To this Col. Sumner had appended the following note: "The proclamation of the President and the orders under it require me to sustain the Executive of the Territory in executing the laws and preserving the peace. I therefore hereby announce that I shall maintain the proclamation at all hazards." This act of Marshal Donaldson was fiercely denounced as an impertinent intermedding with other men's business. The general drift of the reasoning was as follows: "Our act in framing a constitution and in electing a legislature is not treasonable nor revolutionary. There is no law against it: consequently we are breaking no law. It is, moreover, something that has to be done at some time by the majority of the citizens of this Territory, and we hope to be able to convince Congress and the President that we are that majority. If we had undertaken to set in operation a government in contravention to the one now recognized by the President, then might there have been some apology for this interference; but we have done nothing of the kind." The writer will say to the reader that Gov. Walker, an ex-Senator from Mississippi, and the ablest Governor Kansas ever had, admitted afterwards that this reasoning of the Kansas squatters was perfectly correct. But however this might be, here was a patent fact. Here was Col. Sumner with his United States dragoons, and he was a man to obey orders; and what were we going to do about it? Should we fight, or should we not fight? The writer submitted the following resolution: _Resolved_, That this Convention expresses its determination not to resist the United States troops. The resolution was carried, and a committee was sent to Col. Sumner to inform him of its adoption. His answer was one to draw the hearts of the people to himself: "I knew," said he, "that you were loyal to the old flag." Our readers will be incredulous that such a resolution should be needed, or that there should be any division of sentiment as touching its adoption. It is for this reason we call this incident up. It is that the reader may understand how strained was the state of feeling of many of the Free State men. They had spent the past months fighting, and they, in their own minds, associated the United States troops with the oppressors of Kansas Free State men. When Mr. Sumner went into the Legislative hall to disperse the Legislature, he spoke as tenderly as a woman. He said: "Gentlemen, this is the most painful act of my life But I must obey orders, and you must disperse." When he wheeled his dragoons to march away the boys cheered Col. Sumner. They cheered the old flag and the United States soldiers, but they gave such groans for the Lecompton Legislature as, it was said, frightened the dragoons' horses. There was now no further cause that the writer should tarry longer, and he immediately mounted his horse and rode towards home, with a heart heavy with the thought of all the distempers that had come on unhappy Kansas. CHAPTER XVII.