So rapidly did the saints gather to Zion during this summer that the _Star_ for November reported eight hundred and thirty souls in the new settlements. The Lord had blessed them both with food and with raiment, and there was plenty in Zion. A feeling of insubordination, however, existed among the brethren of the priesthood. Seven high priests had been appointed to preside over the affairs of The Church in Zion, viz., Oliver Cowdery, W. W. Phelps, John Whitmer, Sidney Gilbert, Edward Partridge, Isaac Morley and John Corrill. These brethren, with the common consent of the several branches comprising The Church in Missouri, were to appoint elders to preside over the respective branches, and attend to all the affairs of The Church in that land. But a number of those high priests and elders who went up to Zion, ignored the authority of the seven who were placed there to preside, and began setting some of the branches in order without being appointed to do so; and it resulted in some confusion. Others who went there sought to obtain inheritances in some other way than according to the laws of consecration and stewardship; and these things, together with jealousies, covetousness, light-mindedness, unbelief, and general neglect to keep the commandments of God, enkindled the displeasure of the Almighty against Zion and her inhabitants. This state of affairs coming to the knowledge of the Prophet Joseph, through his correspondence with the leading elders in Zion, he wrote a letter to the saints in Missouri, severely reproving them for their neglect to keep the commandments of God; and as the communication is full of prophecy of those calamities which eventually befell the Church, I quote it entire: KIRTLAND, January 11, 1833. _Brother Wm. W. Phelps:_