We had now entered the white settlements of the Sabine river, and found,
to our astonishment, that, far from arriving at civilisation, we were
receding from it; the farms of the Wakoes and well-cultivated fields of
the Pawnee-Picts, their numerous cattle and comfortable dwellings, were
a strong contrast to the miserable twelve-feet-square mud-and-log cabins
we passed by. Every farmer we met was a perfect picture of wretchedness
and misery; their women dirty and covered with rags, which could
scarcely conceal their nudity; the cattle lean and starving; and the
horses so weak, that they could scarcely stand upon their legs.
Where was the boasted superiority of the Texians over the Indian race?
or were these individuals around us of that class of beings who, not
daring to reside within the jurisdiction of the law, were obliged to
lead a borderer's life, exposed to all the horrors of Indian warfare and
famine? Upon inquiry, we discovered that these frontier men were all,
more or less, eminent members of the Texian Republic, one being a
general, another a colonel; some speakers of the House of
Representatives; and many of them members of Congress, judges, and
magistrates. Notwithstanding their high official appointments, we did
not think it prudent to stop among them, but pushed on briskly, with our
rifles across the pommels of our saddles; indeed, from the covetous eyes
which these magistrates and big men occasionally cast upon our horses
and saddle-bags, we expected at every moment that we should be attacked.
A smart ride of two hours brought us to a second settlement which
contrasted most singularly with the first. Here, all the houses were
neat and spacious, with fine barns and stables; the fields were well
enclosed, and covered with a green carpet of clover, upon which were
grazing cattle and horses of a superior breed.
This sight of comfort and plenty restored our confidence in
civilisation, which confidence we had totally lost at the first
settlement we had fallen in with; and perceiving, among others, a
dwelling surrounded with gardens arranged with some taste, we stopped
our horses and asked for accommodation for ourselves and beasts. Three
or four smart young boys rushed out, to take care of our horses, and a
venerable old man invited us to honour his hearth. He was a Mormon, and
informed us that hundreds of farmers belonging to that sect had
established themselves in East Texas, at a short distance from each
other, and that, if we were going to travel through the Arkansas, and
chose to do so, we could stop every other day at a Mormon farm, until we
arrived at the southern borders of the state of Missouri.
We resolved to avail ourselves of this information, anticipating that
every Mormon dwelling would be as clean and comfortable as the one we
were in; but we afterwards found out our mistake, for, during the
fifteen days' journey which we travelled between the Sabine and a place
called Boston, we stopped at six different Mormon farms, either for
night or fore-noon meals, but, unlike the first, they were anything but
comfortable or prosperous. One circumstance, however, attracted
particularly our attention; it was, that, rich or poor, the Mormon
planters had superior cattle and horses, and that they had invariably
stored up in their granaries or barns the last year's crop of every
thing that would keep. Afterwards I learned that these farmers were
only stipendiary agents of the elders of the Mormons, who, in the case
of a westward invasion being decided upon by Joe Smith and his people,
would immediately furnish their army with fresh horses and all the
provisions necessary for a campaign.
One morning we met with a Texian constable going to arrest a murderer.
He asked us what o'clock it was, as he had not a watch, and told us that
a few minutes' ride would bring us to Boston, a new Texian city. We
searched in vain for any vestiges which could announce our being in the
vicinity of even a village; at last, however, emerging from a swamp,
through which we had been forcing our way for more than an hour, we
descried between the trees a long building, made of the rough logs of
the black pine, and as we advanced, we perceived that the space between
the logs (about six inches) had not been filled up, probably to obtain a
more free circulation of air. This building, a naked negro informed us,
was Ambassadors' Hall, the great and only hotel of Texian Boston.
Two hundred yards farther we perceived a multitude of individuals
swarming around another erection of the same description, but without a
roof, and I spurred on my horse, believing we should be in time to
witness some cockfighting or a boxing-match; but my American
fellow-travellers, better acquainted with the manners and customs of the
natives, declared it was the "Court House." As we had nothing to do
there, we turned our horses' heads towards the tavern, and the barking
of a pack of hungry dogs soon called around us a host of the Bostonians.
