did. But I think they just kept their bows and arrers in there, for I
don’t see how they could breathe good. An’ in this day an’ time everybody’s tryin’ to get all the fresh air they can. But maybe them kind of people didn’t need air. Well, anyhow, some of them Indians was on mighty good terms with these white folks. One old Indian in partikler. He used to climb down the cliff an’ come ’cross the river in his boat to see his neighbors. He used to take th’ little two-year-old in his canoe for a ride, sometimes. Mighty queer they would let him do it, but they did anyhow.
“One day the white settler an’ the Indian had a fuss. What ’bout, I don’t zactly recollect; but seems like the white man hit the Indian with a piece of wood. He had tried to make the Indian do some dirty work for him, an’ when the red-skin refused, the white man beat him nearly to death. The Indian swore revenge. He went home terr’ble mad. He didn’t go to see the settlers for a long time. They kind-a missed him too.
“But one day they looked out and saw him a-crossing the river. They didn’t know whe’r to be glad or sorry. The Indian dragged the canoe up on the shore and came straight to their hut. He looked happy and glad to see them. They was glad to see him too, I can tell you.
“Finally he took the little girl and started down to the canoe. He pushed ’cross the river. It took him a long time, for you all know this here river is pretty wide. He climbed the cliff with the child in his arms. He’d never done this before. The white man got scared. He called loud to the chief to come back; for an answer the Indian turned ’round and looked at the man with a horrible grin. Then he climbed on to the top of the cliff. When he reached the top, he stopped, threw up his hand to the anxious folks on the other side, and with a deadly Indian whoop, leaped over the cliff into this here river.
“‘What did the child’s parents do?’ you ask. Nothin’; there wasn’t nothin’ to do. The Indian and baby was both dead. But the folks moved away and never was heard of agin. We call the place Indian Bluff, and now you know why.”
HOW MEDICINE MOUNDS OF HARDEMAN COUNTY GOT THEIR NAME
By L. W. Payne, Jr.
This legend was contributed by a University of Texas student named W. A. Darter, from Hardeman County, a number of years ago. He says that though some of the details are “made up” the main incidents are based on legendary material current in the country of the Mounds.
The Medicine Mounds, as they are called today, are located in Hardeman County, about nine miles southeast of Quanah. They are four in number and extend north and south in a direct line. The tallest one stands to the north two thousand feet above the surrounding country. The lowest one stands to the south of the other three, fifteen hundred feet lower than the tallest one. The other two are of such heights that if a line were determined by their peaks, it would pass through the top points of the two extreme ones. To the west of these mounds, running almost north and south, is a deep-worn trail said by the old settlers to have been a buffalo trail. About these mounds and about this trail especially are to be found today many flint arrow-heads that the Indians let fly at the buffaloes as they passed back and forth on these hills.
On the top of the tallest mound, there is a great, flat, over-hanging rock. This rock, the Indians used to say, was the dwelling place of a good spirit. From this position one can see the surrounding country for miles and miles; and it was on this account that the good spirit took up its abode there. While the red man was in search of game, the good spirit would direct his arrows straight toward the mark; and while he was on the war path, this good spirit would also help him to defeat his enemies.
Now, during early days, a tribe of Indians were roaming over this rich country, killing big game with their arrows and big fish with their spears. And in this tribe, as in every tribe, was a medicine man. This medicine man had a beautiful daughter who had been asked to become the first squaw of the brave young chief. But she was sick with a fever, and she became worse as time passed on. Her father had done all he could for her. He had driven away all the evil spirits that, by his many devices, he could drive away, and at the same time he had brought in all the good spirits that he could in order that they might help her; but his beautiful daughter only grew worse. He had mixed his different medicines in every way that he could think of, but all in vain. At last he despaired of saving her. He went outside of the little wigwam, squatted down, and prayed to the good spirit that dwelt upon the high rock.
Instantly almost, the expression of his face changed from gloom to hope. The idea had come to him that if he would but mix his medicine on the rock, the remedy would in some way receive the power of the good spirit. He returned for one more glance at his daughter, and then, pulling his bright-colored blanket about him, left for the high rock.
It was not long before he returned. He found his daughter resting well. He felt her face; it was not so hot as it had been when he left. He stopped and looked. Had he lost her? Then he thought of the good spirit and the medicine. It was his last hope. He gave it.
Outside the wigwam, the medicine man once more drew his blanket tightly about him and squatted down. He prayed for many hours—he knew not how many. It was nearing evening when he heard a faint voice calling him by name; it was the voice of his daughter. He rose as if he had been on springs; and in two steps, he was by her side. The fever had left her while he was away, and she had simply fallen into a deep sleep. The good spirit had saved her.
From this time on, the medicine man did not forget the good spirit on the high rock; and it is said that every year thereafter he went regularly to these mounds in order to instil some of this good spirit into his medicine. From this habit of the medicine man, these hills have been called the Medicine Mounds.
THE NAMING OF METHEGLIN CREEK, BELL COUNTY
By Alex. Dienst
Metheglin Creek of Bell County is the only creek, so far as I can learn, in the United States bearing its name. The account of how it got its unique name I have derived from old-timers familiar with the naming, and just this year the facts as given below were confirmed to me by the son of the pioneer Morrison.
One of the oldest pioneer settlers of Bell County was a ranchman named Morrison. He settled in the extreme northwest part of Bell County, and his land extended into Coryell County. His home was close to an unnamed creek. Like many other pioneers of unexceptionable character, he was inclined to imbibe too freely at times. His wife never called him by any other name than “Honey,” a fact well known to the neighbors. One day his wife asked “Honey” to fetch her a bucket of water from the creek. He was pretty well “shot” when he leaned over to fill the bucket, and fell into the creek. A waggish neighbor who witnessed the accident instantly christened the creek “Metheglin”—a mixture of honey and water. And Metheglin Creek has been the name ever since.
Metheglin was a favorite improvised drink of Texas pioneers. It was a mixture of honey and water, boiled, fermented, and then spiced to suit.
HOW DEAD HORSE CANYON GOT ITS NAME
By Victor J. Smith
This brief account of a name was secured from Mr. E. E. Townsend, sheriff of Brewster County. Shortly after 1880 General Geno, of the United States Army, and a party of surveyors were making their way down the Rio Grande when they entered the upper mouth of a rugged canyon. To proceed with their horses meant a detour of many miles via Fort Stockton. To continue travel directly meant that they must abandon horses and use the river for transportation. It was finally decided to proceed down the river on rafts. In order to prevent their mounts from falling into the hands of Indians and being used in forays against the whites, the exploring party shot all their horses, some thirty or forty head. To this day the rugged canyon through which the Rio Grande winds its way for several hundred miles above Del Rio is called Dead Horse Canyon.
HOW THE BRAZOS RIVER GOT ITS NAME
By J. Frank Dobie
The Spanish word brazo means arm. The word, like its English equivalent, has a wide pictorial use; thus the Spanish speak of un brazo (an arm) of the sea, and as applied to streams the word may mean fork or branch. The complete name of the great Texas river as given by the Spanish was Los Brazos de Dios—The Arms of God. The name is remarkable, and in attempting to explain its origin legend has been no less remarkable. Old histories have contributed to the legend. At last, the history of the naming of the stream is clear; yet the name itself has something of mystery that will always provoke speculation.
According to Miss Eleanor Claire Buckley, [122] when the Spaniards of the Aguayo Expedition in 1621 struck what is now called Little River, in Bell County, they called it “Espíritu Santo (Holy Ghost), having reached it on the eve of Pentecost. As will be remembered, the Brazos had, in 1690, been given the name of Espíritu Santo or Colorado by De León, who, however, had struck it before its branching (Diario, entry for May 14). In the next expedition, 1691, Massanet, though he knew that it had been called the Espíritu Santo, named it the San Francisco Solano (Diario, entry for July 24); while Terán, ‘though the natives called it the Colorado,’ named it the San Geronimo (Demarcación, entry for July 25). Espinosa and Ramón, in 1716, crossed Little River just above its junction with the Brazos. The former did not give it any name; the latter called it la Trinidad. Both of them called the Brazos proper la Trinidad, thinking doubtless that it was the river that De León had named thus in 1690 (Diario and Derrotero, entries for June 14). Rivera called it the ‘Colorado o de los Brazos de Dios’ (Diario, entry for August 30).” “It may be noted,” adds Dr. Bolton, “that the name los Brazos de Dios was applied to the Little River and to the main Brazos, and not to the main Brazos and the Little Brazos.”
But why the arms de Dios? asks legend. I have heard that Corpus Christi was named through belief that the sacred words would act as a protection against harm to the inhabitants of the place. Probably the old custom, still maintained in Catholic countries, of giving holy or sainted names had its origin in some such belief. Many other streams in Texas than the Brazos were given holy names; as, the Trinidad (Trinity), the Navidad (Nativity), and the Arroyo de las Benditas Animas (Creek of the Blessed Souls). Thrall says that the Trinidad and Navidad were so named because they were discovered on Trinity Sunday and Christmas day respectively. [123] He offers no authority.
The version of the Brazos legend to be quoted presently from Mollie E. Moore Davis’ Under the Man-Fig goes back at least a century to Austin’s colonists, who, in all likelihood, derived it from the Spanish. It is probably the source of all the other versions and seems to be by far the best known. Incidentally, it appears in a book replete with folk-lore—one of the half dozen best Texas novels. The scene of Under the Man-Fig is Columbia, on the Brazos River, in Brazoria County. Now, among the oldest inhabitants of Columbia is Mr. J. P. Underwood, whose mother was one of the “first three hundred” of Austin’s colonists. Acting upon a request, Mrs. V. M. Taylor of Angleton secured from Mr. Underwood his version of how the Brazos got its name. Mrs. Taylor writes:
“Hostile Indians were pursuing a body of Indians under the care of the Catholics who were trying to reach the Tockanhono, ‘mighty water of the Tejas.’ They reached it in time to gain the opposite shore, but the hostiles trying to follow were swept away by a mighty current. The joy of the padre and company was expressed by their calling the Tockanhono (Indian name) ‘Los Brazos de Dios’—The Arms of God. Mr. Underwood gave me the account as above, saying that it is the true version of the origin of Los Brazos as he heard it from old settlers of Austin’s colonies.”
It will be noted that Mr. Underwood says nothing of the “mission” that figures so largely in Mrs. Davis’ account. There was no Spanish mission on the Brazos; Nuestra Señora de la Luz was a mission on the not distant Trinity, and at it there was a miraculous escape, but from fire, not from water. [124] The mission is but ambiguously hinted in a song entitled “Los Brazos de Dios,” [125] written years ago by Mrs. Laura Bryan Parker, formerly of Houston, now of Washington City. Another poetic version, [126] printed in 1897, makes use of the mission, but the details of this poem seem to have been taken entirely from Mrs. Davis’ narrative. It may be, after all, that the mission is borrowed from the San Saba, and that the fifth and last version of the legend given in this compilation is the oldest of all versions.
It is to be observed that in its lower reaches the Brazos does not come down with a sudden sweep like a mountain canyon, a fact that would still further indicate a borrowing from some upland stream, such as the San Saba or higher Colorado.
But it is high time to get to Mrs. Davis’ complete, if somewhat belletristic, tale. [127]
I
THE MIRACULOUS ESCAPE
“The name of the river is Los Brazos de Dios, which is to say, The Arms of God.
“The bed of it is very deep; and the color of the water—when it creeps sluggishly along between its banks, so shallow in places that the blue heron may wade it without wetting his knees—is the color of tarnished brass. But when it comes roaring down from the far-away Redlands, a solid foam-crested wall, leaping upward a foot a minute, and spreading death and destruction into the outlying lowlands, then it is as red as spilled blood.
“On its banks, more than a century and a half ago, a handful of barefoot Franciscan friars, who had prayed and fought their way across the country from Mexico, founded the Presidio of St. Jago, and corralled within the boundary walls a flock of Yndios reducidos.
“There were the stately church, cloistered and towered and rose-windowed—a curious flower of architecture abloom in the savage wilderness—and the blockhouse with its narrow loopholes, and the hut into which the Indian women were thrust at night under lock and key.
“The mighty forest and open prairies around teemed with Yndios bravos, who hated the burly, cassocked, fighting monks, and their own Christianized tribesmen.
“These came, in number like the leaves of the live oak, to hurl themselves against the Presidio. And, after many days of hard fighting, the single friar who remained alive turned his eyes away from the demolished church, and, under cover of smoke from the burning blockhouse, led the remnant of Yndios reducidos (who because they had learned to pray had not forgotten how to fight) out of the enclosure by a little postern-gate, and down the steep bank to the yellow thread of the river below.
“Midway of the stream—thridding the ankle-deep water—they were, before the red devils above discovered their flight. The demoniac yell from a thousand throats pushed them like a battering ram up the opposite bank, whence, looking back, they saw the bed of the River Tockonhono swarming with their foes. Then the Yndios reducidos opened their lips and began to chant the death-song of the Nainis; and the friar, lifting his hand, commended their souls and his own to the God who gives and who takes away.
“But, lo, a miracle!
“Even as the waves of the Red Sea—opened by the rod of Moses for the passage of his people—closed upon Pharaoh and his host, so, with the hoarse roar of a wild beast springing upon his prey, the foam-crested wall of water fell upon the Yndios bravos, and not a warrior of them all came forth from the river bed but as a bruised and beaten corpse.
“So the friar, falling on his knees, gave thanks. And the river, which was the Tockonhono, became from that day Los Brazos de Dios, which is to say, The Arms of God.
