Sir,
This will inform your excellency that I am one of two hundred and forty-eight Texians who were taken prisoners of war by General Pedro d'Ampudia, of the Mexican army, on the 26th of December ultimo, at Mier. On the 11th of January, [288] with the permission of General Ampudia, I addressed you a hurried note from Matamoras upon the subject of our captivity, and not hearing whether said note ever reached its destination, I am induced to write again. In the above-named note I solicited your intercession, as the head of a neutral and friendly power, in our behalf, and in the then hurry and limited time of writing, suggested only one ground for your intercession, which I then thought, and still believe, tenable. Since which, other and stronger reasons have occurred to my mind in favour of your doing so, which you will please permit me to state more fully.

In my note of the 11th of January, I assumed the position that a seven years' maintenance of our nationality, which is recognised by the most enlightened and powerful nations of the earth, has taken from us the character of a "rebel province," and this consideration entitles us to all the tolerations of civilized warfare. I was more confirmed in this position when I understood that the Mexican government last summer declared that on their part the war with Texas should hereafter be conducted upon the strictest principles of civilized nations. This declaration I understood to have been made to the foreign minister resident near Mexico, with the farther declaration that "no farther interference upon their part should be allowed in favour of the subjects of their respective countries who should be found in arms with the Texians, but that they would be treated [289] as prisoners of war." This principle, so boldly avowed in the proclamation of Major-general Arista, commanding the army del Norte of Mexico, was widely distributed in Texas last spring when invaded by General Vascus, under his (Arista's) orders, and also when General Woll invaded Texas he made a like declaration.

If, then, the seven years' maintenance of our nationality, either with or without this declaration on the part of Mexico, entitles us to this consideration, which I am bound, in respect to those governments that have so