Mr. LANE, of Indiana. If I understand the law upon this subject, it is just this: before the organization of the Dept of the Interior pensions were mid un(or the rules and regulations of the ar Dept. In many in stances special agents were appointed for the purpose; in others the cashiers of banks acted as agents. The whole business was done ufider the supervision of the War Dept, and it had a discretion as to the number of districts and the number of agents to be appointed. On the organization of the Interior Dept the whole business of pensions was transferred from the War Deptto the Interior Dept, with precisely the same iscretion to a point agents who should pay the pensions. he increased compensation lS nothing. Suppose there is only one agent in the State of Illinois today, and he pays all the pensions, he gets a certain%age upon the amount paid; that is all that he gets. If there are 4 agents, that%age is divided among the four; so that the expense is not increased by the unlimited mimber of appointees, while the convenience of the people is greatly facilitated by it, because they are enabled to receive their pensions at a point nearer than they would if there was only one agent in a State. There are now only 49 pension agents in the U.S. I have in my hand a list of them and a statement of the amount of bonds now required of every agent. I do not think it is practicable to limit the discretioh of the President as to the number of districts or the number of agents. There are some ten or 11 States which were lately in rebellion that now have no pension agents at all. The SecyInterior thinks it very desirable, and so does the ComrPension, that he should have discretion to establish agencies, for instance, in Tennessee and Alabama, at points where we have raised Union troops in the rebellious States, and I do not think itpruc ticable to limit this discretion. While the payments were made by the SecyWar he had full discretion as to the number of it cuts to be appointed; since it has been in the nte prior dept the SecyInterior has h precisely the same discretion; and under this bill, the only change contemplate is that you give the power to the president and give a discretion to the President as to the number of agents, so that when an agent is appointed he has to be nominated to the Senate and pass the scrutiny of this body. I think it emi nentl proper that the bill should be passed, and I" inlir) it impracticable to limit the number of agents by legislation.