“Such is the legend of the river.”
II
HOW PERISHING SEAMEN NAMED THE RIVER
The following account comes from Mrs. A. F. Shannon of Velasco, who was reared near the mouth of the Brazos. Velasco, be it remembered, was, in ancient days, a port of many ships—the rival of Galveston. Whether or not this legend is indigenous to the mouth of the Brazos cannot be asserted; however, it is but natural that in such a place the legend should be connected with the sea.
Now this is Mrs. Shannon’s version: “My uncle said that he always heard the story like this. A ship out in the Gulf was without water, and the crew were parched with thirst. Suddenly, one of them saw a muddy current reaching far out into the clear blue of the salt water. The ship followed the current to a wide river, which was on a great rise and so threw its muddy waters far out to sea. It must have been a Spanish ship. The crew drank the saving fresh water, and in gratitude named the unknown stream Los Brazos de Dios—the Arms of God.”
III
THE GREAT DROUTH AND THE WATERS AT WACO
The third legend is connected with the famous “Bowie,” or Los Almagres, Mine on the San Saba. Like many other legends, it came to me from West Burton of Austin. He got it from an old man named White, now living out in the Big Bend country, but formerly of Mason or thereabouts. According to Burton, White got the account, written on a parchment, from a grateful old Mexican whom he had befriended in a spell of sickness. The Mexican claimed to have secured the parchment from his grandfather, the date it bore being over one hundred and fifty years old. When the aged Mexican took sick on Mr. White’s place in Mason County, he was traveling through the country with a crude Mexican cart and two burros, looking for two dugouts somewhere between the old San Saba Mission or mines and the site of the Waco Indian village, which was located at about the present site of Waco. As the parchment reads, thirty-six (or it may be forty-six, Burton says) jack loads of silver bullion were buried in these two dugouts.
It was a time of terrible drouth. The drouth had lasted two years and the little colony of Spaniards at San Saba had gone on mining with their captive Indians and their peons until the Indians had deserted, the peons had died, and there was absolutely no water left in the river or springs. Each month the band of Spaniards hoped that the next new moon would bring rain, but no rain came, and they knew that in the nearly always dry region towards Mexico, the drouth must be even worse. So, instead of going south towards San Antonio as they would normally have gone, the Spaniards set out eastward toward the village of the Waco Indians. They had often heard of a great river flowing by the Wacos’ camp, and there they hoped to find water. They left not a soul or a hoof behind, but packed on the burros their little store of provisions and what bullion they had accumulated, well knowing that they could not return until the drouth was broken.
At Las Chanas (the Llano), they found a dry bed; the Colorado was as dry as the top of a rock. Arrived at the Lampasas Springs, they found a little water, a great deal of mud, and dead buffaloes covering the ground. They pulled some of the dead buffaloes out of the bog, got a little stinking water, and slowly moved on. But the burros were poor from want of grass and starved from want of water. To carry the heavy bullion much farther was impossible. The provisions had to be taken at any price. So two small dugouts were made in the side of a hill, the bullion was buried therein, and after the captain of the band had called on all to witness the marks of the place, the cavalcade moved on.
The trail on eastward was marked by dead beasts and dead men, but at last, depleted in numbers and wasted in fortune, the travelers arrived at the village of the Wacos. There they found a great river flowing clear and fresh, and when they had drunk and had seen their beasts drink, they knelt down to give God thanks, and the padre with them blessed the stream and called it Los Brazos de Dios—the Arms of God.
The Spanish built a kind of rude fort and waited. The drouth kept on for three more years. Los Brazos still flowed clear and sweet, and memories of the rich mines and the rich bullion left behind began to grow dim. But at last the drouth broke and the grass and weeds sprang from the earth with a great rush. The grass grew so quickly that a powerful and fierce tribe of Indians was down upon the Spaniards before they could leave. Their little settlement was annihilated. Only one man lived to get back to Mexico, and that years later when he was old and feeble; he was so broken that he had no desire ever again to come into the region of the terrible drouth. But a while before he died he wrote out on a piece of parchment the history of that search across the desert for water, the directions, as well as he could give them, to the buried bullion, and this account of the settlement and disaster on the river called Los Brazos de Dios. The hidden dugouts with their wealth have never been found, and history has forgot to record that tragic episode of the first Spanish settlement on the Brazos.
IV
A MIRACULOUS SWIM
The meager details of this legend were supplied by Mr. Charles B. Qualia, Instructor in Spanish at the University of Texas. He says in explanation: “I heard or read the story when I was a child—where or under what circumstances, I know not.”
A Franciscan, so the legend goes, was running for his life from some terrible pursuer. He came to the river, which was so swollen and turbulent that no human being could hope to swim across it. The waters were swirling around tree tops on the banks, and in the middle of the stream great drift trunks were sweeping by. Nevertheless, he plunged in and was miraculously enabled to reach the other side. After he had looked at his helpless pursuer standing far away on the opposite bank and after he had gazed steadily at the waters he had escaped, he kneeled, and, thanking God, said that his deliverance was by “los brazos de Dios.” After that time the phrase came to be applied to the river.
In some way this version may be connected with the “Legend of the Monk’s Leap” as told by Gustave Aimard, in his The Freebooters, A Story of the Texan War. [128] In this legend a pursued monk is helped over a gorge near Galveston by two angels. However, Aimard was one of the most brazen liars that ever lived, and he probably made up the legend as facilely as he made up history and geography.
V
ARMS AVENGING AND SAVING
The following account from Kennedy’s History of Texas [129] has been contributed by Mr. E. G. Little John. As I have suggested, it may, after all, be the original of the better known version quoted from Mrs. Davis. The endless confusion among the earlier Spanish regarding the nomenclature of rivers is fully set forth in the extract from Miss Buckley’s article on the Aguayo Expedition already quoted. Thrall makes the matter a little too simple perhaps when he says: “The Spaniards gave the name of Brazos de Dios to the Colorado, and Rio Colorado to the Brazos, but blundering geographers afterwards interchanged their names.” [130] A French map dated 1733, in the University of Texas archives, has the Brazos River marked the “Therese” and the San Marcos the “San Markos or Colorado.” Mr. Littlejohn’s “Indian legend” of a flood, which follows this legend, seems largely based on the early Spanish confusion of the Brazos and the Colorado.
“About thirty miles from the mouth of the San Saba, there was once a Spanish mission and fort, the destruction of which is thus recorded in Mexican tradition:
“Prosperity reigned at the post, which carried on an extensive trade with the Comanche Indians, and a large revenue was derived from certain silver mines in the vicinity. The mines occupied about one hundred laborers; the post was protected by an equal number of soldiers, and there were some women, who manufactured articles for the Indian trade. At a time when all the soldiers, save about a dozen, were absent on an expedition, the Comanches appeared, under pretense of traffic, and were admitted to the fort in great numbers. At a signal from the chief, the Indians drew weapons concealed under their buffalo robes, and massacred the small guard and the women. The laborers in the mines fled, and were butchered in detail. The priest alone escaped, and by a miracle. The holy man having fled to the Colorado River, the waters divided, permitted him to pass through, and closed upon the pursuing Indians, consigning them to a common grave. After great suffering, the priest reached the Spanish mission of San Juan, at that period the only settlement on the San Antonio River. The absent soldiers, returning in a few days to the fort, where lay the mingled bodies of their companions, found the banks of the Colorado covered with dead Indians, and as they could discern no marks of violence upon them, they pronounced it a retributive miracle, and named the river Brazos de Dios, or ‘the Arm [sic] of God.’ In the ignorance of after times, it received the name of Colorado, which previously distinguished the red and muddy stream now known as the Brazos. The preceding tradition is devoutly believed by the old Mexicans about San Antonio.”
HOW THE BRAZOS AND THE COLORADO ORIGINATED
By E. G. Littlejohn
[It is hardly necessary to point out that this is not an undiluted Indian legend, the names and other elements in it showing Spanish and even American influence. La Salle is said to have called what is now the Colorado “The River of Canes”; the Indians—and again we go back to Thrall [131] for authority—called it the “Pashohono.”—Editor.]
The following legend is an adaptation of “An Indian Legend of the Flood,” signed by Jas. Spillane, reprinted a number of years ago in the Galveston News from the Philadelphia Times.
Long, long ago, long before the coming of the white man, in all the country drained by the Brazos and the Colorado, there was but one great river. It was a mighty stream, the Caney (Old Caney). To the east lived and hunted the Caranchuas; to the west the Ripas, the Lipans, and the Tawakonies. The Wacos lived to the north. The Ripas were warlike and powerful. They made war on the Caranchuas and drove them far to the east, stealing their squaws, killing their young men, and forcing the remnant of the tribe to flee to the islands of the sea. Likewise the Lipans, the Tawakonies, and the Wacos were driven from their hunting grounds, and the Ripas were masters of the whole land.
The Great Spirit was angry with the Ripas. He sent a messenger to them telling them to restore the squaws that they had stolen, and the horses and cattle, and to make no more war upon his other children. But the Ripas would not listen. They thought themselves more powerful than the Great Spirit himself, and determined to make war upon him. They sought out the messenger with defiance in their hearts, to challenge the Great Spirit to battle. But no messenger could be found. They searched the woods, the prairies, the river, the sky, but he had left no trail.
Then a great fear fell upon them, and some of the chiefs wanted to make peace with the Great Spirit. They called their wise men together to take counsel as to what they should do to turn away the anger of the Great Spirit. And while they held talk the heavens opened, the rain fell, the thunder roared, and the sky seemed all afire. In the midst of the fire the messenger appeared, his face glowering, his hand raised in menace. The Ripas threw themselves on their faces and begged the Great Spirit for mercy. And still the rain poured, the lightning flashed, the thunder crashed, and the whole earth rocked and shook as with an ague. The water soon rose and covered the earth. Then the Ripas ran for the trees. The wind blew down the trees and many of the Ripas were killed or drowned. The water rose higher and higher, and the rain and the thunder and the lightning lasted for many days. And there was no earth; all was water.
Then the Great Spirit smiled. The Ripas were no more. The waters had swallowed them up. To the Caranchuas on the islands came the messenger. He told them of the fate of the Ripas. He bade them return to their homes.
When the Caranchuas returned, all was changed. Where had been the great river was now but a small stream, Caney. The great river was now two rivers, the white man’s Brazos on the east, the red man’s Colorado on the west. Between the rivers were the hunting grounds of the Caranchuas, the gift of the Great Spirit.
MISCELLANEOUS LEGENDS
THE WHITE STEED OF THE PRAIRIES
By W. P. Webb
The wild horses of the plains were descendants of the Spanish horses that escaped from the conquistadores of the sixteenth century. Under the favorable conditions these horses multiplied and spread from Mexico and Texas up the great plains corridor to Canada. They went in large herds, each led by a stallion. Now, this stallion was leader because he was the best horse in the herd. He led by fleetness of foot, by courage to fight, and by strength sufficient to kill or drive out every horse that disputed his supremacy. Not only did he lead the horses, but he actually herded them, controlled them, dominated them. By the very law of survival he had to be unusual. Not only did he have to be strong and fleet, but he had to be wise and wary as well, full of good horse sense.
When settlers began to push on to the plains of the West, and to capture and domesticate wild horses, it was quite natural for the leaders of these herds to captivate the imagination of the vaqueros and cowboys. The stallion leader of the herd was the object of desire of every man of the West. Where a man was little better than the horse he rode, he naturally desired a good horse above all else, save a saddle to house him under. Now, the leader of the herd was not only a good horse; he was the best horse, with all the endurance, speed and intelligence that were so dear to the riders of the plains. These qualities made him the object of desire of every plainsman, and the hero among them was the man who could take the stallion leader. But to take the leader today was not to destroy leadership. Tomorrow another stallion would lead the herd. There was always a leader. The individual horse might be captured, but the quality of leadership could never be caught—it resided in the herd because it was a part of it. Now, it was this quality of leadership that became the object of desire. But since this quality of leadership could never be captured, the desire for it was a desire for the unattainable, the impossible.
Out of these conditions and facts grew the legend of the White Steed of the Prairies, that superb horse, a super-horse that had all the desirable and unusual qualities, all the speed, all the endurance, all the beauty that imagination could give him. Since he had all these attributes, everybody wanted him, but nobody could take him. He was ubiquitous, ethereal, a mere ideal, a phantom of the plainsman’s mind, and he ranged from Canada to Mexico.
One of the best accounts of the White Steed of the Prairies, or the Pacing White Stallion, as he was sometimes called, was given by Kendall, [132] when writing of his experiences in Texas in 1841.
“Many were the stories,” he says, “told that night in camp, by some of the old hunters, of a large white horse that had often been seen in the vicinity of the Cross Timbers and near Red River. That many of these stories, like a majority of those told by gossiping campaigners, were either apocryphal or marvelously garnished, I have little doubt; but that such a horse has been seen, and that he possesses wonderful speed and great powers of endurance, there is no reason to disbelieve. As the camp stories ran, he has never been known to gallop or trot, but paces faster than any horse that has been sent out after him can run; and so game and untiring is the ‘White Steed of the Prairies,’ for he is well known to trappers and hunters by that name, that he has tired down no less than three race-nags, sent expressly to catch him, with a Mexican rider well trained to the business of taking wild horses. * * *
“The Mexican who was sent out to take the wild steed, although he mounted a fresh horse as the one he was riding became tired, was never near enough the noble animal to throw a slip-noose over his head, or even to drive him into a regular gallop. Some of the hunters go so far as to say that the white steed has been known to pace his mile in less than two minutes, and that he can keep up this rate of speed until he has tired down everything in pursuit. Large sums of money have been offered for his capture, and the attempt has been frequently made; but he still roams his native prairies in freedom, solitary and alone. The fact of his being always found with no other horse in company is accounted for, by an old hunter, on the ground that he is too proud to be seen with those of his class, being an animal far superior in form and action to any of his brothers. This I put down as a rank embellishment, although it is a fact that the more beautiful and highly formed mustangs are frequently seen alone.” [133]
Kendall’s account in the New Orleans Picayune inspired the poet to sing of this wonderful horse. The following, by J. Barber, appeared in The Democratic Review for April, 1843: [134]
THE WHITE STEED OF THE PRAIRIES
Mount, mount for the chase! let your lassos be strong, And forget not sharp spur and tough buffalo thong; For the quarry ye seek hath oft baffled, I ween, Steeds swift as your own, backed by hunters as keen.
