culpate one another and the Clerk from any collusion or participation in them except what they would have the committee and. the public believe were their rightful profits, in which they would have done well to have consulted the law and common sense; and the author of the report, seeming utterly confounded thereat, from his labored effort to explain the whole matter, never bethought himself of the legal view of the Clerk's responsibility, conjointly with the rest, for all of these infractions of the criminal law touching such agencies. The ordinary idea that great abuses are destined to cure themselves, will not apply to the inordinate craving for public plunder which has of late become so contagious at the seat of government. That is an exception to the rule. Once imbibed, it so contaminates every fibre of the human system, every moral restraint of the once virgin conscience, that the actual cautery, the branding iron itself, to the forehead would not expurgate it. The law therefore contemplates no other remedy for this felonious proclivity short of the practical, the physical restraint of that personal enlargement which admits the possibility of its continued indulgence. The fourth resolution says:

"Resolved, That negligence and inattention have been shown by the late Clerk in the execution of the resolution of July 7, 1856, and the act of March 8, 1857."

The testimony given before the committee, when published, will show whether this negligence and inattention of the late Clerk was not connected with the frauds jointly practiced by himself and his agent, H. Tyler, on the Treasury and individuals in their account, for their alleged purchase and supply of books alluded to only in general terms in this resolution. But the next resolution (the fifth and last) is more specific, and opens up everything that might be said under this head.

Moreover, after the repeated avowals of premeditated public plunder-for it can be called by no other name-as is plainly to be inferred from the testimony of several witnesses quoted from the report in the latter part of the preceding number, and specifically set forth by testimony otherwise adduced to the committee, in his boastful declaration to B. B. French, esq'r, that he "would make a great deal more than his salary and the percentage allowed by law," and his statement to O. H. Morrison, esq., that he "was entitled to all he could make from the perquisites of his office," which had no perquisites, and by his fraudulent purpose evinced throughout the testimony in the case laid before the accounting officers of the Treasury, as well as before the committee of investigation in the same documents-all taken into consideration with the zeal manifested by the Chairman of the Committee in hunting up negative testimony of exculpation, in the face of positive testimony of crimination, it is impossible to be

lieve that "such a man" as William Cullom, so determined in his purpose, did not avail himself of all these opportune occasions to accomplish his avowed intentions.

The fifth and last resolution runs thus:

"Resolved, That in the settlement of his accounts at the Treasury Department for the purchase and delivery of books to certain members of the 34th Congress, under the resolution of July 7, 1856, the Clerk certified to the purchase and delivery of two sets of books which were not, in fact, delivered, but money, in whole or in part, had been taken in lieu thereof: and a custom is proved to have previously existed of exchanging books for money; and in two instances of the receipts filed by the late Clerk, the money has been paid at the special instance of the members themselves.”

Here is an explicit declaration and exposure by the committee, of two instances impugning the veracity of the late Clerk, in certifying that he had delivered these books; and there may have been other instances, besides a third one, the Hon. John Williams, whose testimony is quoted below, inasmuch as all the twenty-one members do not appear to have been examined; but one only of those mentioned would have been sufficient to establish the embezzlement, to that extent, of the money avowed to have been divided by the Clerk, retaining part to his own use; though it is not presumable he could have done so with all the new members, nor even will all the twenty-one who signed receipts, as there must have been many who entertained other views on the subject. But it would appear from the testimony of Mr. Williams, that the plan of the Clerk was, to address to members-probably to all those entitled to the books-blank receipts for their signature without dates, and without the delivery of the books. In confirmation of such probability, it will suffice to quote the testimony of Mr. Williams from the said report of the committee, viz:

"Hon. John Williams, of New York, testifies in substance, that on the 5th of March, 1857, one of his colleagues undertook to procure for him his books, and to have them sent to him; that he signed a receipt at Willards' Hotel and enveloped it to the Clerk; made no examination of the receipt, and remembers nothing of its contents; finds the same receipt on file in the Treasury Department, dated July 15, 1856; had no interview or communication with the Clerk; gave no directions, and made no provisions for the freight of his books, and had not received them, but had been assured by the Clerk on the morning he gave his testimony, which was the first time he saw him, that the books were awaiting his orders. No money was received or proffered to be received by him."

Here is a full and positive disclosure of a receipt sent by the late Clerk to Mr. Williams for his signature, bearing a date nearly a year before it was signed, and placed on file in the treasury by Mr. Cullom, as a voucher for one set of books, amounting to over $1,000, as having been paid for to his agent H. Tyler, and delivered to Mr. Williams among the 21 members, according to a list certified by said Cullom. Mr. Williams' name is the second on that list, which is false in every aspect, according to the testi

mony of Mr. Williams and the avowal of the late Clerk; and the amount charged in his account for the books and placed to his credit at the treasury was a clear embezzlement to the extent of one set of the books. Whether these books were ever delivered afterwards, and the money repaid into the treasury after Mr. Williams' testimony, when neither had been done, is not material to the fact of falsifying the accounts for books and the certificate of their delivery, as in the two other instances. So much for the proposed review and comparison of the report and the resolutions appended to it.

The report, however, goes on to state under this head that the 1st Auditor, on the 3d of August, 1857, certifies that "the rates charged for the books in this account have been compared with prior accounts, and have in no case been found to exceed the prices heretofore paid for them." Grant it--but there was another question necessary to ascertain the equity and the honesty of the transaction between Mr. Cullom and his agent H. Tyler, viz: Whether Tyler, the agent, paid the prices for the books which he charged to Cullom, his principal? This question was propounded to Tyler at the treasury, and he declined to answer it. This refusal was an avowal that he speculated on his principal, which was an infraction of the law and treasury regulations, for which they are both amenable. See the law and regulations before quoted in No. 1.

The other portions of the said report of Mr. Maynard are obnoxious to similar objections, on account of the distortions of some facts and suppression of others in the same connection, as is evinced in the perverted use made of the testimony of Robert K. Elliott, for example, and on account of the omissions to notice. much of the most important testimony, such as that of Mr. Whittlesey, Mr. Rives, William F. Bayly, V. Blanchard, Wm. Pettibone, John Alexander, and many others. But nevertheless, the avowals of the report in regard to the conduct of William Cullom, and his agent, H. Tyler, towards Mr. Seaton and Mr. Tretler, and the exactions or extortions of the agent Tyler from each of them, as if insensible of their felonious character, are admissions of guilt, involving both principal and agent, that cannot always evade the scrutiny of the law, though temporarily hoodwinked by the artifices and special pleadings of a report of a committee; nor can the numerous other evidences of guilt here denuded be longer blinked by the same means.

But I will defer further comment thereon, until the testimony taken by the committee shall be printed by the public printer, when these comments will be rendered still more obvious, and the discrepancies noted will probably be much more numerous. R. MAYO,

For himself and other parties defrauded.

WASHINGTON, March 24, 1859.