New York to Texas ^l 



not insure our money over the bar of the Rio 

 Grande without an immense premium, so I, with 

 Biddle Boggs and James Clement, having landed 

 the horses brought with us, went overland from 

 Brazos to Brownsville opposite Matamoras, thirty- 

 two miles, long ones. We took all our money 

 with us, and started in buoyant spirits. At 10:30, 

 March 8th, I found myself riding along the beach 

 of this barren island ; for six or eight miles we went 

 merrily on, watching the little sand-pipers and 

 turn-stones, and enjoying the invigorating sea- 

 breeze, as the sun was intensely hot, and when, 

 from time to time we passed through narrow lanes 

 of chaparral where the breeze was shut out, and 

 the dust followed our horses, we were exceedingly 

 oppressed. 



We had all seen Texas before, and like sailors 

 once familiarized with the sea whom an hour re- 

 stores to old habits and thoughts, so with the man of 

 the prairies, and we all felt at home at once. The 

 country is flat, showing here and there in the dis- 

 tance some of those bold prominences of clay repre- 

 sented so beautifully by the Prince de Neuwied in 

 his wonderful illustrations of the West.^ These 

 near the Rio Grande, are, of course, only minia- 

 tures of the "Chateaux blancs" of the northern 



^ Travels in the Interior of North America^ by Maximilian, Prince 

 of Wied-Neuwied (London, 1843). Reprinted in Thwaites's 

 Early Western Travels^ 1 748-1846 (Cleveland, 1905). 