Fleet barb of the prairie, in vain they prepare For thy neck, arched in beauty, the treacherous snare; Thou wilt toss thy proud head, and with nostrils stretched wide, Defy them again, as thou still hast defied.
Trained nags of the course, urged by rowel and rein, Have cracked their strong thews in the pursuit in vain; While a bow-shot in front, without straining a limb, The wild courser careered as ’twere pastime to him.
Ye may know him at once, though a herd be in sight, As he moves o’er the plain like a creature of light— His mane streaming forth from his beautiful form Like the drift from a wave that has burst in the storm.
Not the team of the Sun, as in fable portrayed, Through the firmament rushing in glory arrayed, Could match, in wild majesty, beauty and speed, That tireless, magnificent, snowy-white steed.
Much gold for his guerdon, promotion and fame, Wait the hunter who captures that fleet-footed game; Let them bid for his freedom, unbridled, unshod, He will roam till he dies through these pastures of God.
And ye think on his head your base halters to fling! So ye shall—when yon Eagle has lent you his wing; But no slave of the lash that your stables contain Can e’er force to a gallop the steed of the Plain!
His fields have no fence save the mountain and sky; His drink the snow-capped Cordilleras supply; ’Mid the grandeur of nature sole monarch is he, And his gallant heart swells with the pride of the free.
The legend of the White Steed of the Prairies has almost died out. One can pick it up now only from the older generation, from those who have recollections of the open country when Texas was held together by rawhide and dominated by horsemen. When one of these early Texans was asked if he had heard of the Pacing White Stallion, he replied: “Yes, I have heard of him from the Canadian to the Llano.” But one finds little variation in these stories. There is no room for the White Steed of the Prairies in a country where horses are no longer wild and free. He is now all but a forgotten memory of a past unreality. [135]
THE LEGEND OF SAM BASS
By W. P. Webb
Sam Bass was born in Indiana—that was his native home, And at the age of seventeen young Sam began to roam. He first came out to Texas, a teamster for to be; A kinder hearted fellow you scarcely ever see.
This bit of biography of the Texas bandit was probably the first poem the writer learned outside the home circle. He learned it at the age when it was a great privilege to be permitted to pad along in the freshly plowed furrow at the heels of the hired man, Dave. Not only was Dave the hired man, he was a neighbor’s boy, and such a good poker player that he developed later into a professional gambler. But at the time I write of Dave was my tutor in Texas history, poetry, and music, all of which revolved around Sam Bass. To me and to Dave, Sam Bass was an admirable young man who raced horses, robbed banks, held up trains, and led a life filled with other strange adventure. At length, this hero came to an untimely end through a villain named Murphy, “who gave poor Sam away.” It was a story calculated to capture the imagination of young men and small boys. All over Texas hired men were teaching small boys the legend of Sam Bass, a story which improved in the telling according to the ability of the teller.
Not only was the story thus told. Men of high station in life, the lawyers, judges, and oldtimers, congregated around the courthouse of this western county and told of how Sam rode through the country at night after one of his daring robberies. Once a posse organized to go out and take Sam Bass. The leader of the posse was a lawyer, a smart man, and he knew exactly where Sam could be found and how he could be taken. He bravely placed himself at the head of a group of heavily armed men; he assured them that they would take the bandit and share the liberal reward that had been set on his head. They rode away into the night, they approached the lair of the fugitive; they knew they had him—at least the leader knew it. But that was the trouble. Sam did not run; therefore, the posse could not pursue. Sam seemed too willing to be approached; that willingness was ominous. Sam was such a good shot, so handy with a gun. The posse paused, it halted, consulted with the leader. The leader’s voice had lost its assurance. The posse that had ridden up the hill now rode down again. Sam Bass could not be found! And until this day, when old-timers get together in that county some one is sure to tell the story of that hunt. The wag of the courthouse, a lawyer, reduced it to writing, and on such public occasions as picnics and barbecues, he will read the account of “How Bill Sebasco Took Sam Bass.” It was cleverly done and made as great hit with the public as did Dave’s rendition of the song and story to the small boy. In both cases all sympathy was with Sam Bass, all opinion against Murphy and Bill Sebasco.
Thus in West Texas, from the judge in the courthouse to the small boy in the furrow behind the hired man, was the story of Sam Bass told. What was taking place in this county was occurring, with proper variations, in every other county in the state, especially in those of the north and west. The legend of Sam Bass was in the process of becoming. Today it would fill a volume.
Few are the facts known relative to Sam Bass, but some of them are these: Samuel Bass was from Indiana. He was born July 21, 1851, came to Texas, raced horses, made his headquarters in Denton County, participated in some bank robberies and train holdups. He became the recognized leader of his band and enjoyed a wide reputation, which he achieved before he was twenty-seven years old. In the summer of 1878 he left Denton County with the intention of robbing a bank or train. With him were Murphy, the man who had arranged to sell him out to the officers of the law, also Seaborn Barnes and Frank Jackson. The plan was made to rob the Round Rock bank on Saturday, July 20, 1878. En route to Round Rock, Murphy sent a note to Major John B. Jones, adjutant general of Texas, giving their plan. The result was that when Bass reached Round Rock the town was full of Texas Rangers and other officers of the law. On Friday Bass with Jackson and Barnes went into Round Rock to look over the ground before their attempt to rob. While purchasing tobacco in a store adjoining the bank, they were accosted by officers of the law, and a battle ensued. Barnes was killed on the spot, along with an officer. Bass escaped with a mortal wound, was found next day in the woods, and died the following day, Sunday, July 21, 1878. On that day he was twenty-seven. Frank Jackson made good his escape and has never been heard from since.
From these facts, the legend of Sam Bass has grown. Legend and fact are inextricably mixed. I shall make no effort to separate the one from the other, but shall set all down, much as I heard it.
Bass died gamely, as he lived. He refused to give any of his comrades away, though he was rational until the end. “If a man knows any secrets,” he said, “he should die and go to hell with them in him.” Bass said that he had never killed a man, unless he killed the officer in Round Rock. Frank Jackson wanted to remain and help Bass, but the latter, knowing he was near the end, persuaded Jackson to leave him, and gave him his horse to ride.
Bass and his men had camped near some negro cabins at Round Rock, not far from the cemetery. Bass had an old negro woman, Aunt Mary Matson, to cook some biscuits for him and to grind some coffee. When she had done this, Bass gave her a dollar. He then asked, “Have you ever heard of Sam Bass?” She told him she had. “Well, you can tell them you saw Sam Bass,” he said, and went away.
His generosity was well known. He always paid for what he got from individuals. He was particularly considerate of poor people. He would give a poor woman a twenty-dollar gold piece for a dinner and take no change. He paid the farmers well for the horses he took from them, though sometimes he did not have time to see the farmer.
Sam Bass relics are scattered over the country, everywhere. Some say that he gave his gun to Frank Jackson. Others declare he surrendered it to the officers who found him. His belt with some cartridges in it is in the library of the University of Texas. A carpenter at Snyder has a horseshoe from Bass’s best race horse nailed to the top of his tool chest. Near Belton are some live oak trees that Bass is said to have shot his initials in while riding at full speed. Horns of steers supposed to have been killed by Bass sell over the country at fancy prices. In Montague County there is a legend of $30,000 of loot buried by Sam Bass. Again, he is supposed to have left treasure in the Llano country. At McNeill, near Austin, there is a cave in which Sam Bass hid when he was in retirement. There he kept his horses and from there he made his forays.
Finally, when Sam was dead, legend wrote an epitaph on his monument which is not there. The legendary epitaph reads:
“Would That He Were Good as He was Brave.” No such inscription can be deciphered on Bass’s monument. The monument has been badly mutilated by souvenir collectors, but the inscription remains.
Samuel Bass Born July 21, 1851 Died July 21, 1878 Aged 27 Years
In the lower right hand corner of the block on which the inscription appears is the name of the maker, C. B. Pease, Mitchell, Indiana. The people of Round Rock say that the monument was erected by a member of his family about a year after Bass’s death.
More interesting than Bass’s rather pretentious monument is that of his comrade, Seaborn Barnes, who sleeps the long sleep by his side. A rough sandstone stands at the head of this grave. It has been chipped away until the name is gone. The inscription, however, remains along with the date of his death. Were there no legend of Sam Bass in Texas, this inscription would make one. It is written in language Bass would have loved; it has a certain impertinence to law abiding people in the nearby graves, a certain pride in the leader at whose heels Barnes died. The epitaph contains seven words. The spirit of the person who wrote the seven words of that epitaph is the spirit that has created the legend of Sam Bass in Texas.
He Was Right Bower to Sam Bass
THE HORN WORSHIPERS
By L. D. Bertillion
[From an ethnological point of view, the legend, or more properly myth, of “The Horn Worshipers” is the most interesting in this collection of legends. None of the scholars at the annual meeting of the American Anthropological Society held in New York, December, 1923, knew any parallel for it among the aborigines of America.
However, horns have been significant among many primitive peoples. Many of the Plains Indians of America, notably the Sioux, wore buffalo horns, and if I mistake not the totem of one tribe was a head of buffalo horns. However, the buffalo horn was to the Plains Indian merely a symbol of the power that he admired, an emblem of the animal that he was so far dependent on for food and shelter. In the Asia Magazine for December, 1922, is a picture of a pair of ox-horns fastened over the entrance to a village near Rodosto, Turkey. The horns so fastened are said to bring good luck to those who pass under them.
The medicinal properties ascribed to horns among primitive peoples have a corollary interest here. In a letter accompanying his legend of “The Horn Worshipers,” Mr. Bertillion says: “As late as ten years ago I bought a beautiful pair of buck horns, several points of which I had to sharpen because they had been sawed off a half inch or more for the purpose of curing some disease, which, to the best of my memory, was measles, the cure being a dose of pulverized horn, about a teaspoonful.”
In the same letter, Mr. Bertillion encloses a clipping from a syndicated article appearing in the McKinney, Texas, Examiner, November 9, 1922, which tells of an Indian rhinoceros horn presented to Pope Gregory XIV in 1590 as a protection against poisoning. According to the article, “The horn given to the pope by the prior and brothers of the monastery of St. Mary of Guadalupe in Spain, was credited with sweating in the presence of poison, by the way of warning, and if powdered and taken internally, with acting as an antidote. The tip is missing. It was cut off in 1591 and administered to the pope in his last illness.”
I myself recall as a pioneer remedy for distemper in horses, the smoke of burning horn-chips and rags, funneled through a horn up the horse’s nostrils. The Mexicans sometimes used the same remedy for colds.
The underground palace of this legend of “The Horn Worshipers” is a feature common to the lore of many peoples. “The Aztecs,” says Lewis Spence, [136] “believed that the first men emerged from a palace known as Chicomoztoc (The Seven Caverns), located north of Mexico. Various writers have seen in these mystic recesses the fabulous ‘seven cities of Cibola’ and the Casas Grandes, ruins of extensive character in the valley of the River Gila, and so forth.” [137] Then Spence adds a comment on the number seven pertinent also to the legend of “The Horn Worshipers”: “The allusion to the magical number seven in the myth demonstrates that the entire story is purely imaginary and possesses no basis of fact.”
The legend of the underground palace has various forms even in Texas. There are rumors of an underground palace near Leander in Williamson County and of another on the Blanco River. Some such story is connected with the Devil’s Cave on the Devil’s River; with a vast underground passage that workmen are said to have discovered while excavating for the foundation of the second Austin dam; and with the Carlsbad Mammoth Cave, located on the Texas-New Mexico line in the Guadalupe Mountains.
Mr. Bertillion says that he knows a man who claims to have discovered about fifteen years ago a great house within a mountain in West Texas, perhaps a hundred and fifty feet below the surface. This man was out with a surveyor. Searching for a place to set up the flagpole, he discovered a small hole in a rock, “not larger than an ordinary apple.” Secretly, he flashed sunlight into the hole by means of a pocket mirror, and down in a great cave he beheld a wonderful edifice. The details he has kept secret, for he intends to return to the place some day and make his fortune.
Back in the sixties, according to his own account, a Mexican living in Fort Stockton (1911) was carrying the mail between Fort Davis and El Paso. On one trip a band of Indians led by some renegade Mexicans confiscated his mail and express, burned the mail coach, and took him and his horses into an unknown region afterward identified as the Guadalupe Mountains. There, high up on a barren peak, he discovered some giant mahogany logs, “so big that there never has been a car on the Southern Pacific Railroad that could have hauled one of them.” Query: For what else than the palace of the Horn Worshipers could these mighty logs have been transported to that region?
Finally, the palace of the Horn Worshipers inevitably suggests the great legend of the Cave of Montezuma, a version of which follows this.—Editor.]
