necessity at times shift its tactics and its instruments, as the exigency demands. Its solemn and imperative duty is to look every issue, however grave and transcendent, firmly in the face; and having ascertained upon mature and conscientious reflection what is necessary to suppress the Rebellion, it must then proceed with inexorable purpose to inflict the blows where Rebellion is the weakest and under which it must inevitably fall. On the 30th of July, General Butler, being still unprovided with adequate instructions,--the number of contrabands having now reached nine hundred,--applied to the War Department for further directions. His inquiries, inspired by good sense and humanity alike, were of the most fundamental character, and when they shall have received a full answer the war will be near its end. Assuming the slaves to have been the property of masters, he considers them waifs abandoned by their owners, in which the Government as a finder cannot, however, acquire a proprietary interest, and they have therefore reverted to the normal condition of those made in God's image, "if not free-born, yet free-manumitted, sent forth from the hand that held them, never to return." The author of that document may never win a victor's laurels on any renowned field, but, depositing it in the archives of the Government, he leaves a record in history which will outlast the traditions of battle or siege. It is proper to add, that the answer of the War Department, so far as its meaning is clear, leaves the General uninstructed as to all slaves not confiscated by the Act of Congress. The documentary history being now completed, the personal narrative of affairs at Fortress Monroe is resumed.