Green, J. of the Texian Expedition Against Mier (tjg

of man or books, he took in his little companion. "Often," said he, "when reason was nearly dethroned, and hope sunk into despair, this little animal would come as a special messenger sent by Providence to recall my senses; and - would you believe it? - I have laughed at [274] his antic miniature comedies, and talked to him for hours."

Lord Byron makes the prisoner of Chillon thus beautifully express this feeling, and it has in it even more truth than poetry:

With spiders I have friendship made,
And watch'd them in their sullen trade;
Had seen the mice by moonlight play,
And why should I feel less than they?
We were all inmates of one place,
And I the monarch of each race;
Had power to kill - yet, strange to tell!
In quiet we had learned to dwell:
My very chains and I grew friends.
So much a long communion tends
To make us what we are.

It is constitutional with mankind that his desire increases for the thing inhibited to him. I have seen many striking illustrations of this fact. I have known men who could well do without tobacco where it was plenty, but when they could not get it would long for it with the intense feeling of a woman for some particular fancy when in the most interesting state of nature. I have known men who rarely or never drank ardent spirits when it was easily to be had, so soon as the use of it was denied them, they would put themselves to the greatest possible shifts to procure it. Above all others, the most inveterate habit was the use of tobacco, and those of us who had never used it were truly fortunate, as it was a contraband article, and difficult to procure.

The old sailing-master was a great slave to the weed, and it was always gratifying to meet his good-natured [275] face when his pipe was well filled and protruding full two inches from his contented countenance. Then his happy looks made one feel better; but on those occasions when he could not fill his pipe, both his face and his gait reminded us of a funeral procession, and made us feel sad. Much, however, as he loved his pipe, he did not love it so well but that he would stop, no matter how great his hurry, and let a comrade take a pull at it - half a dozen long, strong pulls. As liberal as he was with his tobacco, still, at times, "the boys," would depredate upon him.

Near the head of his sheepskin, where he slept, there was a crack in the wall, into which, after the lights were blown out, he would carefully transfer his "old