I am a great lover of horns and have collected and sold many fine pairs. In order to make my collections I have had to keep constantly inquiring for specimens. On one such expedition, a good many years ago, down on the border, I met a very old Yaqui Mexican, by the name of Pedro Osabia, as I remember.
When I made inquiry after long-horned cattle, he told me that the long-horned cattle were all dead and that their worshipers were all dead, but that the spirits of the Horn Worshipers never die, but enter into new men when the bodies they inhabit decay. He said that if I continued strong in the worship, some day I would find plenty of long horns.
Further interrogation brought out the story that long years ago—more years than man can count—this whole world belonged to one man, and that this one man lived in a grand temple, such as men do not know how to build any more, and that this temple is located inside one of the great peaks of the Jeff Davis Mountains. This Ruler of the whole world had his subjects scattered over all the earth wherever caves could be found or made in cliffs. And every seven years these subjects journeyed from their caves and their cliffs to the Great Palace to worship, each worshiper bringing the longest horns he had collected from any animal during the seven years. Then the horns were hung in the great hall of horn worship, and the Supreme Ruler stood amidst the horns as judge. The man bringing the longest horns received the first blessing and was not subject to the laws of the great Ruler for seven years, and those bringing the second and the third longest horns received second and third blessings and were immune from the laws for five and for three years. Furthermore, those who willfully refused to bring horns to the general worship were made servants of those bringing the longest horns to the shrine, and would eventually become dead in soul, thus losing the power to rise after death and enjoy the great horn worship in the wide, free spaces and the open air, where search for food would no longer be a necessity.
Finally, though, a great bird came and flew to the cliffs, and destroyed the dwellers throughout the world, and then, when none came to worship at the great palace, the great Ruler died of grief. Our present race is the offspring from a man who had been banished from some colony for his refusal to contribute horns and to join in their worship. Consequently, the great bird on his flight of destruction missed this outcast, who, having lost his blessing through neglect to worship, was doomed, he and all his generations, to work for a living.
Before he died of his grief the great Owner of the world, knowing that some day the mountain would decay and the deserted palace be exposed, placed a magic wand in the greatest horn in the great horn room. It is there now, waiting for the hand of some one of the soulless to touch it. Finally when the horn is touched, it will rise into space and draw all those who worshiped in full faith to the great horn worship above, where manual labor and death shall be forever unknown.
Such is the story of the first world of men, who were probably the Cliff Dwellers, or the Horn Worshipers!
THE CAVE OF MONTEZUMA
By Leeper Gay
[This legendary “Cave of Montezuma” is in Mexico, but so persistent and numerous are rumors of it across the border in Texas that I do not hesitate to include it among Texas legends. Mr. Gay knows many legends, and he has told me that he has often heard Texans mention Montezuma’s Cave; I myself have heard of it from treasure hunters in Texas. Indeed, legend has placed an Aztec cave, presumably Montezuma’s, in Texas. I am indebted to Mr. W. D. Notley, superintendent of public schools at Del Rio, for the following account:
On the south edge of Del Rio there is a mound of considerable size called Sugar Loaf. Legend has it that it was built by the Aztecs and stored with treasures. In the troublesome times that followed the conquest by the Spanish, the Aztecs built an acequia (irrigation ditch) around it, or alongside it, so as to cut off entrance through the subterranean passage that once led to the great storehouse.—Editor.]
I have at last learned one complete version of the legend of the Montezuma Cave. It cost me seven hours’ hard work, a delay of twenty-four hours in getting home, a deal of cheap drink, a headache, and the suspicion of my relatives; but the man who told me the story was alone worth the price. He is a broken-down newspaper man, “whose story is the story of every man that ever went down into Mexico. It is the story of a coward, the story of a man with a yellow streak down his back.” I was sitting on the plaza at Juarez, absorbed in a religious dance of the Festival, which was being held in front of the cathedral by people dressed as Indians, when Alec Martin came strolling along and sat down beside me. He was a colorless blond, white-faced, and rather small of figure, his neat dress falling into untidiness. His pale blue eyes were supplemented with powerful shell-rimmed spectacles, and as they continued to watch the dancers, I asked him how he liked the dancing. “But you should see the Festival of la Cruz Verde, at Tepic,” he replied without turning his head. From this auspicious beginning, we drifted into conversation, and he told me the legend of the Cathedral de la Cruz Verde. It is a simple story, such as, he explained, overruns Mexico. Observing that he wore no overcoat, although the day was cold, and that he shivered at frequent intervals, I suggested a hot Tom and Jerry. He was not slow in accepting, and since I had begun to find his company excellent, I suggested another, and then a glass of Bordeaux as a lid. He seemed quite shame-faced about not paying for the drinks, and somehow I believed him when he told me that, whatever he was at present, he had been a gentleman at one time.
He could not stay away from the subject of Mexico for long at a time, and since he continued to tell me legends, I asked him for the one about the Montezuma Cave. The liquor that he had taken in the course of the day had begun to affect him, but he would not say anything about the Montezuma Cave except that it had broken him. Presently he insisted that he take me to a bar up next to the Market, where he had credit. I went with him, and we began to drink sotol, which is said to be a fiery liquor, but which I found no worse than red whiskey. But whenever I asked him for the particulars of his story, he would say: “But that is not the important thing; a drink is all that matters.” In the course of time, however, he became thoroughly inebriated, as he confessed to me in a precise, though sometimes uncertain voice. Finally, while my relatives waited in El Paso and my train left without me, he told his story and the legend of the Montezuma Cave. This is the legend that he told me.
When Montezuma was killed by Cortez at the City of Mexico, the room full of gold that had been offered as a ransom for Montezuma was too heavy for Cortez to carry with him in his flight to the coast. Montezuma had foreseen this, and before his death had ordered that the gold be stored safely, where it could lie without danger until his tree fell and he came back to save his people. The Aztec generals, having seen the lack of respect for their gods that the Spaniards had shown, were afraid to bury the treasure in the tomb of Montezuma, and instead had it taken to a cave in the mountains. This cave was at the end of a long canyon, a mere crack in the rock only a few feet wide, although the walls were hundreds of feet high. At the mouth the canyon was twelve feet wide, but it became narrower toward the cave, until there was not passage for a man, unless he crawled on his belly for the last few hundred yards. The Indians worshiped the cave as a shrine after the treasure of Montezuma had been stored there, and made pilgrimages to it, although none but priests were allowed to enter the cave itself. The guardians disposed of unwelcome visitors by dropping rocks on them as they wormed up the narrow canyon.
After the Aztecs perished as a nation, the cave was in Yaqui territory, what was called the Sonora Mountains, and the Yaquis continued to guard the shrine. Renegades and half-breeds sometimes whispered the story of the cave to the Spaniards, but since none of the men who went to hunt for it ever returned, the story became a legend.
Some hundreds of years later, a very drunk Mexican told the story to Martin, who remembered it the next day. At that time he was a correspondent to certain American newspapers, and when he told the story to two of his friends, they wanted to go after the treasure immediately. The Mexican agreed to go with them, and claimed to know where the cave was, having seen the canyon for himself. The expedition was so carefully planned and executed that the little party camped within a few miles of the cave without being discovered by the Indians. That night they went into the cave, taking water and food enough to last them the following day. The next night they came out safely, each carrying about one hundred and fifty pounds of gold. Their good fortune did not desert them, and they were out of Yaqui country before the loss was discovered. When they arrived at the City, they cashed the gold for forty thousand dollars apiece, and for some months lived in great state.
Then, having spent all of their fortune, they decided to return to the Montezuma Cave and to bring out a little more this time. This gold was to be invested, so that each could live off his interest. As they had done before, they camped a few miles from the mouth of the canyon, and entered the cave at night. The next night they started out of the canyon, but as they stepped out on the plain in front of the canyon, they were taken quietly in charge by the Yaquis, who had watched them from the time that they had first come into the country. The Mexican was sacrificed to the old gods, for he was part Indian and had betrayed the secret of the cave, but the Americans were first tortured and then kept about the camp as slaves. In a few weeks two of them died. Martin finally escaped, but not until he was broken physically.
From that day on, his bad luck had followed him. He had come back to El Paso, on his way to Mexico, but on the morning that he arrived, he had broken the mirror in his room and the friends that he had expected did not arrive. His savings had gradually dribbled away, until he had sold his watch and pawned his overcoat, with winter almost at hand.
When the story was finished, Martin added, somewhat lamely: “This Mexico has broken me; it’s made a bum and a drunkard out of me, but I love it. I can’t stay away from it. I’ve been out of it fifteen months this time, and now I’m going into it again.”
THE FIRST CORN CROP IN TEXAS
By A. W. Eddins
Have you ever heard how Grandma when she was a young girl made the first corn crop in Texas, and how the only tools she had to make it with were a hound dog and a big stick? This is the way she told the story.
After Stephen F. Austin had secured the grant of land for his colony in Texas, he returned to his home and gathered the families to settle it. He leased the schooner Lively at New Orleans, loaded it with farm tools and supplies, and sent it to the mouth of the Colorado River to meet the colonists. The Lively was lost, and no word of her or her crew has ever been heard. [138]
Meanwhile, Grandma and her family were on their way in an ox wagon. She walked nearly all the way with her sister behind the wagon. They entered Texas at the Red River, and reached the mouth of the Colorado about Christmas. Here they built a cabin and waited in vain for the Lively. The men hunted and the women kept house. They ate venison for bread and fresh bear steak for meat. They needed bread, but had no tools for planting the corn.
Now the Colorado River bottom was covered with a heavy growth of reed cane. The dogs ran a bear into this canebrake and the boys set it on fire, and as it burned the cane popped and roared like guns in a battle. When the fire was out, where the canebrake had been was a wonderfully clean field, covered with ashes and as loose and mellow as plowed land.
Grandma took a sharp stick and punched the holes, and her sister dropped a grain of corn in each hole and then covered it with her foot. In a few days a beautiful crop of corn was growing, but the ground was also covered with young shoots of cane. The planters had neither plow nor hoe but they took big sticks and went in the field and knocked down all the tender cane shoots; they did this three times and then the corn was big enough to shade out the cane. But when the roasting ears began to make, the coons began to destroy the crop. So Grandma tied an old hound dog in the midst of the corn field, and he barked all night and scared the varmints away. The colonists soon had plenty of bread, and before time to plant the next crop they had secured farming tools from the East.
LA CASA DEL SANTA ANNA
By A. W. Eddins
The children in the Navarro School of San Antonio often express some original and interesting ideas in their Texas history classes. They do not know such a thing as the Alamo; to them it is “La Casa del Santa Anna” (Santa Anna’s house), and they have many interesting stories of what “mi padre grande” said about this old landmark in Texas history and the remarkable things that have happened there.
A very interesting story that seems to be known and believed by nearly all the pupils is that of the old cave, or underground passage, that formerly connected the Alamo with the San Pedro Springs. The entrance to this cave was covered with a big round stone in the very middle of the Alamo. By lifting the stone and going down the steps and following the dark, crooked path, first down, then up, through some water and some mud, one finally came out in a clump of bushes near the big spring in what is now the San Pedro Park. The priests often used this passage to communicate with their friends when the Indians made it unsafe to leave the Alamo by any other way.
Santa Anna learned about it from an old priest, and by this means was able to get his men inside of the Alamo on the last, fatal day of the siege. Since that time the cave has been partly filled and cannot be used any more, but the place where it formerly opened in the park is still pointed out by the old people, and the children are strong in their belief of its existence.
LOST CANYON OF THE BIG BEND COUNTRY
By J. Frank Dobie
I
The legend of a lost canyon somewhere in the Big Bend country has had a long and wide circulation. When I was in the Big Bend country some fourteen years ago I heard of it as being “an old story.” A version of the legend came out in the Western Story Magazine, December 2, 1922. Early in 1923, the “Cattle Clatter” department of the San Antonio Express reprinted an enlarged version of the Western Story Magazine legend, giving its source as the New York World. A syndicated feature article was probably the source of both versions.
According to the World legend, a Mexican by the name of Lopez had come into Sanderson from an exploring expedition initiated on the Mexican side of the Rio Grande. He and a Mexican vaquero had followed up a gorge that emptied into the Rio Grande until the gorge widened out into a green valley, an oasis, wherein were grazing a herd of perhaps five hundred buffaloes.
In all of the legends the valley is stocked with buffaloes, notwithstanding the fact that buffaloes were never in the Big Bend country. [139] The wild and inaccessible nature of this country, however, gives color to the idea of a lost canyon. Maps in the State Land Office at Austin still show a stretch of unsurveyed territory along the river. Akin to “Lost Canyon” must be the “Lost Mountains,” which are said to lie beyond the Davis Mountains.
The idea of a “lost” land is probably as old as any legend of mankind; it luxuriates in the lore of modern seamen; but it may not be generally known that regions of the modern West other than the Big Bend also claim “lost” areas. No longer ago than February 2, 1923, the San Antonio Express published a news story to the effect that Zane Grey had discovered a lost plateau in Arizona inhabited by mustangs that had some secret pass, unknown to man, down to water in the valley. Six days earlier the same newspaper printed a dispatch from Scenic, South Dakota, descriptive of a legendary oasis in an uncharted Bad Lands. According to a tradition handed down by the Sioux Indians, inaccessible bluffs and walls enclose a garden-like place “rich in food, sunlight, warmth and pure running water.” Before the coming of the pale-faces this protected spot was the home of Wankinyan (the Thunder Bird), and no man has ever entered it to return. The story suggests that the legend of the Lost Canyon in the Big Bend may be of Indian origin.
