AMONG the most despicable occupations that men engage in, that of camp follower holds a front rank. By plundering the dead, by the practice of extortion upon the living, by taking advantage of the license and reign of terror that follows in the wake of an army, the camp follower plunders the terrified people, not unfrequently claiming to be authorized by the commanders of the army, in order to be more successful in his rapine. Thus he seeks to enrich himself upon the misfortunes and terrors of others and at the expense of the reputation of armies and their commanders. More loathsome are such characters than the vultures that hover about the fields made red by human gore, to glut themselves upon the festering, swollen bodies of the dead. Yet more to be despised than the camp follower is that man who will attach himself to a religious association with a view of profiting in schemes of villainy; and when discovered in his crimes throws the responsibility of his evil doing upon the leaders of said association, claiming that his crimes have been taught to him as a part of his religion! Such men are wholesale character assassins, for by their deeds virtuous communities are brought into disrepute, and reproach is cast upon their religion. Some such characters had attached themselves to the Saints in Nauvoo and vicinity, and gave a coloring to the charges that were made against The Church, to the effect that the leaders thereof sanctioned stealing, so long as it was practiced on the Gentiles--those not belonging to The Church. Such were the rumors given out by some members of The Church engaged in this infamous business. On the eighteenth of November a nest of such vipers was uncovered at Ramus, near Nauvoo; and they were promptly excommunicated from The Church by the Apostles, who were holding a conference at the place on the date above mentioned. Both Joseph and Hyrum took advantage of the occasion to make affidavits before proper officers of the law to the effect that they had never given their sanction to such infamous doctrine as that attributed to them; [1] and the Twelve Apostles in an epistle to the public disavowed ever sanctioning the crime of theft. Hyrum in his affidavit says: I hereby disavow any sanction, or approbation by me of the crime of theft, or any other evil practice in any person or persons whatever, whereby either the lives or property of our fellow-men may be unlawfully taken or molested; neither are such doings sanctioned or approbated by the First Presidency or any other persons in authority or good standing in The Church, but such acts are altogether in violation of the rules, order and regulations of The Church, contrary to the teachings given in said Church, and the laws of both God and man. In a public declaration to which Joseph appended his affidavit, the Prophet said: