appropriate money to pay for them, and for their transportation to Africa, could its authority for that course be obtained, or for any other disposition of them_, WOULD OCCASION GREAT AND EXTENSIVE EXCITEMENT. Such a relation assumed by the United States, for however laudable an object, would, it appears probable, place the country in no enviable attitude, especially at this juncture, when the _public mind here and elsewhere it so sensitive upon the subject of slavery_. The alternative would seem to be, to deliver the negroes to the Creeks, as originally agreed on. The subject involves so many delicate considerations, that I respectfully invite your attention to it, and your direction as to the answer to be given to the delegation now in the city. As early a decision of this question as practicable, is very desirable: the Indians intending to leave this place in four or five days, and being anxious that this matter should be disposed of before they go. "Very respectfully, Your most obedient servant, C. A. HARRIS, _Commissioner_. Captain S. COOPER, Acting Sec'y of War." "P. S.--If it should be determined to deliver them to the Creeks, I would suggest, as the opinion of this office, that it would be _impolitic for them to be taken to the country West_, and that so far as the Department may of right interfere in regard to the ultimate disposition, _it should endeavor to have it effected_ IN SOME OTHER MODE. C. A. H." It is no part of our duty to comment on these proceedings; yet we are constrained to say, that no historian has, or can explain the reason of delay on the part of the Creek Indians, in regard to their claim to these people, for more than an entire year, upon any principles of consistent action. General Jessup said, in his official communications, they _had received their pay_, and that "the negroes _were the property of the Government_;" and the Department had approved his whole course on this subject. The Creeks, so far as we can learn, left the country and went West, perfectly satisfied. This Delegation had been some months in Washington, and, as the Commissioner of Indian Affairs says, were to leave in four or five days; when, for the first time, they mentioned the subject, although the negroes had been detained from them, as they allege, in direct violation of their contract. They appear to have rested satisfied until difficulties from other quarters were presented to the Administration. And these letters may all easily be explained, as the carrying out of a previous understanding between these officers and the Creek Indians. However that may be, the Commissioner of Indian Affairs wrote Captain Armstrong, Superintendent of the Western Territory, as follows: "WAR DEPARTMENT, "_Office of Indian Affairs_, May 5, 1838.