There is a legend connected with another secret canyon of the upper Rio Grande country that seems to owe its existence to the Indians. Walter B. Stevens in his Through Texas, published in 1892, tells of “The Mystery of Diablo Canyon.” [140] The canyon, so the legend goes, was sacred to the Indians, and only a few of their number knew its nature. In it was an abundance of game and of pure water, but no white man could ever find the water. Dry hides, sprinkled with sod and covered with grass, concealed it cunningly.
II
West Burton of South Austin and I were on a hunting trip down below San Antonio. The talk had been, as usual, on old days and lost mines and trails. I brought up the subject of Lost Canyon. “Yes,” said he, “I have heard of the place many times, but I never believed that it existed till I met an old prospector in Mexico who had once been in the place.
“This prospector was a broke man when I saw him, broke in more ways than one, but he could tell his story straight. He was prospecting down the Rio Grande in a skiff or canoe, putting in at various canyons and gorges to examine for minerals. At a certain rapids his boat got snagged so that he could not fix it, and there was nothing for him to do but to strike out afoot. He made up a small pack of a blanket and some provisions, and with a rifle struck north up a steep ravine, intending somehow to reach the Southern Pacific Railroad.
“The ravine that he took up was so narrow and rough that in some places he could hardly travel, but after a while it began to open out, and imagine his surprise when it spread into a kind of basin that stretched out farther than he could see. The grass in it was as green as a wheat field, though there was a drouth on, as usual, and there were springs of pure, sweet water; but the thing that made him rub his eyes was a herd of buffaloes, perhaps a hundred or more. The prospector killed one for meat, and camped for two or three days by a spring, while he got a good fill of the meat and jerked as much as he could take with him. Then he set out towards the north again.
“He found when he tried to get out that the basin was rimmed in by a high bluff up which there was apparently no trail. But after he had trailed himself around a good deal, he discovered a kind of gorge that he climbed out through. No buffalo could ever get out or in through it, he said. When he got up on top of the rim he was in the Chisos Mountains, unfenced, even unclaimed, some of them, I guess. He was in a country that no outpost of a range rider ever comes into, that no trapper has ever entered. There’s no reason why a human being should go into that country. The wonder to me is that this prospector tried to make his way over it. His way was crookeder than a devil’s walking cane—if you have ever seen one of them. They are about the only things that grow in that country, you know. But he kept on generally north. He nearly perished for water, and only the moisture of the jerked buffalo that he had had sense enough not to salt kept him from parching to death. He threw away all of his pack but that jerkie.
“Finally, somehow, by the help of the Lord, he reached the railroad somewhere between Sanderson and Marathon, and as luck would have it, he stumbled right into the camp of a construction gang. The cook of the outfit was an old Mexican who had worked for his father and knew him. This cook gave the prospector only a little beef broth and would not let him have that except in sips. And so in a few days he got over his terrible experience.
“From the camp he went on to Sanderson and actually raised an expedition to go back and find the canyon of buffalo. But he never could find the way back across to it. He says that he knows now that the only way ever to reach it is to enter it from the Rio Grande, up that narrow gorge.”
A TRADITION OF LA SALLE’S EXPEDITION INTO TEXAS
By Alex. Dienst
The original of the letter that follows is in my possession, having been given to me by Governor George C. Pendleton, to whom it is addressed. It is my impression that the writer of this letter was, in 1891, connected with the Department of Statistics, History, and Insurance, at Austin. De León could not have been “Governor of Texas and Coahuila” in 1688, for the states were not united until long afterward. [141]
Austin, Texas, September 9th, 1891
Hon. Geo. C. Pendleton, Belton, Texas.
Dear Mr. Pendleton: You will please accept my thanks for your note of the 5th inst. I appreciate very highly your promise to obtain for me such information as you can in reference to La Salle. I would however, be very sorry to give you any trouble about the matter.
I have obtained a copy of the official report made by Gen. Alonzo De Leon, Governor of Coahuila and Texas, to the Spanish Government. This report contains the account of a Frenchman who was reported to be living in Texas where he had congregated several thousand Indians together and had acquired such authority over them that they not only recognized him as their chief, but treated him with the greatest reverence; always kneeling when in his presence. Gen. De Leon alarmed lest the authority of this Frenchman might be used by the French Government to assert a claim to Texas organized an expedition for his capture. After traveling in a northeast direction for forty leagues from what is now Monclova, Mexico, they reached the Rio Grande and twenty-five leagues beyond that stream, still in the direction of northeast, they found the Frenchman, whom they, with the use of a good deal of diplomacy and artifice succeeded in persuading to accompany them back to Mexico. This occurred in May, 1688; and this Frenchman is said to have been the last survivor of La Salle’s Expedition. I have translated from the Spanish the account of this Frenchman and De Leon’s Expedition. It is a very curious and interesting incident in the early history of Texas, and it was in connection with it that I wished to ascertain if there was any tradition of La Salle having been killed in Bell County as the Frenchman indicates....
Yours Most Respectfully, Betty B. Brewster.
BIG FOOT AND LITTLE FOOT
By Mrs. S. J. Wright
This legend was given me by Mrs. Jack Hardy, now of El Paso, whose home was for several years in Alpine, Brewster County. The time of it goes back only thirty or thirty-five years, and the appearance of the footprints is vouched for today by some of our substantial citizens who were cowpunchers then.
In the Big Bend country campers would awake in the mornings to see tracks of moccasined feet leading to and from the vicinity—apparently of a man and a woman following. Sometimes, after having been trailed for miles, sometimes for shorter distances, suddenly the trail would be lost.
A cowboy sleeping out would awake and say: “Well, boys, ‘Big Foot and Little Foot’ have been here”; and there would be the ghostly footprints. By whom they were made, whence they came, whither they led, is still a mystery. Leaving their mysterious tracks, the treaders came and went as the winds and the rains, and with as little warning.
THE WILD WOMAN OF THE NAVIDAD
By Martin M. Kenney
[This account of “The Wild Woman of the Navidad” has been supplied from her father’s manuscripts by Mrs. Margaret Kenney Kress, Instructor in Romance Languages in the University of Texas.
The line between history and legend is not always definitely drawn. Mr. Kenney called his narrative “a true story”: it is “true” in that it sets down many of the speculations and some of the probably unsubstantiated tales connected with “The Wild Woman.” Herein, the derivation of legend from fact is admirably illustrated, for I must think that all legends, even such improbable ones as that of Romulus and Remus, have their inception in fact. The universal practice of transferring legendary lore concerning one place or person to another place or person does not disprove the theory that fact is at the basis of legend.
The theme of the wild man or the wild woman is not uncommon in legend. People want wild men or wild women to thrill their imaginations. Twenty-five years ago a number of the inhabitants of Live Oak County, Texas, were aroused over tales of a “wild woman.” Two or three deputy sheriffs on her trail stayed at our house one freezing night. The next day they found her huddled in a Mexican jacal—an addle-brained negro woman who was trying to get through the country afoot. Fifteen years later stories in the same county circulated about a “wild cave man.” His diet, according to the tales, was as miraculous as that of the fabled chameleon; his elusive powers as incomprehensible as those of Fortunatus. Rumor grew riotous and fearsome. Finally, some cowpunchers rode the “wild man” down and roped him. He proved to be a Mexican moron who was in hiding for having murdered another Mexican.
Mr. Kenney gives 1837 and 1850 as the dates between which “The Wild Woman of the Navidad” flourished. Victor M. Rose, who treats of the subject sketchily, gives the dates as 1840 and 1850. [142] Both speak of the wide newspaper publicity given the “woman”; and it is interesting to note that during this time of publicity other sections were claiming their “wild men.” Marryat, who cribbed most of his wild west material from current newspapers, published in 1843 an account of a purported “wild man” on Red River.
“One day,” he says, “a report was spread in the neighborhood of Fort Gibson, that a strange monster, of the ourang-outang species, had penetrated the cane-brakes upon the western banks of the Mississippi. Some negroes declared to have seen him tearing down a brown bear; an Arkansas hunter had sent to Philadelphia an exaggerated account of this recently discovered animal, and the members of the academy had written to him to catch the animal, if possible, alive, no matter at what expense.” [143]
The man, it seems, had endured all manner of adventure, which he related to some hunters who shot him. Later he became a wealthy river captain, but probably tales about him as a “wild man” grew even after his death.
Again, in 1851 there was a “wild man” in the Arkansas woods. On May 26th of that year, the Galveston Weekly Journal reprinted a report from the Memphis Enquirer of May 9th, concerning this “wild” being. He is described as long-haired, gigantic in frame, with a footprint thirteen inches in length.—Editor.]
Rising in the gentle hills, between the Colorado and Lavaca rivers, the Navidad River, after a short course, expands into a deep stream which creeps sluggishly through the wide and dense forests that cover the alluvial lands near the sea. Some of the earliest settlements in Texas were made on the Navidad. The dense growth of trees and cane in the river bottom was the haunt of all species of wild animals, which, through fear or ferocity, seek the recesses of the forest.
About the year 1837 there appeared in the settlements of the lower Navidad a phenomenon. The barefoot tracks of two human beings were frequently seen, but the persons who made them kept themselves carefully from sight. It was inferred from the size of the tracks that one was made by a boy and the other by a girl or woman of delicate feet. The two sometimes invaded the sweet potato fields and sometimes helped themselves to a few ears of corn, but seemed to avoid any mischief and took only something to eat. Many conjectures were made, and abandoned as fast as made, as to who they could be. At first they were thought to be runaway slaves. But the size of the tracks demonstrated that they were not negroes, and they avoided making themselves known to the negroes of the country. Then it was supposed that they were some wandering remnant of Indians, and this conjecture was favored by the smallness of the feet. But their conduct was foreign to the Indian character. Indians would not have been so secluded; they would have committed more mischief—or less. The most probable conjecture seemed to be that they were lost children who had become separated from their friends during the hurried retreat of the American settlers from the invading army of Mexico in 1836. It was supposed that they had become so alarmed that, believing the whole world hostile, they kept themselves in innocent ignorance secluded from mankind. But there were grave objections to this theory also. If the supposed lost children had been old enough to maintain themselves in the wilderness, they would not have lacked discretion to make themselves known when their friends returned. Altogether, the riddle remained unsolved. After some years the larger track was no more seen, but the small and slim track frequented the country. Some time later a party of hunters noticed some bones protruding from a pile of sticks and leaves in the woods, and upon investigation discovered there the skeleton of a man. Nothing was noticed by which his race or nation could be determined; indeed, but little was thought of the matter at the time, but afterward it was concluded that the larger of the two strange recluses, who was probably a man, had died, and that his weaker mate, covering his body with sticks and leaves, had furnished as best she could his primitive shroud and sepulture.
However this might be, the small track was often found in the potato fields, where the strange wild being frequently came by night and, after grappling a few potatoes with the hands, went away as stealthily as she came. From the impress of the fingers left in the garden mould it was judged that the hands were small and slim; and from the tracks, which were only a span long, it seemed certain that the author of these little depredations was a woman, and not of the black race, whose feet are all large, flat, and ill-shaped. She was now called “The Wild Woman,” though some called her “It.”
Curious to know what manner of being she was, some young men set a watch at a potato patch where were the signs of her recent depredations. As she was harmless and possibly ignorant of speech, they planned to seize her with their hands, and for this purpose they concealed themselves between the high ridges of the potato vines and waited in silence. At a late hour she came, and as near them as they had expected. The night was dark, but they could see the shadowy form. It was slim and apparently unclothed, but the color could not be distinguished. They sprang out to seize her, but, though they were active young men, she was more agile still, and bounded away as silently and quickly as the flitting of a shadow, and was instantly lost in the darkness.
For a long time she was not heard of. But at length fresh signs of her appeared in a manner that raised curiosity. The settlers were obliged to keep vigilant and fierce dogs to protect the houses and domestic animals against beasts of prey. Trained to guard against the stealthy approach of wild cat and cougar, and accustomed to battle with bear and panther, the dogs were trusted security against the clandestine approach of man or beast. The houses of the early settlers were constructed on the general plan of two log pens connected by a wide porch or hall open at both ends, all under one roof, shade and ventilation being the chief requisites in the southern climate. The saddles, ropes and other horse-gear hung against the wall in the porch; the guns were stacked in the corners of the rooms or rested in racks over the mantels and doors, ready for instant service; and the inmates of the house, skilled in the use of weapons, were scarcely less vigilant than their dogs. Thus guarded, they felt secure from prowling beasts, and confident that no human being would be foolhardy enough to venture clandestinely upon the premises. In the summer time the doors and windows stood open day and night, and all wayfarers coming in good faith were welcome.
To such a house in summer, on a bright moonlight night, when everything was still and the inmates were asleep, The Wild Woman came and entered, stepping over dogs, it would seem. What other search or exploration she made is not known, but she entered the dining room, in which there was an open cupboard containing a plate of meat and a loaf of bread. She took part of the meat, and, breaking the bread in two, she took one half and left the other; and with this mute explanation of her motive, she departed as silently as she came. Not a dog whimpered, and the people of the house were none the wiser until the morning, when this excusable theft excited their curiosity and compassion. But they wondered at the dereliction of the dogs.
