e papers herewith enclosed.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, August 5, 1861

TO SECRETARY CAMERON.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, AUGUST 7, 1861

HON. SECRETARY OF WAR

MY DEAR SIR:--The within paper, as you see, is by HON. John S. Phelps
and HON. Frank P. Blair, Jr., both members of the present Congress from
Missouri. The object is to get up an efficient force of Missourians in the
southwestern part of the State. It ought to be done, and Mr. Phelps ought
to have general superintendence of it. I see by a private report to me
from the department that eighteen regiments are already accepted from
Missouri. Can it not be arranged that part of them (not yet organized, as
I understand) may be taken from the locality mentioned and put under the
control of Mr. Phelps, and let him have discretion to accept them for a
shorter term than three years--or the war--understanding, however, that
he will get them for the full term if he can? I hope this can be done,
because Mr. Phelps is too zealous and efficient and understands his ground
too well for us to lose his service. Of course provision for arming,
equipping, etc., must be made. Mr. Phelps is here, and wishes to carry
home with him authority for this matter.

Yours truly,

A. LINCOLN

PROCLAMATION OF A NATIONAL FAST-DAY, AUGUST 12, 1861.

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

A Proclamation.

Whereas a joint committee of both houses of Congress has waited on the
President of the United States and requested him to "recommend a day of
public humiliation, prayer, and fasting to be observed by the people of
the United States with religious solemnities and the offering of fervent
supplications to Almighty God for the safety and welfare of these States,
His blessings on their arms, and a speedy restoration of peace"; and

Whereas it is fit and becoming in all people at all times to acknowledge
and revere the supreme government of God, to bow in humble submission to
His chastisements, to confess and deplore their sins and transgressions in
the full conviction that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom,
and to pray with all fervency and contrition for the pardon of their past
offences and for a blessing upon their present and prospective action; and

Whereas when our own beloved country, once, by the blessing of God,
united, prosperous, and happy, is now afflicted with faction and civil
war, it is peculiarly fit for us to recognize the hand of God in this
terri