No. 486.
Mr. Peixotto to Mr. Fish.
Bucharest, May 5, 1872. (Received May 29.)
Sir: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your dispatch, No. 28, of the 10th of April. My dispatch No. 30, of the 19th of April, and previous dispatches will have shown you that I had anticipated the present instructions, and, pervaded by a proper sense of the general views you gave me in person while in Washington, in December, 1870, [Page 691] have acted in consonance with the directions which you are now pleased to express in even more specific language.
As I predicted in my dispatch No. 30, the jury in the case of the Cabool rioters have brought in a verdict of acquittal, thus setting at liberty those Ku-Klux of Roumania who continually disturb the tranquillity of the country and bid defiance to all laws except those of their own bad passions.
Upon the receipt of this news I had an interview with the minister, and represented that, while having no disposition to interfere in the internal affairs of the country, and especially in no sense to meddle with the administration of justice, I could not be insensible to the grave dangers attending the result of these trials, and my belief that the government of the prince would take measures to restrain such impunity and license, which might otherwise prove fatal. I expressed the hope that the convicted Israelites would be afforded a new trial, or, in the event of no better result being hoped for, they would be set at liberty.
The minister assured me that he greatly deprecated the verdicts given, and that he would lose no time in recommending to the prince the extension of his grace in behalf of the condemned.
I am, &c.,