The American Wilderness 17 



other mighty hunter, Houston, who when a boy ran 

 away to the Indians; who while still a lad returned 

 to his own people to serve under Andrew Jackson in 

 the campaigns which that greatest of all the back- 

 woods leaders waged against the Creeks, the Span- 

 iards, and the British. He was wounded at the 

 storming of one of the strongholds of Red Eagle's 

 doomed warriors, and returned to his Tennessee 

 home to rise to high civil honor, and become the 

 foremost man of his State. Then, while Governor 

 of Tennessee, in a sudden fit of moody anger, and of 

 mad longing for the unfettered life of the wilder- 

 ness, he abandoned his office, his people, and his race, 

 and fled to the Cherokees beyond the Mississippi. 

 For years he lived as one of their chiefs; until one 

 day, as he lay in ignoble ease and sloth, a rider from 

 the south, from the rolling plains of the San Antonio 

 and Brazos, brought word that the Texans were up, 

 and in doubtful struggle striving to wrest their 

 freedom from the lancers and carbineers of Santa 

 Anna. Then his dark soul flamed again into burn- 

 ing life ; riding by night and day he joined the risen 

 Texans, was hailed by them as a heaven-sent leader, 

 and at the San Jacinto led them on to the overthrow 

 of the Mexican host. Thus the stark hunter, who 

 had been alternately Indian fighter and Indian chief, 

 became the President of the new Republic, and, after 

 its admission into the United States, a Senator at 

 Washington ; and, to his high honor, he remained to 



