Taylor.

Here let us pause a moment, to reflect on the utter atrocity and profligacy of a design which the Secretary of War ostentatiously parades before the woi-ld. Admit- ting the truth of the ridiculous rumors said to have reached Fremont, it is very evident, that he was perfectly confident that the combined strength of his own party and that of the American settlers, was abundantly suffi- cient for their own protection, since he relied on it to overturn the Mexican authority and to establish an inde- pendent Government. He, a commissioned officer of the United States, without any known authority from his own Government abandons the object of his mission, and returns from Oregon into CaUfornia, for the express purpose of organizing a rebellion and wresting from Mexico with whom we were at peace, an " extensive department." It is certainly a remarkable coincidence, that while we had a squadron off the ports of California with orders to seize them at a moment's warning, Captain Fremont was opportunely exciting rebellion and a civil war in the interior. The Secretary himself foolishly puts the stamp of iniquity upon this adventure by declaring, *' it was on the 6th of June, and before the commencement of the war between the United States and Mexico could have been hiown^ that this resolution was taken, and by the 5th July it was carried into effect by a series of rapid attacks by a small body of adventurous men under the conduct of an intrepid leader." We are told that on the 11th June, a convoy of two hundred horses for Castro's camp with an officer and fourteen men, were surprised and captured by twelve of Fremont's party. On the loth, the miUtary post of Sanoma was also surprised and taken, with nine brass cannon, two hundred and fifty stand of muskets, and several officers and some men, with munitions of war.