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teacher the small sum required, if the planters will only give him board.  Where this has been tried it has been rewarded by increased energy and permanence of labor.  Every encouragement the Bureau can afford will be given to those who will take this in hand.

Past marriages of freedmen, although often formally solemnized, have not been so authenticated that misconduct can be legally punished, or inheritance rightly determined.  It is most urgently and plainly needful that this outgrowth of a by-gone system should now cease.

A general re-marriage (for the sake of the record) of all persons married without license, or living together without marriage, should be insisted upon by employers and urged by all who have any connection with, or knowledge of, such persons.  They should know that, if ample facilities have been for some time afforded, they have not conformed to this necessity of social life, they will be prosecuted and punished.  And that facilities may be ample, all Probate Judges are respectfully requested to dispense with the customary bond, and to reduce the fee according to the situation of applicants.  Circumstances may also dictate a separate book of records.  These re-marriages should be, as far as possible, private;  certainly without festivities.

Where one of two parties to a contemplated marriage has been formally, or in fact, though not legally, married to a third person, who is still living, license should be refused unless the conduct or absence of the party last named has been such as to entitle the party contemplating marriage to complete divorce, in case the marriage had been legal.  This question, like that of consanguinity, should be investigated by the Probate Judge.

As to both Freedmen and Refugees, (destitute persons supplied with rations by the Government,) all humane and rightful means should be employed to prevent them crowding into cities and towns, where they will suffer from high rents, scarcity of fuel and infectious diseases.

For Freedmen a system has been established, and will be extended of "Colonies," or farms used as places of transit, where they can be kept and employed till work is found for them, and where all persons wanting labor are invited to apply.  To these places may be sent by Judicial Agents of this Bureau, all Freedmen found sleeping in streets, or in excessively crowded rooms, or who are otherwise committed as vagrants.

For refugees in view of the probable extent of destitution this winter, it is recommended to all city and county officers to procure farms where wood and water will be perfectly accessible, to which the issue of rations can be transferred, and where the able-bodied who now daily make oath that they cannot procure work, can be used to erect buildings for the comfortable shelter for the infirm and destitute.

These suggestions as far as they relate to freedmen only, can be most effectively used by the intelligent and influential of that class, and to them they are especially directed.  But the press and all persons interested in a class whose numbers make their welfare inseparable from that of the community, are involved to aid in giving them prevalence and effect.

WAGER SWAYNE,
Brig. General and Assistant Commissioner.

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