Viewing page 221 of 271

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

have performed their duties well and faithfully. A portion of these supplies has been diverted from their purpose and destination by having been seized by carriers to pay expenses of transportation. This portion was small and the trouble arose from misunderstanding or deficiency of arrangements in providing for transportation of supplies which has perhaps, since been remedied. 
The general condition of the Freedmen is , I believe, gradually improving. The many false and delusive notions by which they have been misled since their emancipation and which were almost irreparable from their new condition are gradually, but surely, giving way to clearer ideas of their true position and its real requirements. Complaints of wrong and injustice from both black and white, though still frequent, are somewhat decreasing. As far as the labor question is concerned, the general experience of this office is, that the freedmen will work and are willing and anxious to work where they are fairly treated and honestly paid. It is not believed that those employers who have faithfully fulfilled their contracts and agreements with freedmen have experienced any difficulty in obtaining labor, or have great complaint to make of their violating their contracts. It is also observable that the strongest and most pertinacious complaints have come from those who have not yet learned the necessity of justice in their own acts, before they hold the freedmen to rigid responsibility to the letters of contracts carefully devised in their own interests. It has been