Fine herds of cattle grazing, and occasionally deer, started by the appearance of travellers, would gaze at us for a moment, then show the white flag and bound away, visible for miles on the open prairie.  As we approached the Brazos, the road descended into a marsh of several miles extent, all subject to overflow.  The soil being red alluvium, like the soil of the Red River country, and the trees showing the marks twenty and thirty feet high.  The Navisot, or Navasta, as it is written on the maps, lay on our right, and enters the Brazos opposite to the new town of Washington, which stands on the south bank.  Arriving at the ferry we saw Capt. Sherman's company on the opposite bank, drawn up in order, and a crowd of citizens, drawn up to receive them in military style, resembling in a striking degree Falstaff's famous corps.[28]

We stopt at a house, called a tavern, kept by a man named Lot,[29]  which was the only place in the city at which we could get fodder for our horses.  It was a framed house, consisting of only one room, about forty by twenty feet, with a large fire place at each end, a shed at the back, in which the table was spread.  It was a frame house, covered with clapboards, a wretchedly made establishment, and a blackguard, rowdy set lounging about.  The host's wife and children, and about thirty lodgers, all slept in the same apartment, some in beds, some on cots, but the greater part on the floor.  The supper consisted of fried pork and coarse corn bread and miserable coffee.  I was fortunately lodged on a good cot with a decent Tennessean named Kimball, who is looking for land, but says the state of anarchy is such that he is afraid to buy, and is waiting to see the course of things after the meeting of the Convention.

Was introduced to Dr. Goodrich, a physician of the place, and a member elect of the new Convention, a strenuous Independence man.[30]

Itinerary of the road from Nacogdoches to Washington, given by Mr. Whitely: