Excerpt from Captain Maury's Letter on American Affairs; Hon. J. C. Breckinridge's Address to the People of Kentucky: Ex-Gov. Lowe's Letter to the Virginia Legislature; Address of Geo. N. Sanders to the Democracy of the North-West; Gov. Letcher's Message to the Virginia Legislature; Message of Jefferson Davis to the Confederate Congress

On the 20th of April, finding that this, my native State, in the exercise of her high prerogative, had withdrawn from the Federal Union and appealed to her sons to rally around her I would not, I could not, and did not hesitate to obey the call and hasten to her relief.

On that day, after formally renouncing all allegiance to the now shattered Federal Government, and turning over to the officer next in command the trust that had by it been confided to my care, I left the Observatory at Washington once more a free citizen of Virginia. Its associations, the treasures there, which, with your help and that of thousands of other friendly hands, had been collected from the sea, were pre cions to me, and as I turned my back upon the place a tear furrowed my cheek, for I could not but recollect that such things were.

The Yankees, as only those who are making war upon us are now called, have shown themselves vindictive to a degree; they have vilified me; they have set a price upon my head, and intercepted all of my foreign correspondence, so that I have not been able to get a hearing in any part of Europe, or to communicate, since April last, with any friend there.

It is becoming and proper that I should make known to my friends abroad the course that I have thought right to pursue in this new state of things. And to be clear, I beg leave to interpolate here a few remarks explanatory of the relations of the several States to the Federal Union, and of the' relations in which the citizen stands to his State and the Union.

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