The woman did not return to that house for a long time. But she soon entered another house of the same style, guarded by particularly vigilant dogs. In this her search was extended, as shown by the things she moved; but it was also obvious that her motives were not venal. There were gold watches hanging over the mantel, where she moved bottles and powder flasks, and she must have seen them, as the moon was shining brightly in the room. There was silverware in the cupboard, but she took only some scraps of food, taking, as before, only half and leaving half; and she effected her departure without disturbing man or dog. She afterward entered numerous houses in the same strange manner; not a dog would notice her. The negroes became superstitious about her. They called her “that thing that comes,” and for her they used the neuter pronoun.
One winter it was found that she was in the habit of taking corn from a crib. The amount she took was wholly trifling; but from motives of curiosity the opportunity was taken to capture her. All that needed to be done was to watch when she entered the crib, then close the door. The watch was kept for several nights without result, but at length the desired opportunity occurred. The man on watch was inside the crib with his hand on the door. He had fallen into a doze, when the stealthy rustling of the corn husks awoke him. The thing had come. He had only to push the door and call the people. But a superstitious horror seized him. The thought of being shut up alone in the dark, even for a few moments, with the mysterious creature was accompanied by a sudden dread that he could not control. In his fright he cried out, and before he could move a limb the creature was gone with a single bound through the door into the enveloping night.
The compassion of the people arose with their curiosity. The poor creature was welcome a hundred times to what she took in her little forays, harmless to others but so dangerous to herself. Every means was used to communicate with her. Diligent search was made in the canebrake and in the great hollow trees, some of which afforded almost a house. But all in vain; she avoided black and white alike, and no signs of her dwelling could be found in the dark forests where she roamed like some wild animal. Sometimes no sign of her would be seen for months or even years, and the people would cease to think of her; then suddenly she would appear with some trick, if it might be so called, more curious and mysterious than any before.
On one of the plantations the woodworkers’ tools, essential to the early settlers, were kept under an open shed where there was a rough work-bench. From this the owner missed his handsaw, drawing knife, and some other tools. At first he suspected some petty thief. But several weeks afterward the tools were all found returned to their places, the handsaw scoured and polished as bright as a looking glass. What could this mean? It must have been the work of The Wild Woman. The polish put on the saw was wonderful. No one knew before that this familiar metal was susceptible of such a gloss, nor did anyone know the process by which it could be effected. Why did the woman take these tools? Was she building a hut or fixing her residence in some hollow tree? Was she making weapons, rafts, boats? For any imaginable purpose the assortment she took was incongruous, deficient, or superfluous. Why did she return the tools so soon? What could be the meaning of the curious but useless pains she had taken with the saw-blade? Was there some symbolic meaning, a message? Thus speculation ran.
Some time afterward a neighbor missed a log chain. The negro teamster gave it as his opinion that “dat thing what comes must have tuk it.” But a chain twelve feet long weighing thirty pounds or more—what use could that wild animal have for it? The owner said that if he ever “whipped a nigger for being a fool,” he would “skin” that one. Not long afterward, The Wild Woman did come to his house and made the usual round among unconscious watch dogs and sleeping people to her usual prize, the cupboard, where she found a pan of milk, two loaves of bread, a plate of butter, and other things. She took half the plate of butter, dividing it neatly, took one of the loaves, poured half the milk out of the pan into a pitcher, and, taking the latter, departed. Two or three weeks afterward, upon awakening one morning, the family found the pitcher standing on the bare ground before the door and the log chain coiled around it. The chain was scoured and polished as bright as the saw had been. To bring this chain and coil it before the door would seem to have been necessarily a somewhat noisy operation, but the dogs had taken no notice.
The people ceased to wonder at the recusancy of the dogs; it had become an established phenomenon. For seven years or more this strange creature had haunted the country, and all sorts of dogs and several generations of them had been tested. They were mysteriously insensible to the coming of The Wild Woman.
Her next exploit surpassed all and set curiosity on tiptoe. A farmer had a hog fattening in a pen near the house. A bear attempted one night to take it off, but the dogs seized the beast and after a severe fight killed it. The combative spirit of the dogs was so raised by this occurrence that they kept a lively watch, especially on the hog pen; and expecting every night to be treated to another bear fight, all were fiercely alive to the slightest alarm. One night during this state of matters, The Wild Woman brought a poor hog out of the woods and put it in the pen, taking the fat one out and making off with it safely, and not a dog barked or growled. The farmer said that he would have killed every dog on his place if he had thought that they were at themselves when “that thing” swapped hogs with him. There was but one explanation possible: she had bewitched both hogs and dogs. There was no use in fattening the new porker; the negroes would not have eaten a mouthful of it short of starvation. During several years “the thing” repeated this mysterious performance at numerous places. There was one inconvenience attending it: the substituted hog was often the property of a neighbor.
Numerous attempts were made to trail her with dogs, as it was thought that she could not carry so heavy a burden as a fat hog to any great distance. But the dogs always lost the trail as soon as the people following were left out of sight. When the hog taking achievement had ceased to be a wonder, some hunters came accidentally upon one of her camps, and here was material for fresh curiosity. There were piles of sugar cane, which abounded in the neighboring fields. Much of it had been cut into short lengths and chewed; hence it was evident that she knew the use of a knife. There were some curious strings twisted of the outside bark of the cotton plant. There were no signs of fire and no implements. A secret watch was kept on the camp for some time, but the creature did not return. Sometime afterwards, fresh signs of her having been seen, a general hunt was resolved upon. Dogs were procured that had been trained to follow runaway negroes. They came upon the trail and pursued eagerly enough; but the trail led through the ponds of water that abounded in the swamp and soon put the dogs at fault.
A long time followed during which she was not heard of; then her camp was found again at a considerable distance from the former one; she had removed to another section of the country. This fresh evidence raised curiosity to fever heat. There were several things of her own manufacture, baskets and a curious snare made from the fibrous bark of the cotton plant, seemingly intended to catch rabbits or other small animals. There were several articles taken from houses, a spoon, some table knives, and a cup. There was no clothing; her bed was moss and leaves; and there had been no fire. But what excited most curiosity was several books, and these had keen kept dry. In one of the books was a letter of old date, containing tender sentiments and addressed to Miss ——. One of the books was a Bible, and in it were the names of the members of a well-known family in the neighborhood.
What then? Could this strange being not only talk but read? Was she some too high-strung heart that had been so overstrained or embittered in the buffets of the world as to renounce human society and resolutely for many years keep herself secluded in the shadows of the forest? Was it some wild romantic sentiment which had prompted her to seek the savage life of the woods with a companion, and losing him to vow so strange and rude a hermitage? And after so many years was the aching heart seeking solace in the company of old books? Or was she seeking for one book only, taking volumes at random in the dark until the light of morning should reveal the name? Seeking one book, wherein from old is written the way from this bad world to a better one? Such were a few of the thousand questions and conjectures which the discovery of the books suggested. The matter got into the newspapers.
Sympathy and curiosity rose together. If the creature could read, as it seemed by her taking books that she could, why not write her letters and place them where she would be most likely to find them? Letters plainly written in simple language were posted at her recent camp and other places entreating her to make herself known. Home and friends were offered her.
This strange and serious drama was not without a comic side scene. There was an eccentric old bachelor in this country at that time by the name of Moses Evans, who had been nicknamed “The Wild Man of the Woods.” Since there was now a veritable Wild Woman of the woods, it seemed to the wits of the time an eligible match. Several love letters notable for droll wit, over the signature of “Moses Evans, the Wild Man,” addressed to the unknown Wild Woman, were published in the newspapers and widely copied through the United States. But the letters which had been posted on trees at the camp of the poor recluse remained untouched, and nothing occurred to indicate that she understood them.
By this time a general resolution had grown up that this riddle must be solved. A more systematic and cautious plan was adopted. A number of hunters formed extended lines and drove through the woods with leashed hounds, while others, well mounted and provided with lassos, took “stands.” Several fruitless hunts were made, but at length the hunters became satisfied late one evening that the woman was in a neck of woods running out into a prairie something more than a quarter of a mile wide. The men with the lassos took positions along the edge of this prairie while others drove through the skirt of woods with the hounds. It was night before the men were well arranged, but a bright moon shone. It is well known that men accustomed to hunting with hounds, can readily tell what kind of game they are pursuing by the nature of their cry. Scarcely were the men at their posts when the hounds raised a cry never heard before. They were following the track of some strange creature. Presently the breaking of little sticks and the hurried rustling of the brush near one of the lasso men announced the approach of something, which immediately bounded with a light and flying step into the open prairie in the bright light of the moon.
It was The Wild Woman. She ran directly across the prairie in the direction of the main forest. The man was mounted on a fleet horse, and it needed all his speed to bring his rider to an even race with the object of his pursuit. But the horse was so afraid of the strange creature that he could not be urged within reach of the lasso. Three times he came up but each time shied to right or left too far for his rider to throw, while the flying figure each time turned her course to the opposite hand and ran with the speed of a frightened deer. They were now nearing the black shadow of the great forest, which was projected far on the plain. Spurring his horse with angry energy, the pursuer came this time fairly within reach and threw his lasso; but at the instant of throwing, his horse shied as before, and the rope fell short. In an instant the pursued creature was in the shadow of a vast forest and further pursuit was useless. Though disappointed in capturing her, one point was gained: the man had a good look at her as they ran together across the prairie for several hundred yards. She had long hair that must have reached to her feet, but that flew back as she ran. She had no clothes, but her body was covered with short brown hair. The rider did not see her face, as she was between him and the moon, so that whenever she turned toward him her face was in the shadow. Once or twice he thought he caught a glimpse of wild eyes as she cast a frightened glance over her shoulder. She had something in her hand when he first saw her, but she dropped it either from fright or to facilitate her escape. After the chase this was sought for and found. It proved to be a club about five feet long, polished to a wonder.
A long time passed without anything further being seen of her. She seemed to have disappeared. But during the severe winter of 1850, when there was a great sleet and the ground was covered with snow, her camp, or its camp, or the thing’s camp, was found in the brush of a tree that had recently blown down in the tangled thicket of a canebrake in the dark recesses of the woods. At this place there were large piles of sugar cane, much of it chewed. There was a rude bed of moss and leaves, but no fire. There was the strangest set of snares, made like those found before, of the bark of cotton stalks, but these were much more complex. The tracks in the snow were numerous and a span long. A watch was set, but the creature had taken alarm and did not come back.
The winter passed, and some fresh signs being seen, another great muster was made; and equipped with horses, hounds, and ropes, the pursuers made a favorable start on the track. The men took up stations in line and closed in from all sides. In the last resort, as was expected, the creature climbed a tree and was soon looking down with a frightened stare at the troops of baying dogs and the faces of the men upturned in eager curiosity. But here was another disappointment. Instead of the man-like ape to which the glimpse on the prairie had directed general conviction, there was only the well known ape-like man of tropic Africa. The wild creature they were pursuing had, it seemed, by accident or design crossed the trail of a runaway negro; the dogs, taking the latter scent, had been misled, and instead of the wonder they expected the hunters had treed only a negro man. Now they could remember that the cry of the dogs changed during the chase, and it was thought that by going back in time the trail might be recovered.
But this negro was somewhat of a curiosity himself, and they stopped to investigate him. He was entirely nude, an unknown condition for runaways. The hunters bade him come down, but he made no sign of obeying. They asked him to whom he belonged, but he made no answer. They threatened him, but he did not seem to understand. To frighten him into obedience they pointed guns at him, pretending that they would shoot him, but he motioned with his hand for them to desist and go away. They then climbed the tree and took him down by force. He trembled, but said nothing. While looking at him they observed his feet and hands. Could it be, after all, that this was the wild being who had so long evaded the sight of man! They led him through a muddy place to see the track he made. It was measured and found to agree with the measure often taken of the strange wild one. The man was kept confined for some time, and the news of his strange capture was published far and wide. But no owner came forward nor could anything be learned concerning him.
At length a wandering sailor came that way who had been at one of the Portuguese missions on the coast of Africa, and knew the captive’s tribe and spoke enough words of his barbarous language to learn his history. The negro had, when a boy, been sold by his parents for “knife and tobacco” to slave traders, who had him with many others for a long time in a ship at sea. They came at last into a river, where they were landed and kept for some days in a large house, where they had plenty of sugar and sugar cane. He and another, a grown man of his tribe, made their escape and wandered for a long time in the woods, crossing a great many rivers and prairies, he did not know how many. Often they were nearly starved to death, but his companion, skillful to throw the club, had as often taken some animal with which they sustained life. At length they came into the section of the country where he afterwards remained so long. They saw the people passing about, and they saw that some of them were negroes, but were afraid of their clothes; they feared that the negroes were cannibals. His companion died after several years, and ever since he had been alone.
As he was now a man in middle life, he had probably been brought across the sea between 1820 and 1830. His small feet received some explanation. It appears that there is a tribe on the west coast of Africa, perhaps more than one, which have very small feet. We learned from the savage what we did not know before, that there is a certain hour in the night, which varies somewhat with the moon, when the most watchful dogs are sunk in insensible sleep, and a man may walk among them and step over them with impunity. His most extraordinary feat of exchanging the hogs was very simple, but if made known it might get some of his improvident race into trouble.
He was advertised as a stray negro and sold on public account. The purchaser turned him loose among his other negroes, and according to the nature of his race, he remained contented in his new home. The Wild Woman was never afterwards heard of. Public curiosity speedily died away, and nothing more being heard from the negro, he also disappears from history and legend.
BIBLIOGRAPHY OF TEXAS LEGENDS
This bibliography makes no pretension to completeness. Mere references to legends, such as references to buried treasure, are not listed, the citations being confined almost altogether to actual narrative or explanation of narrative. Legends marked with an asterisk are either quoted or retold in this volume. It is hoped that the bibliography will continue to grow. Additions, especially of current newspaper accounts, are invited.
