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to take receipt of payments made to such men. I remained at the Agency, being then without transportation, and sought by all the methods in my power to allay the distrust and ill feeling of the Indians, but at the same time to convince them the work must proceed. The men whom Mr Briggs thus picked up to help him on the reservation lines, I did not see, and I knew I could not find them, to have them sign the regular Receipt Roll, as some of them were men en route to the mines. All of those men had to be paid at once for their transient services and at that time I supposed that only those who could be paid on the Receipt Roll should appear on the Monthly Report. The emergency of the situation rendered it impractical and impossible for me to secure the signatures of the men on the Receipt Roll, and my lack of familiarity with forms of the Service concerning Irregular Employees and for the requirements of Sections 249, & 245 had entirely escaped my memory & prevented its occurring to me to report these men on the regular blank with the Surveyer and my Driver & Interpreter, and for the same cause I omitted to enumerate