f the 10th, and had intended answering it
according to your request; but, after I got home, I got your
dispatch of yesterday, announcing that the order I dreaded so much
was issued. I never felt so troubled in my life. Were it an order
to go to Sitka, to the devil, to battle with rebels or Indians, I
think you would not hear a whimper from me, but it comes in such a
questionable form that, like Hamlet's ghost, it curdles my blood
and mars my judgment. My first thoughts were of resignation, and I
had almost made up my mind to ask Dodge for some place on the
Pacific road, or on one of the Iowa roads, and then again various
colleges ran through my memory, but hard times and an expensive
family have brought me back to staring the proposition square in
the face, and I have just written a letter to the President, which
I herewith transmit through you, on which I will hang a hope of
respite till you telegraph me its effect. The uncertainties ahead
are too great to warrant my incurring the expense of breaking up my
house and family here, and therefore in no event will I do this
till I can be assured of some permanence elsewhere. If it were at
all certain that you would accept the nomination of President in
May, I would try and kill the intervening time, and then judge of
the chances, but I do not want you to reveal your plans to me till
you choose to do so.

I have telegraphed to John Sherman to oppose the nomination which
the papers announce has been made of me for brevet general.

I have this minute received your cipher dispatch of to-day, which I
have just answered and sent down to the telegraph-office, and the
clerk is just engaged in copying my letter to the President to go
with this. If the President or his friends pretend that I seek to
go to Washington, it will be fully rebutted by letters I have
written to the President, to you, to John Sherman, to Mr. Ewing,
and to Mr. Stanbery. You remember that in our last talk you
suggested I should write again to the President. I thought of it,
and concluded my letter of January 31st, already delivered, was
full and emphatic. Still, I did write again to Mr. Stanbery,
asking him as a friend to interpose in my behalf. There are plenty
of people who know my wishes, and I would avoid, if possible, the
publication of a letter so confidential as that of January 31st, in
which I notice I allude to the President's purpose of removing Mr.
Stanton by force, a fact that ought no