Colonel Ortis, carried to San Luis Potosi, which place they reached the 26th of February, where they overtook our party, which had been detained here several days.

Captain Reese and his party have been severely censured by many of his comrades for not joining them in their attempt to reach home, and some have ascribed the worst of motives for his not so doing.20 Captain R. is too tried a soldier and devoted [178] a patriot to allow a suspicion either of want of bravery or patriotism. It has been his good fortune, with his late brother, who fell fighting for Texas, to have been in every battle from the taking of San Antonio in 1835, in all of which they were distinguished for their bravery. The writer has been with him in several trying situations, and few men, on all occasions, have evidenced such cool bravery. Had he never given any other evidence than in his scaling the walls of Perote, and successfully making his way through an enemy's country many hundred miles, it would have been sufficient to have stamped him as a man of uncommon fortitude and daring. Captain Reese was opposed to the assault at Salado, because, as he says, he honestly doubted the success of the men in reaching their homes. But while the assault was going on, he exposed himself as much as any one in causing the Mexicans to give up their arms; and after our men were victorious, he determined to share their fate, provided he could get his younger brother William, who was quite a lad, to remain. William resolved he would follow him, and this determined the captain to remain; to which he yielded more on his account and that of his parents, who looked to him to take care of the youth, than his own.

Our party, under charge of Captain Romano, proceeded from Mataguala on the San Luis Potosi road, and on the 17th of February reached the hacienda of Count Zivyes. This gentleman has a [179] large estate, lives in superior style, and treated us with the most bountiful hospitality. Instead of eating our humble fare of tortillas and frijoles, we were invited night and morning to his mansion, and had a dozen covers for our meals. This unsolicited, unexpected hospitality, to use a Texas expression, "looked so much like the white settlements" that it warmly attached this excellent gentleman to us. He took great pains in showing us through his extensive buildings, and all the appurtenances belonging to the establishment, particularly his farming utensils, which we found to be exceedingly crude, at least one hundred years behind Texas in this respect. He was a gentleman of liberal education, but educated in Spain, the wrong place to make a good farmer. He seemed sensible of this, and showed us several English works upon agriculture. Stock is the principal produce of this large estate of forty-five leagues. He showed us a large number of horses and mules, and some of the best native horses we saw in Mexico. He appears very anxious to improve them by fine American breeds, and seemed astonished at our knowledge of blooded pedigree. Upon inquiring as to the extent of his stock, he