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Societies and individuals in behalf of those places. [And here I must be indulged in a personal remark, Viz: In Virginia, where Mr Ayer is known, particularly in the Bureau, where he is best known (ask Genl Armstrong or Genl Brown) his statements, unsupported by other testimony, would not be able to bring an Officer's conduct under suspicion. His habitual drunkenness, of which Genl Brown was obliged often to take official notice, and his bringing charges of speculation against such men as Genl Armstrong without the shadow of evidence, show, at least, that he is not a conscientious and careful witness.] 

I proceed. In August last I called at office of Phil. Friends Freedmen's Asscn [[checkmark]] in Philadelphia, in behalf of the schools at Yorktown and Magruder, and learned that they had determined to withdraw from Magruder, as they had previously done from Yorktown, in favor of the American Miss: Assc'n, and that they might concentrate their operations in another part of the State. I then called on Rev. E. P. Smith, [[checkmark]] Field Agt, of the American Miss: Ass'n, at his office in New York, to urge him to provide for both those places, particularly as they are immediately contiguous to their Hamp'n Schools, and as other Societies had withdrawn. Mr. Smith was not able to give a    

Transcription Notes:
I think writer (or later reader) of original document uses [square brackets] to start his parenthetical remarks, and then (parentheses) within them -- Beth