Agreda, Madre de Jesus de. See Blue Woman, The.
Alamo, Ghosts of the. De Zavala, Adina, History and Legends of the Alamo and other Missions in and around San Antonio, San Antonio, 1917, pp. 54–56. Included is a ballad, “Ghosts of the Alamo,” by Grantland Rice, from the New York Tribune.
Alamo, Legend of the Statue of Saint Anthony at the Church of the, De Zavala, op. cit., pp. 56–57.
Antonette’s Leap. See Lovers’ Leap, Mount Bonnell.
Arroyo Hondo, an Indian legend of the origin of. Dyer, J. O., Galveston News, March 28, 1922.
Barton Springs, Indian legend of the origin of. Brown, Frank, Annals of Travis County and the City of Austin, unpublished manuscript in the archives of the University of Texas, Chap. V, p. 29.
“Black Devil,” Mustang Stallion, Ruled Texas. Pioneer legends of a mustang, San Saba country. Dyer, J. O., Galveston News, February 10, 1924, p. 15.
“Black Wolf’s” Indian Legend. An Indian Rip Van Winkle and the coming of the whites. Duval, John C., The Adventures of Big Foot Wallace, 1870, pp. 51–55.
“Blue Woman,” The. Bolton, H. E. (editor), Spanish Explorations in the Southwest, pp. 354–355, 387. *“Letter of Fray Damian Massanet,” translated by Professor Lilia M. Casis, reprinted from Texas State Historical Association Quarterly, Vol. II, pp. 253–312. De Zavala, Adina, History and Legends of the Alamo and other Missions, San Antonio, 1917, pp. 61–62; 103–106. See bibliographical references given by Heimsath, Charles M., “The Mysterious Woman in Blue,” this volume.
Brazos River, legend of the naming of. *Kennedy, William, Esq., Texas: The Rise, Progress, and Prospects of the Republic of Texas, R. Hastings, London, 1841, Vol. I, pp. 167–168. Thrall, H. S., A History of Texas, p. 37. *Davis, M. E. M., Under the Man-Fig, Boston, 1895, pp. 1–3. Girardeau, Claude M., “The Arms of God” (verse), Texas Magazine, Houston, May, 1897, Vol. II, pp. 431–434.
Brazos River, mythical origin of. *Spillane, James, “An Indian Legend of the Flood,” Philadelphia Times (date?); reprinted in Galveston News (date?). See in this volume Littlejohn, E. G., “How the Brazos and the Colorado Originated.”
Brazos River, mysterious music in. *Hudgins, Charles D., The Maid of San Jacinto, New York, 1900, pp. 12–13n.
Brazos River, sea serpent in. Galveston Weekly Journal, May 12, 1853.
Buckner, Strap and the Devil. *Taylor, N. A., Texas the Coming Empire; or, Two Thousand Miles in Texas on Horseback, Barnes and Company, New York, 1877, pp. 74–88.
Cave of Three Raps, The. Stevens, Walter B., Through Texas, St. Louis, 1892, pp. 33–34.
Cherokee Rose, legend of. Austin Statesman, August 25, 1882, p. 3, col. 4. Wylie, Lottie Belle, Legend of the Cherokee Rose and Other Poems, Atlanta, Georgia, 1887, pp. 5–15.
Colorado River, mythical origin of. See Brazos River, mythical origin of.
Concepción de Acuna, Legends of Mission de Nuestra Señora de la Purisima, San Antonio. De Zavala, Adina, History and Legends of the Alamo, etc., pp. 116–117: the milk moistened mortar, the joyous bells.
Death Bird, The Cry of Served as a Warning. Motes, Isaac, Frontier Times, Vol. I, No. 1, October, 1923, pp. 20–21; reprinted from the El Paso Times.
Diablo Canyon, The Mystery of. Stevens, Walter B., Through Texas, St. Louis, 1892, pp. 28–29.
Eagle Lake, legend of. *Morning Star, Houston, June 13, 1839, p. 2. Richmond Telescope, June, 1839; Telegraph and Texas Register, June 19, 1839. *Darden, Mrs. F. A. D., The American Sketch Book (Texas Pioneer Magazine), Austin, Vol. VII, No. 2, 1881, pp. 99–102. Duke, Mrs. Emma, the Eagle Lake Headlight, 1909. *Carothers, Mrs. H. W., “Legend of the Lake,” four-page folder, in verse, “written for the Eagle Lake Chamber of Commerce,” circum 1922.
Egg-Nog Branch, Nacogdoches County, origin of name of. Fuller, Henry C, “The Story of Egg-Nog Branch and Fall of Fredonia Republic,” Houston Chronicle, February 4, 1923.
Enchanted Rock of Llano County. *New York Mirror, October 20, 1838, p. 135: letter of a traveler lately returned from Texas. *Reid, Samuel C., The Scouting Expeditions of McCulloch’s Texas Rangers, Philadelphia, 1848, pp. 111–112. *Dewees, W. B., Letters from an Early Settler of Texas (compiled by Cora Cordelle), Louisville, Kentucky, 1852, p. 152. Brown, Frank, Annals of Travis County and the City of Austin, unpublished manuscript in the archives of the University of Texas, Chap. I, p. 16. Hörmann, von, Pater Alter, Die Tochter Tehuans oder Texas im vorigen Jahrhundert, Fredericksburg Publishing Company, Fredericksburg, Texas, 1917. The book is a fictional expansion of the legend of the Enchanted Rock as told in this volume by Julia Estill. Wehmeyer, I. G., “The Enchanted Rock,” Fredericksburg Standard, September 3, 1921, p. 1. Dietel, William, “An Indian Legend Retold,” Dallas News, May 28, 1922, Magazine Section.
Fig tree at Columbia, Brazoria County. Tree grew out of blood of a murdered man. Davis, M. E. M., Under the Man-Fig, Boston, 1895, p. 9.
Fort Phantom Hill, Old (Jones County). Chittenden, W. L. [Larry], poem in Ranch Verses, New York, 1893, p. 97.
Galveston Bay, legends of life about. Sjolander, John P., “Rhymes of Galveston Bay”: *“The Padre’s Beacon,” Texas Magazine, March, 1911; “Pinto and the Stingaree,” ibid., 1911, pp. 48–50; “The Ballad of the Bayou Belle,” ibid., June, 1912; *“The Boat that Never Sailed,” ibid., May, 1913.
Haunted Mansion, Mitchell Lake, near San Antonio. Barnes, Charles Merritt, Combats and Conquests of Immortal Heroes, San Antonio, 1910, pp. 240–241.
Headless Horseman on the Nueces, legend of. Reid, Captain Mayne, The Headless Horseman, A Strange Tale of Texas, London, 1866, pp. 361–362. The legend may be purely fictitious.
Honca Tree, The Accursed. How it got its thorns. Raht, Carl, The Romance of Davis Mountains and Big Bend Country, El Paso, 1919, pp. 286–293.
Hornsby’s Bend (Travis County), When Spirits Walked at. Dealey, Edward M., Dallas News, October 2, 1921, Magazine Section, p. 3. In Morphis, J. M., History of Texas and Wilbarger, J. W., Indian Depredations in Texas, the incident is told as history and not as legend, and certainly the weight of evidence seems to be on the side of history. The story of “The Scalping of Josiah Wilbarger,” and the consequent apparitions is reprinted from Wilbarger’s Indian Depredations in Frontier Times, Bandera, Texas, Vol. I, No. 6, March, 1924, pp. 28–31.
Huisache, The Spring of the—An Apache Legend. Wright, Mrs. S. J., San Antonio de Béxar, Austin, 1916, 123–124.
Indian Maid’s Vision, An. A legend of the New Braunfels Oak. De Zazala, Adina, Interstate Index—The Pioneer Magazine of Texas, San Antonio, April, 1922, p. 12.
Lafitte, Jean, legends concerning treasure of.
*“Lafitte’s Treasure Vault,” Galveston News, October 27, 1908.
*“Seeking for Buried Treasure,” Houston Post, date uncertain. See “Horror Guarded Treasure of the Neches,” this volume.
*“Pirates and Their Sacks of Gold,” Galveston News, date uncertain.
“Empty Chest Revives Tales of Buried Treasure Horde,” Port Arthur News, July 1, 1923.
“Buried Treasure of Jean Lafitte,” Frontier Times, Vol. I, No. 8, May, 1924, pp. 24–26; reprinted from the San Antonio Light, February 17, 1923.
Lost Canyon in the Big Bend of Texas. *“A Lost Valley in a Texas Canyon,” Western Story Magazine, December 2, 1922. The same account, evidently syndicated, appeared in the New York World early in 1923 and was reprinted in “Cattle Clatter” of the San Antonio Express early in 1923.
Lost Company of Irish Troops, tradition of, on the Rio Grande. Richardson, T. C, “Trodding [sic] ‘Old Rough and Ready’s’ Path through the Brownsville Country,” Houston Chronicle, November 26, 1922.
Lost Mines. See Treasure Legends.
Lovers’ Leap (also Lover’s Leap and Antonette’s Leap), Mount Bonnell, Austin. *Morphis, J. M., History of Texas, New York, 1874, pp. 510–513. Reprinted in the Austin Tribune, circum 1908, according to Miss Louise von Blittersdorf. Swisher, Bella French, The American Sketch Book (Texas Pioneer Magazine), Vol. IV, 1879, pp. 94–95. The legend is incorporated in “A Historical Sketch of Austin,” and is said to be reprinted from the Courier-Journal. Two years later Bella French Swisher incorporated it in a story called “Mount Bonnell,” which appeared in The American Sketch Book, Vol. VII, No. 1, 1881, p. 34. Whitten, Martha E., “Mount Bonnell,” in Texas Garlands, “Author’s Edition,” Chicago, 1889, pp. 218–221; verse. Rumpel, Charles Frederick, in Texas Souvenir [Poems], Austin, 1903, p. 36. Rumpel plays with the legend in vers de société. Brown, Frank, Annals of Travis County and the City of Austin, unpublished Ms., University of Texas, Chap. VI, p. 49. The Brown account, essentially the same as that of Morphis, appeared in the Austin American, under the title “Austin’s Romantic History,” January 20 and January 27, 1924. Moreland, Sinclair, The Noblest Roman, 1910, 1911, pp. 256–257.
Lover’s Leap, South Llano, Kimble County. *Jaques, Mary J., Texan Ranch Life, London, 1894, p. 255.
Lover’s Leap, Santa Anna. *Callan, Austin, Santa Anna Beautiful, Santa Anna, Texas, 1907. Pamphlet.
Lover’s Leap, Waco. Everett, W. E., “The Legend of Lovers’ Leap,” Waco Times-Herald, December 19, 1913; verse. Scarborough, Dorothy, “Traditions of the Waco Indians,” Publications of the Folk-Lore Society of Texas, No. I, pp. 50–51.
Margil, Fray Antonio, “The Blessed,” also called “The Venerable,” legends of.
“The Blessed Margil’s Enchantment—A Legend of the San Antonio Valley,” Wright, Mrs. S. J., San Antonio de Béxar, Austin, 1916, pp. 127–128. Barnes, Charles Merritt, Combats and Conquests of Immortal Heroes, San Antonio, 1910, “Legend of Enchantment,” pp. 80–81. The versions are practically the same.
*“The Holy Spring of Father Margil at Nacogdoches,” Fuller, Henry C., Galveston News, 1902. Contributed to this volume by Littlejohn, E. G.
“The Margil Vine, Legend of the First Christmas at the Alamo,” De Zavala, Adina, folder, stitched, San Antonio, 1916. Reprinted in History and Legends of the Alamo and Other Missions in and around San Antonio, by De Zavala, San Antonio, 1917, pp. 65–68.
*Legend of the mission bells ringing at the death of Father Margil, De Zavala, op. cit., pp. 150–151.
See also San Antonio River, origin of.
Medina, The Maniac of. Domenech, The Abbê, Missionary Adventures in Texas and Mexico, London, 1858, pp. 113–116.
Mexicans, transmigration of souls of into mesquites. [Page, D.], Prairiedom: Rambles and Scrambles, “by a Suthron,” New York, 1845, pp. 129–130.
Miracles, The Lord of. “Legend of el Señor de los Milagros,” De Zavala, History and Legends of the Alamo, etc., pp. 195–196.
Mocking Bird, Origin of. “Origin of the Mocking Bird, A Legend of Southern Texas,” Sale, Ellen L., Ladies’ Messenger, July, 1888; reprinted in The Bohemian, “Souvenir Edition,” Fort Worth, 1904, pp. 99–100. Verse; lovelorn Indian maiden drowns herself in the San Antonio River; her soul takes the form and song of the mocking bird. According to Mrs. A. B. Looscan, the legend has also been written in verse by Lee C. Harby for either the Gulf Messenger or Texas Magazine, Houston publications. Complete files of these magazines are difficult to find.
Monk’s Leap. Aimard, Gustave, The Freebooters, A Story of the Texan War, Philadelphia (no date given), Chap. XXIII.
Mount Bonnell. See Lovers’ Leap, Mount Bonnell.
Navajoes, a legend of the. “The Dancing Man,” Hunter’s Frontier Magazine, Vol. I, No. 1, May, 1916, pp. 17–18.
