several subjects desired by gentlemen to be embraced in amendments to the ninth section of the act of the last session of Congress. The first amendment declared by members of this House, had for its only object to give bounty lands to such persons as had served for a time as privates, but had never been discharged as such, because promoted to office. That subject, and no other, was embraced in this bill. There were some others who desired, while they were legislating on this subject, that they should also give bounty lands to the volunteers of the war of 1812. His friend from Maryland said there were no such men. He (Mr. L.) did not say there were many, but he was very confident there were some. His friend from Kentucky, near him, (Mr. Gaines), told him he himself was one.

"There was still another proposition touching this matter; that was, that persons entitled to bounty land, should, by law, be entitled to locate those lands in parcels, and not be required to locate them in one body, as was provided by the existing law.

"Now he had carefully drawn up a bill embracing these three separate propositions, which he intended to propose as a substitute for all these bills in the House, or in Committee of the Whole on the State of the Union, at some suitable time. If there was a disposition on the part of the House to act at once on this separate proposition, he repeated that, with the gentleman from Arkansas, he should prefer it, lest they should lose all. But if there was to be a reference, he desired to introduce his Bill embracing the three propositions, thus enabling the Committee and the House to act at the same time, whether favorably or unfavorably upon all."

TEXAS VOLUNTEERS.

MAY 4, 1848.

MR. LINCOLN said, "The objection started by the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Hall), struck him as being a sound one; and he wished to ascertain if there was any thing further to be learned about this claim, for he desired fully to understand it. He understood that the volunteers who served in Mexico were not by any general law entitled to pay for lost horses, and he understood that if this resolution should pass, the Texas volunteers would be entitled to compensation for lost horses. Thus they would be placed in more favorable circumstances than others."

Mr. Lincoln also said, "The payment for these lost horses came within a class of cases in which he was a good deal like a gentleman near him, who was in favor of paying for everything by way of being sure of paying all those that were right. But if this resolution should be passed, and the general law should fail, then everybody but these Texas volunteers would go without their compensation. He was not willing to do any thing that would produce such a result. He preferred placing the Texas volunteers on a level with all other volunteers, and therefore, he should vote for the reconsideration."

Lincoln's penetration and acumen are apparent in the following terse remarks, which are so lucid and compre hensive that they require no explanation.

VIRGINIA COURTS.

JUNE 28, 1848.

MR. LINCOLN said, "He felt unwilling to be either unjust or ungenerous, and he wanted to understand the real case of this Judicial officer. The gentleman from Virginia had stated that he had to hold eleven courts. Now, everybody knew that it was not the habit of the district Judges of the United States in other states to hold any thing like that number of courts; and he therefore took it for granted that this must happen under a peculiar law, which required that a large number of courts be holden every year; and these laws he further supposed were passed at the request of the people of that Judicial District. It came, then, to this: that the people in the Western District of Virginia had got eleven Courts to be held among them in one year, for their own accommodation; and being thus better accommodated than their neighbors elsewhere, they wanted their Judge to be a little better paid. In Illinois, there had been, until the present season, but one District Court held in the year. There were now to be two. Could it be that the Western District of Virginia furnished more business for a Judge than the whole State of Illinois."

The following views on the price of public lands seem eminently just, and are interesting, as coming from one who may hereafter be very influential in administering laws similar to that which he here discusses.

THE PUBLIC LANDS.

MAY 11, 1848.

MR. LINCOLN moved to reconsider the vote by which the bill was passed. He stated to the House that he had made this motion for the purpose of obtaining an opportunity to say a few words in relation to a point raised in the course of the debate on this bill, which he would now proceed to make, if in order. The point in the case to which he referred, arose on the amendment that was submitted by the gentleman from Vermont (Mr. Collamer), in Committee of the Whole on the State of the Union, and which was afterwards renewed in the House, in relation to the question whether the reserved sections, which, by some bills heretofore passed, by which an appropriation of land had been made to Wisconsin, had been enhanced in value, should be reduced to the minimum price of the public lands. The question of the reduction in value of those sections was, to him, at this time, a matter very nearly of indifference. He was inclined to desire that Wisconsin should be obliged by having it reduced. But the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. C. B. Smith), the Chairman of the Committee on the Territories, yesterday associated that question with the general question, which is now, to some extent, agitated in Congress, of making appropriations of alternate sections of land to aid the States in making internal improvements, and enhancing the prices of the section reserved, and the gentleman from Indiana took ground against that policy. He did not make any special argument in favor of Wisconsin; but he took ground generally against the policy of giving

alternate sections of land, and enhancing the price of the reserved sections. Now, he (Mr. L.) did not at this time, take the floor for the purpose of attempting to make an argument on the general subject. He rose simply to protest against the doctrine which the gentleman from Indiana had avowed in the course of what he (Mr. L.) could not but consider an unsound argument.

It might however be true, for anything he knew, that the gentleman from Indiana might convince him that his argument was sound; but he (Mr. L.) feared that gentleman would not be able to convince a majority in Congress that it was sound. It was true, the question appeared in a different aspect to persons in consequence of a difference in the point from which they looked at it. It did not look to persons residing east of the mountains as it did to those who lived among the public lands. But, for his part, he would state that if Congress would make a donation of alternate sections of public lands for the purpose of internal improvement in his state, and forbid the reserved sections being sold at $1.25, he should be glad to see the appropriation made, though he should prefer it if the reserved sections were not enhanced in price. He repeated, he should be glad to have such appropriations made, even though the reserved sections should be enhanced in price. He did not wish to be understood as concurring in any intimation that they would refuse to receive such an appropriation of alternate sections of land because a condition enhancing the price of the reserved sections should be attached thereto.. He believed his position would now be understood, if not, he feared he should not be able to make himself understood.

But before he took his seat he would remark that the