with the destiny of you unfortunate prisoners, most silly and useless communication. It is well known that by far the major part of Colonel Fisher's command were the political opponents of the wily demagogue, and that some of them were the objects of his special personal enmity; and those who know General Houston as well as you and I do, know that he never forgave an enemy or sustained a professed friendship beyond his own interest or convenience. His utter destitution of moral principle, and, signally, his habitual and entire disregard of the truth, render it no breach of charity to suspect him, on slighter evidence than is furnished in this instance, of an extreme of baseness.

I speak advisedly, and, I trust, without an undue feeling of personal hostility. Political feelings I have long since discarded as far as is consistent with the duties we all owe to the society we live in.

I beg you will not long withhold the product of your interesting labours from the public. Give us "the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth," and let venal critics and rewarded editors, sometime bedecked [482] with the ermine, gnaw upon it until their venom fails or their rewards cease. Very respectfully, your friend and obedient servant,

Dear General, - ....Since the release of our countrymen, prisoners in Mexico, I hope there will be nothing to divert your mind from the completion of the work in which I found you engaged last spring - I mean the journal of your Mier expedition, and the events subsequent to it. I have been looking for some time for its announcement as being ready for the press. That it will lose any portion of its interest by time I have no fear, but still, to cause it to be generally read and more anxiously sought after, the incidents which it relates must not become stale on the public mind.... Your friend and servant,