It is strange that the name of city should be given to an unfinished
log-house, but such is the case in Texas; every individual possessing
three hundred acres of land calls his lot a city, and his house becomes
at once the tavern, the post office the court-house, the gaol, the bank,
the land-office, and in fact everything. I knew a man near the Red
River, who had obtained from government an appointment of postmaster,
and, during the five years of his holding the office, he had not had a
single letter in his hand.
This city mania is a very extraordinary disease in the United States,
and is the cause of much disappointment to the traveller. In the Iowa
territory, I once asked a farmer my way to Dubugue.
"A stranger, I reckon," he answered; "but no matter, the way is plain
enough. Now, mind what I say: after you have forded the river, you will
strike the military road till you arrive in the prairie; then you ride
twenty miles east, till you arrive at Caledonia city; there they will
tell you all about it."
I crossed the river, and, after half an hour's fruitless endeavours, I
could not find the military road, so I forded back, and returned to my
host.
"Law!" he answered; "why, the trees are blazed on each side of the
road."
Now, if he had told me that at first, I could not have mistaken, for I
had seen the blazing of a bridle-path; but as he had announced a
military road, I expected, what it imported, a military road. I resumed
my journey and entered the prairie. The rays of the sun were very
powerful, and, wishing to water my horse, I hailed with delight a
miserable hut, sixteen feet square, which I saw at about half a mile
from the trail. In a few minutes I was before the door, and tied my
horse to a post, upon which was a square board bearing some kind of
hieroglyphics on both sides. Upon a closer inspection, I saw upon one
side, "Ice," and upon the other, "POSTOFF."
"A Russian, a Swede, or a Norwegian," thought I, knowing that Iowa
contained eight or ten thousand emigrants of these countries. "Ice--
well, that is a luxury rarely to be found by a traveller in the prairie,
but it must be pretty dear; no matter, have some I must."
I entered the hut, and saw a dirty woman half-naked, and slumbering upon
a stool, by the corner of the chimney.
"Any milk?" I inquired, rousing her up.
She looked at me and shook her head; evidently she did not understand
me; however, she brought me a stone jug full of whisky, a horn tumbler,
and a pitcher of water.
"Can you give my horse a pail of water?" I asked again.
The woman bent down her body, and dragging from under the bed a girl of
fourteen, quite naked, and with a skin as tough as that of an alligator,
ordered her to the well with a large bucket. Having thus provided for
my beast, I sat upon a stump that served for a chair, and once more
addressed my hostess.
"Now, my good woman, let us have the ice."
"The what?" she answered.
As I could not make her understand what I wanted, I was obliged to drink
the whisky with water almost tepid, and my horse being refreshed, I paid
my fare and started.
I rode for three hours more, and was confident of having performed twice
the distance named by mine host of the morning, and yet the prairie
still extended as far as the eye could reach, and I could not perceive
the city of Caledonia. Happily, I discovered a man at a distance riding
towards me: we soon met.
"How far," said I, "to Caledonia city?"
"Eighteen miles," answered the traveller.
"Is there no farm on the way?" I rejoined, "for my horse is tired."
The horseman stared at me in amazement. "Why, Sir," he answered, "you
turn your back to it; you have passed it eighteen miles behind."
"Impossible!" I exclaimed: "I never left the trail, except to water my
horse at a little hut."
"Well," he answered, "that was at General Hiram Washington Tippet's; he
keeps the post-office--why, Sir, that was Caledonia city."
I thanked him, unsaddled my horse, and bivouacked where I was, laughing
heartily at my mistake in having asked for _ice_, when the two sides of
the board made _post-office_.
But I must return to Boston and its court-house. As it was the time of
the assizes, some fifty or sixty individuals had come from different
quarters, either to witness the proceedings, or to swap their horses,
their saddles, their bowie knife, or anything; for it is while law is
exercising its functions that a Texian is most anxious to swap, to
cheat, to gamble, and to pick pockets and quarrel under its nose, just
to shew his independence of all law.
The dinner-bell rang a short time after our arrival, and for the first
time in my life I found myself at an American _table-d'hote_. I was
astonished, as an Indian well might be. Before my companions and self
had had time to set down and make choice of any particular dish, all was
disappearing like a dream. A general opposite to me took hold of a
fowl, and, in the twinkling of an eye, severed the wings and legs. I
thought it was polite of him to carve for others as well as himself, and
was waiting for him to pass over the dish after he had helped himself,
when to my surprise, he retained all he had cut off, and pushed the
carcase of the bird away from him. Before I had recovered from my
astonishment, his plate was empty. Another seized a plate cranberries,
a fruit I was partial to, and I waited for him to help himself first and
then pass the dish over to me; but he proved be more greedy than the
general, for, with an enormous horn spoon, he swallowed the whole.
