redit on the 1st of December, in New York, but
intelligence of it reached Oregon too late to carry out any attempt to
corrupt a Republican Elector.

As nothing had been known of these extraordinary facts when Mr. Potter
moved for the appointment of his investigating committee, the House of
Representatives, on the 20th of January, 1879, directed that committee
to investigate the cipher telegrams. Before this committee the
genuineness of the telegrams and the correctness of the translation
by the _Tribune_ were abundantly established. Some of the principal
persons connected with them appeared before the committee to explain
and to excuse. Senator Kelly had previously stated that he endorsed
Mr. Patrick's dispatch without knowing its contents, a statement
probable in itself and sustained by Mr. Kelly's good reputation. Mr.
Marble swore that he transmitted to headquarters information of the
opportunities for corruption merely "as danger signals." Mr. Weed
admitted and tried to justify his efforts to bribe the South Carolina
Canvassing Board. Mr. Pelton admitted all his attempts and took upon
himself the full responsibility, saying that if money became actually
necessary, he intended to call for it upon Mr. Edward Cooper and the
members of the National Democratic Committee. Mr. Cooper swore that he
first knew that Mr. Pelton was conducting such negotiations when he
went to Baltimore; and that when on the next day he received from Mr.
Pelton a cipher telegram requesting that the $80,000 should be sent to
him at Baltimore, he informed Mr. Tilden what Pelton was doing,
whereupon he was recalled and "the thing was stopped." Under
cross-examination by Mr. Reed of Maine, Mr. Tilden swore that he knew
nothing of any of the telegrams; that the first he knew of the Florida
transactions was when they were mentioned to him by Mr. Marble after
his return from Florida; that he was informed by Mr. Cooper of the
South Carolina negotiations and stopped them; that he scorned to
defend his title by such means as were employed to acquire a felonious
possession. Neither Mr. Patrick nor Mr. Woolley appeared before the
committee.

Two general conclusions may safely be drawn from the voluminous
evidence: _first_, that the Democratic agents in the contested States
of Florida, South Carolina, and Oregon earnestly and persistently
endeavored to change the result from Hayes to Tilden by the use of
large sums of money as bribes to official p