman of the National Breckinridge Committee.  But such was his honor as a gentleman, and his sense of the duty of subordination to the wishes of the Government, that his personal courtesies and official aid were never wanting.  He received his mortal wound at Chantilly, Virginia, on the first of September following, and a braver and abler officer has not fallen in the service.

Notwithstanding our work was commenced six weeks too late, and other hindrances occurred, detailed in the second report of the agent, some eight thousand acres of esculents,—­a fair supply of food,—­and some four thousand five hundred acres of cotton (after a deduction for over-estimates) were planted.  This was done upon one hundred and eighty-nine plantations, on which were nine thousand and fifty people, of whom four thousand four hundred and twenty-nine were field-hands, made up of men, women, and children, and equivalent, in the usual classification and estimate of the productive capacity of laborers, to three thousand eight hundred and five and one-half full hands.  The cotton-crop produced will not exceed sixty-five thousand pounds of ginned cotton.  Work enough was done to have produced five hundred thousand pounds in ordinary times; but the immaturity of the pod, resulting from the lateness of the planting, exposed it to the ravages of the frost and the worm.  Troops being ordered North, after the disasters of the Peninsular campaign, Edisto was evacuated in the middle of July, and thus one thousand acres of esculents, and nearly seven hundred acres of cotton, the cultivation of which had been finished, were abandoned.  In the autumn, Major-General Mitchell required forty tons of corn-fodder and seventy-eight thousand pounds of corn in the ear, for army-forage.  These are but some of the adverse influences to which the agricultural operations were subjected.

It is fitting here that I should bear my testimony to the superintendents and teachers commissioned by the associations.  There was as high a purpose and devotion among them as in any colony that ever went forth to bear the evangel of civilization.  Among them were some of the choicest young men of New England, fresh from Harvard, Yale, and Brown, from the divinity-schools of Andover and Cambridge,—­men of practical talent and experience.  There were some of whom the world was scarce worthy, and to whom, whether they are among the living or the dead, I delight to pay the tribute of my respect and admiration.

Four of the original delegation have died.  William S. Clark died at Boston, April 25th, 1863, a consumptive when he entered on the work, which he was obliged to leave six months before his death.  He was a faithful and conscientious teacher.  Though so many months had passed since he left these labors, their fascination was such that he dwelt fondly upon them in his last days.