on the trade; merchants would have settled in the West, to participate in it; emigrants would have collected in the district, where the soil is rich and the climate healthy.  It is true, the trade would have been illicit; but such is ever the inevitable consequence of a high and ill-regulated tariff.  It would, nevertheless, have been very profitable, and would have conciliated the population of Rio Grande towards the Texans, and in all probability have forced upon the Mexican government the establishment of friendly relations between the two countries.

But this trade has been totally destroyed; the Indians now seize and plunder every caravan, either to or from San Antonio; the Texan robbers lie in wait for them, if they escape the Indians; and should the Mexican trader escape with his goods from both, he has still to undergo the chance of being swindled by the soi-disant Texan merchant.

If ever there was a proof, from the results of pursuing an opposite course, that honesty is the best policy, it is to be found in the present state of Texas.

CHAPTER XX.

Happily for me and my two companions, there still remained two or three gentlemen in San Antonio.  These were Colonel Seguin and Messrs. Novarro, senior and junior, Mexican gentlemen, who, liberal in their ideas and frank in their natures, had been induced by the false representations of the Texans not to quit the country after its independence of Mexico; and, as they were men of high rank, by so doing they not only forfeited their rights as citizens of Mexico, but also incurred the hatred and animosity of that government.

Now that they had discovered their error, it was too late to repair it; moreover, pride and, perhaps, a mistaken sense of honour, would not permit them to remove to Mexico, although severed from all those ties which render life sweet and agreeable.  Their own sorrows did not, however, interfere with their unbounded hospitality:  in their house we found a home.  We formed no intimacy with the Texans; indeed, we had no contact whatever with them, except that one day Roche thrashed two of them with his shillalah for ill-treating an old Indian.

Inquiries were made by Colonel Seguin as to where the Comanches might be found, and we soon ascertained that they were in their great village, at the foot of the Green Mountain, upon the southern fork of the head-waters of the Rio Roxo.

We made immediate preparations for departure, and as we proposed to pass through Austin, the capital of Texas, our kind entertainers pressed five hundred dollars upon us, under the plea that no Texan would ever give us a tumbler of water except it was paid for, and that, moreover, it was possible that after passing a few days among the gallant members of Congress, we might miss our holsters or stirrups, our blankets, or even one of our horses.