Our scouts have come in frequently the last few days.  They tell us Price is at Stockton, and is pushing rapidly on towards the southwest.  He has been grinding corn near Stockton, and has now food enough for another journey.  His army numbers twenty thousand men, of whom five thousand have no arms.  The rest carry everything, from double-barrelled shot-guns to the Springfield muskets taken from the Home-Guards.  They load their shot-guns with a Minie-ball and two buck-shot, and those who have had experience say that at one hundred yards they are very effective weapons.  There is little discipline in the Rebel army, and the only organization is by companies.  The men are badly clothed, and without shoes, and often without food.  The deserters say that those who remain are waiting only to get the new clothes which McCulloch is expected to bring from the South.

McCulloch, the redoubtable Ben, does not seem to be held in high esteem by the Rebel soldiers.  They say he lacks judgment and self-command.  But all speak well of Price.  No one can doubt that he is a man of unusual energy and ability.  McCulloch will increase Price’s force to about thirty-five thousand, which number we must expect to meet.

Hunter and McKinstry have not yet appeared, but Pope reported himself last night, and some of his men came in to-day.

Camp White, October 22d. The bridge is built, and the army is now crossing the Osage.  In five days a firm road has been thrown across the river, over which our troops may pass in a day.  The General and staff crossed by the ferry, and are now encamped two miles south of the Pomme-de-Terre.

* * * * *

BIRDOFREDUM SAWIN, ESQ., TO MR. HOSEA BIGLOW.

    Letter from the REVEREND HOMER WILBUR, A.M., inclosing the
    Epistle aforesaid.

Jaalam, 15th Nov., 1861.

It is not from any idle wish to obtrude my humble person with undue prominence upon the publick view that I resume my pen upon the present occasion. Juniores ad labores. But having been a main instrument in rescuing the talent of my young parishioner from being buried in the ground, by giving it such warrant with the world as would be derived from a name already widely known by several printed discourses, (all of which I maybe permitted without immodesty to state have been deemed worthy of preservation in the Library of Harvard College by my esteemed friend Mr. Sibley,) it seemed becoming that I should not only testify to the genuineness of the following production, but call attention to it, the more as Mr. Biglow had so long been silent as to be in danger of absolute oblivion.  I insinuate no claim to any share in the authourship (vix ea nostra voco) of the works already published by Mr. Biglow, but merely take to myself the credit of having fulfilled toward them the office of taster, (experto crede,) who, having first tried, could