The cause of the recent outbreak cannot, perhaps, be absolutely determined; the manner of its beginning is more easily traced. It must be understood that, for the purpose of receiving their annuities, the Indians, at a certain period every summer, come down from their hunting grounds to the two Agencies, one at Redwood, near Fort Ridgely, and the other at Yellow Medicine. It is the custom to keep a certain quantity of provisions at these Agencies to feed them during these visits, and also to sometimes send them supplies during times of great want and scarcity of game in winter. Unfortunately, they came last year much earlier than common, and before they had received their usual notification from the Agent, that the annuities were awaiting them. In addition, as if all the accidents were destined to be adverse, the session of Congress was very long, the Appropriation Bill, which included the Indian appropriations, did not pass until the day before the adjournment, and the immense pressure of business on the Departments, and the great difficulty of obtaining coin, all occasioned long and unusual delays. The coin, $71,000 in silver (Indians understand silver coin, and will scarcely take any other), was finally shipped by express from the sub-treasury in New York city, on the 12th of August, reached St. Paul on the 16th, and was immediately despatched by private conveyance to Yellow Medicine, via Fort Ridgely, at which latter place it arrived on the 18th. The Indians came down to the Agency at Yellow Medicine about the middle of July, to the number of four thousand, men, women, and children. Here they remained in waiting some three weeks. Provisions, in small quantities, were given to them, but for so large a number of mouths the rations were scanty. This supply, with the few wild ducks and pigeons which they could shoot from time to time, the little flour they were able to buy on credit from the trading houses, and the half-grown potatoes they stole from the fields, enabled them to eke out a scanty subsistence.