DEAR MADAM: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 2d inst., with the papers enclosed. The petition to the Legislature will be presented by the senator from this county and I will apprise you of the action had upon it. My daughters are obliged to you for the interest you take in them. To a certain extent I agree with you as to the duties of woman. I am greatly in favor of her elevation to her proper sphere as the equal of man as to her civil rights, the security of her person, the right to her property and, where there is a separation after marriage, her equal right with the father to the custody and education of the children. All this as a legislator I have endeavored to accomplish, making large innovations upon the ancient common law. If I differ from you as to her political rights, it is because I think that, from political as well as moral considerations, she is unfit for, indeed incapacitated from, the performance of most of the duties which are now performed by men as members of the body politic; but there are many avocations and professions now exclusively occupied by men which women are as well, perhaps better fitted to fill. I hope these will soon be thrown open to an active competition of both sexes. Then came the raid on Harper's Ferry and all its terrible consequences, and in December Judge Ormond wrote again: MADAM: In redemption of my promise to tell you the fate of the woman's rights petition to our Legislature, I have the honor to inform you that it was virtually rejected, being laid on the table. I interested a distinguished member of our Senate in its presentation and, in addition, wrote a letter which under ordinary circumstances would have insured its respectful consideration. But after your petition was forwarded came the treasonable and murderous invasion of John Brown. The atrocity of this act, countenanced as it manifestly was by a great party at the North, has extinguished our last spark of fraternal feeling. Whilst we are all living under a Constitution which secures to us our right to our slaves, the results of which are in truth more beneficial to the whole North, and especially to the New England States, than to us, you are secretly plotting murderous inroads into our peaceful country and endeavoring to incite our slaves to cut the throats of our wives and children. Can you believe that this state of things can last? We now look upon you as our worst enemies and are ready to separate from you. Measures are in progress as far as practicable to establish non-intercourse with you and to proscribe all articles of northern manufacture or origin, including New England teachers. We can live without you; it remains to be seen how you will get along without us. You will probably find that