g he "had been an absolute stranger
to it." The arrest was made, he repeated, without his "suggestion
or hint, direct or indirect." He declared that he "was as free
from all connection with it" as "the intimate friends and family
relatives of the prisoner." At the close of the debate Mr. McDougall
accepted Mr. Wilson's resolution as a substitute for his, and on
the 21st of April the latter was adopted by general consent.

SENATOR SUMNER AND GENERAL STONE.

The unfounded assumption of Mr. Sumner's connection with the arrest
sprang perhaps from some censorious remarks in the Senate made by
him in December touching General Stone's alleged course in sending
back fugitive slaves. Subsequent intelligence indicated that Mr.
Sumner had been misinformed on this matter, and that the facts did
not inculpate General Stone. But instead of writing to Mr. Sumner
to correct the statements made in his speech, General Stone, most
unwisely and most reprehensibly, addressed to the senator on the
23d of December an ill-tempered and abusive letter. Mr. Henry
Melville Parker of Massachusetts investigated all the facts and
incidents of the case, and came to the conclusion that Mr. Sumner,
as an act of revenge for the insolent letter, had caused General
Stone's arrest. But the facts do not warrant Mr. Parker's conclusion.
Aside from Mr. Sumner's public denial on the floor of the Senate--
which of itself closed the issue--he was never known to be guilty
of an act of revenge. That passion belongs to meaner natures.
The dates, moreover, remove the imputation of Mr. Parker. General
Stone's hasty and ill-considered letter was placed in Mr. Sumner's
hands on Christmas Day, 1861. The arrest was made on the 8th of
February, 1862--forty-six days later. The intervening circumstances
nowhere involve Mr. Sumner in the remotest degree.

In answer to the call upon the President for information, Mr.
Lincoln sent a message to the Senate on the 1st of May, saying,
"General Stone was arrested and imprisoned under my general authority,
and upon evidence which, whether he be guilty or innocent, required,
as appears to me, such proceedings to be had against him for the
public safety." The President deemed it "incompatible with the
public interest, and perhaps unjust to General Stone, to make a
more particular statement of the evidence." After saying that
General Stone had not been tried because the officers