The table was now deserted by all except by me and my companions, who,
with doleful faces, endeavoured to appease our hunger with some stray
potatoes. We called the landlord, and asked him for something to eat;
it was with much difficulty that we could get half-a-dozen of eggs and
as many slices of salt pork. This lesson was not thrown away upon me;
and afterwards, when travelling in the States, I always helped myself
before I was seated, caring nothing for my neighbours. Politeness at
meals may be and is practised in Europe, or among the Indians, but among
the Americans it would be attended with starvation.
After dinner, to kill time, we went to the court-house and were
fortunate enough to find room in a position where we could see and hear
all that was going on.
The judge was seated upon a chair, the frame of which he was whittling
with such earnestness that he appeared to have quite forgotten where he
was. On each side of him were half-a-dozen of jurymen, squatted upon
square blocks, which they were also whittling, judge and jurymen having
each a cigar in the mouth, and a flask of liquor, with which now and
then they regaled themselves. The attorney, on his legs, addressing the
jury, was also smoking, as well as the plaintiff, the defendant, and all
the audience. The last were seated, horseback-fashion, upon parallel
low benches, for their accommodation, twenty feet long, all turned
towards the judge, and looking over the shoulders of the one in front of
him, and busily employed in carving at the bench between his thigh and
that of his neighbour. It was a very singular _coup-d'oeil_, and a
new-comer from Europe would have supposed the assembly to have been a
"whittling club."
Having surveyed the company, I then paid attention to the case on trial,
and, as I was just behind the defendant, I soon learned how justice was
executed in Texas, or, or least, in Texian Boston. It appeared that the
defendant was the postmaster and general merchant of the country. Two
or three weeks back, the son of the plaintiff had entered his shop to
purchase his provision of coffee, sugar, and flour, and had given him to
change a good one-hundred-dollar bill of one of the New Orleans banks.
The merchant had returned to him a fifty-dollar note and another of ten.
Two hours afterwards, the young man, having swapped his horse,
carriole, and twenty dollars, for a waggon and two couple of oxen,
presented the fifty-dollar note, which was refused as being
counterfeited. The son of the plaintiff returned to the merchant, and
requested him to give him a good note. The merchant, however, would
not: "Why did you take it?" said he; "I be damned if I give you any
other money for it." Upon which the young man declared it was shameful
swindling, and the merchant, throwing at him an iron weight of nine
pounds, killed him on the spot.
The attorney, who was now pleading for the defendant, was trying to
impress upon the jury that the murder had been merely accidental,
inasmuch as the merchant had thrown the missile only in sport, just to
scare away the fellow who was assaulting him in his own house; but,
strange to say, no mention was made at all of the note, though everybody
knew perfectly well that the merchant had given it, and that it was a
part of his trade to pass forged notes among his inexperienced
customers. As soon as the lawyer had ended the defence, the merchant
was called upon by the judge to give his own version of what occurred.
He rose:
"Why," said he, "it was just so as has been said. I wished not to hurt
the fellow; but he called me a swindler. Well, I knew the man was in a
passion, and I did not care. I only said, `How dare you, Sir?' and I
threw the piece of iron just to frighten him. Well, to be sure, the
blackguard fell down like a bull and I thought it was a humbug. I
laughed and said, `None of your gammon;' but he was dead. I think the
thing must have struck something on the way, and so swerved against his
head. I wished not to kill the fellow--I be damned if I did."
The jurymen looked at each other with a significant and approving air,
which could be translated as accidental death. Gabriel touched the
merchant upon the shoulder, "You should have said to him, that you
merely wished to kill a mosquito upon the wall."
"Capital idea," cried the defendant. "I be damned if it was not a
mosquito eating my molasses that I wished to kill, after all."
At that moment one of the jurymen approached the merchant, and addressed
him in a low voice; I could not hear what passed, but I heard the
parting words of the juryman, which were, "All's right!" To this
dispenser of justice succeeded another; indeed, all the jurymen followed
in succession, to have a little private conversation with the prisoner.
