A word more in reference to so extraordinary a character may not be amiss. Many months afterwards he had the brass to come to me again. Without any allusion to our relations in the past, he at once went on to say, that General Schofield by a military order had taken away the firearms of all in his neighborhood, and among the rest his shotgun had been seized and confiscated; that wild turkeys were coming into his cornfield, and he wished me to ask the general to grant him a permit to buy a shotgun so that he might shoot them. Making no allusion to what I had done for him in 1861, I asked him, “Are you a Union man?” He replied, “Yes, in the Constitution.” “Why,” I said, “do you say in the Constitution? Why do you not say, yes, I am a Union man?” “Well,” he answered, “the fact is, I am a secessionist.” “Why,” said I, “did you not then honestly say so?” “Oh! I don’t want to talk about that,” he responded, “I want to get a shotgun.” I then said to him, “I will ask the general to grant you a permit to get one on the condition that, if Missouri becomes a free State, you will leave it forever.” He said that he would gladly agree to that since he would not live in a free State. So I went with him to the military headquarters and said to the general: “This is Rev. Mr. ——, a Baptist minister; under your order his shotgun was taken away from him. The wild turkeys are coming into his cornfield and he has nothing to shoot them with. I cannot vouch for his loyalty, but I feel quite sure that if he has a shotgun he will not shoot black-Republicans, and he wishes you to give him a permit to buy one.” The general replied, “I will grant the permit, if you say so.” “Well,” I responded, “I think it safe to do so;” and writing out the permit he handed it to the secession preacher, who went away happy. I never saw him again. A friend told me that a few months afterwards he heard him bitterly denounce me in a large public assembly.