Two hundred and odd more political prisoners are on their way.

I would be more full in my communication if I had time.  Yours truly,

RobertOULD, Commissioner of Exchange.

To Brigadier general John H. Winder.

But, supposing that our Government, for good military reasons, or for no reason at all, declined to exchange prisoners, what possible excuse is that for slaughtering them by exquisite tortures?  Every Government has ap unquestioned right to decline exchanging when its military policy suggests such a course; and such declination conveys no right whatever to the enemy to slay those prisoners, either outright with the edge of the sword, or more slowly by inhuman treatment.  The Rebels’ attempts to justify their conduct, by the claim that our Government refused to accede to their wishes in a certain respect, is too preposterous to be made or listened to by intelligent men.

The whole affair is simply inexcusable, and stands out a foul blot on the memory of every Rebel in high place in the Confederate Government.

“Vengeance is mine,” saith the Lord, and by Him must this great crime be avenged, if it ever is avenged.  It certainly transcends all human power.  I have seen little indication of any Divine interposition to mete out, at least on this earth, adequate punishment to those who were the principal agents in that iniquity.  Howell Cobb died as peacefully in his bed as any Christian in the land, and with as few apparent twinges of remorse as if he had spent his life in good deeds and prayer.  The arch-fiend Winder died in equal tranquility, murmuring some cheerful hope as to his soul’s future.  Not one of the ghosts of his hunger-slain hovered around to embitter his dying moments, as he had theirs.  Jefferson Davis “still lives, a prosperous gentleman,” the idol of a large circle of adherents, the recipient of real estate favors from elderly females of morbid sympathies, and a man whose mouth is full of plaints of his wrongs, and misappreciation.  The rest of the leading conspirators have either departed this life in the odor of sanctity, surrounded by sorrowing friends, or are gliding serenely down the mellow autumnal vale of a benign old age.

Only Wirz—­small, insignificant, miserable Wirz, the underling, the tool, the servile, brainless, little fetcher-and-carrier of these men, was punished—­was hanged, and upon the narrow shoulders of this pitiful scapegoat was packed the entire sin of Jefferson Davis and his crew.  What a farce!

A petty little Captain made to expiate the crimes of Generals, Cabinet Officers, and a President.  How absurd!