At last the judge condescended to cease his whittling, and come to make
his own bargain, which he did openly:
"Any good saddles, Fielding? mine looks rather shabby."
"Yes, by Jingo, a fine one, bound with blue cloth, and silver nails--
Philadelphia-made--prime cost sixty dollars."
"That will do," answered the judge, walking back to his seat.
Ten minutes afterwards the verdict of manslaughter was returned against
the defendant, who was considered, in a speech from the judge,
sufficiently punished by the affliction which suck an accident must
produce to a generous mind. The court broke up, and Fielding, probably
to show how deep was his remorse, gave three cheers, to which the whole
court answered with a hurrah, and the merchant was called upon to treat
the whole company: of course he complied, and they all left the court
house. Gabriel and I remained behind. He had often tried to persuade
me to abandon my ideas of going to the States and Europe, pointing out
to me that I should be made a dupe and become a prey to pretended
well-wishers. He had narrated to me many incidents of his own life, of
his folly and credulity, which had thrown him from an eminent station in
civilised society, and had been the cause of our meeting in the Western
World. He forewarned me that I should be disappointed in my
expectations, and reap nothing but vexation and disappointment.
He knew the world too well, I knew nothing of it, and I thought that he
was moved by bitterness of spirit to rail so loud against it. He would
fain persuade me to return with him to my own tribe of Shoshones, and
not go in search of what I never should obtain. He was right, but I was
obstinate. He did not let pass this opportunity of giving me a lesson.
"You have now witnessed," said he, "a sample of justice in this
_soi-disant_ civilised country. Two hundred dollars, perhaps, have
cleared a murderer; ten millions would not have done it among the
Shoshones."
"But Texas is not Europe," replied I.
"No," said Gabriel, "it is not; but in Europe, as in Texas, with money
you can do anything, without money nothing."
At that moment we perceived a man wrapt in his blanket, and leaning
against a tree.
He surveyed the group receding to the tavern, and the deepest feelings
of hatred and revenge were working evidently within him. He saw us not,
so intense were his thoughts. It was the plaintiff whose son had been
murdered. Gabriel resumed:
"Now, mark that man; he was the plaintiff, the father of the young
fellow so shamefully plundered and murdered; he is evidently a poor
farmer, or the assassin would have been hung. He is now brooding over
revenge; the law gave not justice, he will take it into his own hands,
and he will probably have it to-night, or to-morrow. Injustice causes
crime, and ninety-nine out of a hundred are forced into it by the
impotency of the law; they suffer once, and afterwards act towards
others as they have been acted by. That man may have been till this day
a good, industrious, and hospitable farmer; to-night he will be a
murderer, in a week he will have joined the free bands, and will then
revenge himself upon society at large, for the injustice he has received
from a small portion of the community."
Till then I had never given credit to my friend for any great share of
penetration, but he prophesied truly. Late in the night the father
announced his intention of returning to his farm, and entered the
general sleeping-room of the hotel to light a cigar. A glance informed
him of all that he wished to know. Forty individuals were ranged
sleeping in their blankets, alongside of the walls, which, as I have
observed, were formed of pine logs, with a space of four or six inches
between each: parallel with the wall, next to the yard, lay the murderer
Fielding.
The father left the room, to saddle his horse. An hour afterwards the
report of a rifle was heard, succeeded by screams and cries of "Murder!
help! murder!" Every one in the sleeping-room was up in a moment,
lights were procured, and the judge was seen upon his knees with his
hands upon his hinder quarters; his neighbour Fielding was dead, and the
same ball which had passed through his back and chest had blazed the
bark off the nether parts of this pillar of Texian justice.
When the first surprise was over, pursuit of the assassin was resolved
upon, and then it was discovered that, in his revenge, the father had
not lost sight of prudence. All the horses were loose; the stable and
the court-house, as well as the bar and spirit store of the tavern, were
in flames. While the Bostonians endeavoured to steal what they could,
and the landlord was beating his negroes, the only parties upon whom he
could vent his fury, our companions succeeded in recovering their
horses, and at break of day, without any loss but the gold watch of the
doctor, which had probably been stolen from him during his sleep, we
started for the last day's journey which we had to make in Texas.
As we rode away, nothing remained of Texian Boston except three patches
of white ashes, and a few half-burnt logs, nor do know if that important
city has ever been rebuilt.