Pacing White Stallion, or White Steed of the Prairies. *Kendall, George W., Narrative of the Texan Santa Fe Expedition, New York, 1844, pp. 88–89. Marryat, Captain, Narrative of the Travels and Adventures of Monsieur Violet in California, Sonora, and Western Texas, Leipzig, 1843, pp. 155–156. Marryat purloined his material largely from Kendall’s account as it appeared in the New Orleans Picayune. *Barber, J., “The White Steed of the Prairies,” The Democratic Review, New Orleans, April, 1843, Vol. XII, p. 367 ff. A ballad.
Pecos Bill, The Saga of. O’Reilly, Edward, the Century Magazine, October, 1923, pp. 827–833.
Pirate fortress on Galveston Island, legend of the founding of by Don Estevan de Sourdis and the Devil. Aimard, Gustave, The Freebooters, A Story of the Texan War, Philadelphia, Chap. XXI.
Pirates. See Lafitte.
Randado Ranch, Jim Hogg County, origin of name of. Falvella, J. Will, a feature article in the San Antonio Express, August 12, 1923.
Rio Grande: “Legend of the Great River.” Clark, A., Jr., Add-Rann (Texas Christian University), Vol. IV, No. 8, 1898. Verse; narrative of phantom lovers.
Sabine Lake, The Legend of. Reid, Mrs. Bruce, Port Arthur News, July 1, 1923.
San Antonio River, legendary origin of: *“Legend of the San Antonio River,” Barnes, Charles Merritt, Combats and Conquests of Immortal Heroes, San Antonio, 1910, pp. 76–79. Wright, Mrs. S. J., “A Legend of the ‘Blessed Margil,’” San Antonio de Béxar, Austin, 1916, 121–122. Swisher, Bella French, “The San Antonio River,” in Writers and Writings of Texas, edited by Davis F. Eagleton, 1913, pp. 86–87; reprinted from The American Sketch Book (Texas Pioneer Magazine). The versions by Barnes and Wright vary little. Swisher’s version employs a thunderbolt, lovers, and fairies.
San Antonio Valley, Discovery of. Wright, Mrs. S. J., op. cit., “An Apache Legend,” pp. 125–126.
San Antonio River, springs of. Wright, op. cit., “When the Springs Ceased to Flow,” pp. 124–125.
San Antonio, The Folk of the Underground Passages of. “The Padre’s Gift,” “The Courteous and Kindly Child and the ‘Good People’ of the Underground Passageway,” De Zavala, Adina, History and Legends of the Alamo, etc., pp. 58–65.
San Bernard River, mysterious music in. *Letts, F. D., an article in the Galveston News, no date given; reported by E. G. Littlejohn. *Wilson, Eugene, J., Jr., Gulf Messenger, Houston, December, 1894, Vol. VII, pp. 691–692. *“Wesley,” (J. W. Morris), two articles on “Fiddler’s Island,” Freeport Facts, summer of 1922; another article, ibid., on “Mystic Music in the San Bernard.” Western Story Magazine, “Music Heard on Texas River,” December 2, 1922, p. 131. All these versions are incorporated in “Mysterious Music in the San Bernard River,” by Bertha McKee Dobie, this volume.
San Gabriel Mission, early Spanish legend concerning the abandonment of. *Bolton, H. E., Texas in the Middle Eighteenth Century, pp. 268–269.
San José Mission, San Antonio, legends of. “The Windows of the Voices” and “A Legend of the Bells of the Mission San José,” De Zavala, Adina, History and Legends of the Alamo, etc., pp. 142–145.
San Marcos River, A Legend of: how water lilies came in. *Swisher, Bella French, The American Sketch Book (Texas Pioneer Magazine), Austin, Vol. I (Vol. IV), 1879, p. 146; reprinted in Vol. II (Vol. V), 1880, pp. 91–92.
Santiago Peak, Big Bend, how it got its name. Raht, Carl, The Romance of Davis Mountains, El Paso, 1919, pp. 77–81.
Snively. See Snively under Treasure Legends.
Sour Lake, The Legend of. Young, Maud J. The legend is referred to in various places in Texasana, including Raines’ Bibliography of Texas, but I have been unable to find time or place of its publication.
Staked Plains, origin of name of. Gregg, Josiah, Commerce of the Prairies, 1855, Vol. II, p. 181. Marcy, Randolph B., Captain United States Infantry, Exploration of the Red River of Louisiana, 1852, Washington, 1854, p. 92. Parker, W. B., Notes ... Through Unexplored Texas ... 1854, Philadelphia, 1856, p. 161. Sneed, John, “Many Legends as to Staked Plains,” Dallas News, June 9, 1923.
Steed, White, of the Prairies. See Pacing White Stallion.
TREASURE LEGENDS
Almagres Mines, Miranda’s reports on. Archives University of Texas. See pp. 12–13, this volume, notes. See Bowie, Cerro de la Plata, San Saba, and Llano.
Anna Cache Mountains, Kinney County, treasure in. San Antonio Express, “Cattle Clatter,” January 5, 1924.
Bowie Mine. *Hunter, John Warren, Rise and Fall of the Mission San Saba to which Is Appended a Brief History of the Bowie or Almagres Mine, Mason, Texas [Austin, 1905], pp. 42–59. Pamphlet, 84 pages, very rare. *Hunter, John Warren, “The Hunt for the Bowie Mine in Menard,” Frontier Times, Bandera, Texas, Vol. I, No. 1, October, 1923, pp. 24–26. “Fight by Bowie Brothers while in Search for Mine,” Dallas News, January 28, 1921, Pt. II, p. 7, col. 1. Stoddard, William O., The Lost Gold of the Montezumas—A Story of the Alamo, Philadelphia, 1897. A highly fictionized account of some of Bowie’s treasure hunting expeditions. See also Almagres, Cerro de la Plata, San Saba, and Llano.
Brand Rock Water Hole, Dimmit County, treasure in. Honnoll, W. V., Galveston News, 1909.
Casa Blanca, Jim Wells County, legends of treasure at. Sutherland, Mary A., The Story of Corpus Christi, Houston, 1916, pp. 2–3.
Cerro de la Plata. Bolton, H. E., Spanish Explorations in the Southwest, pp. 283–284.
Coleman County, Dig for Treasure in. Dallas News, December 9, 1923.
Ebony Cross, legend of. Brown, Clinton G., Ramrod Jones, Akron, Ohio, 1905, pp. 316–317.
“Escondida” and “Big Rocks,” treasures of, Victoria County. Rose, Victor M., Some Historical Facts in Regard to the Settlement of Victoria Texas, Laredo [1883?], p. 9.
Franklin Mountains, Lost Mine in to be sighted from the tower of the church in Juarez. Stevens, Walter B., Through Texas, St. Louis, 1892, pp. 61–63.
Guadalupe Mountains, Lost Mine in. *Hunter, J. Marvin, “Mysterious Gold Mine of El Paso County,” Hunter’s Frontier Magazine, Vol. I, No. 6, October, 1916, pp. 177–179; reprinted in Frontier Times, Vol. I, No. 7, April, 1924, pp. 24–26. “Lost Gold Mine of the Guadalupe Mountains,” Frontier Times, Vol. I, No. 6, March, 1924, pp. 1–3; reprinted from El Paso Times.
Leander, old Spanish mine near. Fulcher, Henry C., “Corn Tassels Wave over Spot where Legend Says Earth Gave up Fortune,” Austin American, October 14, 1923; reprinted in Frontier Times, Vol. I, No. 4, January, 1924, pp. 16–17, under title of “Legend of the Old Spanish Mine.” A variant of the same legend appeared in the Galveston News, March 8, 1906.
Leon County, treasure in a lake near Trinity, in. Wood, W. D., “History of Leon County,” Texas State Historical Association Quarterly, Vol. IV, p. 208.
Llano country, legends of rich minerals in. *“The Brook of Gold Discovered by Lost Rangers,” and *“The Smelter on the Little Llano,” both printed in this volume, were adapted from stories printed in the Galveston News of uncertain date. “Llano Treasure Cave,” Naylor, Dick, Texas Magazine, Houston, Vol. III, pp. 195–204; reprinted, under name of T. B. Baldwin, in the Dallas Semi-Weekly Farm News, July 11 and July 14, 1922. See also Almagres, Bowie, Cerro de la Plata, San Saba.
Lometa (Lampasas County) Wakes up to Find Evidence that Landmark Held $49,611 Treasure, San Antonio Express, March 1, 1923.
Mexican diggers for buried money follow white horse, San Antonio. “Report of Mysterious Diggers Leads Police to Treasure Hunters,” San Antonio Express, January 29, 1923.
Mexican Government gold dumped into Attoyaque Bayou, Nacogdoches County. Fuller, Henry C., “Neutral Ground of Louisiana Line and Legend of Buried Treasure,” Houston Chronicle, October 29, 1922. The legend involves Aaron Burr, General Wilkinson, and the Mexican Army.
Moro’s Gold. Rose, Victor M., Some Historical Facts in Regard to the Settlement of Victoria, Texas, pp. 36–37.
Nigger Gold Mine of the Big Bend. *Raht, Carl, The Romance of Davis Mountains, El Paso, 1919, pp. 331–334.
Peak of Gold, The. Lummis, Charles F., The Enchanted Burro, Chicago, 1912. The “Peak of Gold” may be in New Mexico, but seems to be in Texas.
*Realitos, six loads of treasure in a well below. In a news item regarding the Texas Folk-Lore Society, Dallas Times-Herald, October 22, 1922; also in other Texas papers about the same date.
San Pedro treasure, the guarded. Barnes, Charles Merritt, Combats and Conquests of Immortal Heroes, pp. 88–91.
San Saba Mines. Hornaday, William D., “The Lost Gold Mines of Texas May Be Found,” Dallas News, January 7, 1923. Sturmberg, Robert, “The Elusive City of Gold,” in History of San Antonio and of the Early Days in Texas, San Antonio, 1920, Chap. III. Webber, Charles W., The Gold Mines of the Gila, New York, 1849, pp. 190–191; 196–197. Webber makes vague use of the legends in Old Hicks the Guide, 1848, to which The Gold Mines of the Gila is a sequel. Bonner, J. S. (K. Lamity), in The Three Adventurers, Austin (undated), elaborates the legend of the lost mines. See Bowie, etc.
Snively (Schnively), Jacob, gold hunting expedition of. Hunter, John Warren, “The Schnively Expedition,” Hunter’s Magazine, January, 1911, p. 5. Whitehurst, A., “Reminiscences of the Schnively Expedition of 1867,” Texas State Historical Association Quarterly, Vol. VIII, pp. 267–271.
Starr County, treasure of “Casa de Bob” in. Lott, Virgil N., “Unbroken and Unsuccessful Buried Treasure Hunt along Mexican Border Goes Merrily on,” Houston Chronicle, November 5, 1922.
Wichita Mountains, quicksilver in. Kendall, George W., Narrative of the Texan Santa Fe Expedition, New York, 1856, Vol. I, pp. 183–186; Vol. II, p. 425.
Wichita, origin of the name. Dallas News, Magazine Section, September 30, 1923, p. 4.
Wold Woman of the Navidad. Rose, Victor M., op. cit., pp. 71–72.
CONTRIBUTORS
From the brief sketches of contributors that follow, something is revealed of the humanistic interest in their own social inheritance that is stirring among men and women over the State of Texas. If culture is a cultivation of the inherent rather than a grafting of the extrinsic—and history shows that it is—then surely no small debt will be acknowledged to these individuals by the growing number of children of Light who claim also to be children of Texas.
Stanley E. Babb, a young man of Galveston, has written some genuine poetry of the sea. He is literary editor of the Galveston News.
Julia Beazley of Houston is a gatherer of Texas folk-songs as well as of legends.
L. D. Bertillion’s business of mounting horns has carried him into many parts, and apparently he has always traveled with open ears. Only lack of space has prevented the inclusion of other legends of his gathering. He lives at Mineola.
Austin Callan, who used to live at Santa Anna, is a newspaper man.
John R. Craddock is a true product of the rangy West, and he is gathering all manner of folk material from the old-time Plains people. Only one to the manner born can seize a legend as he has seized “The Legend of Stampede Mesa.” At present Mr. Craddock is ranching in Dickens County. He has written good ballads and has been a student at the University of Texas.
Dr. Alex. Dienst of Temple is a well known scholar in Texas history. He has contributed to the Southwestern Historical Quarterly and is engaged on a bibliography of Texasana.
Bertha McKee Dobie has from childhood been familiar with the country of the Brazos and the San Bernard rivers.
Flora Eckert is a native of the Llano region. At present she is teaching in the Fredericksburg Public Schools.
A. W. Eddins, who is engaged in school work in San Antonio, has contributed to both preceding Publications of the Society. He promises more lore from the Mexicans.
Julia Estill is president of the Texas Folk-Lore Society and one of the most useful members that the Society has ever known. Last year she contributed an article to the Publications on German lore of Gillespie County. She is principal of the Fredericksburg High School.
Jord Leeper Gay has played tramp, cowboy, treasure hunter, and collegian. At present he is attending the School of Mines at El Paso.
Lillian Gunter is librarian of the Cooke County Free Library at Gainesville. There she has a county museum and is inspiring a widespread interest in local history.
Charles Heimsath is instructor of English at the University of Texas.
Frontier Times, issued monthly at Bandera, is, to one interested in Texas folk-lore and pioneer reminiscences, the most interesting magazine ever published within the borders of the state. Of it J. Marvin Hunter is editor and publisher. During the eight months that Frontier Times has appeared it has printed as many Texas legends, in addition to folk-lore of other forms. One who is interested in folk diction, folk metaphor, etc., will find in this magazine invaluable source material. Mr. Hunter compiled the two volumes of Trail Drivers of Texas published by George W. Saunders of San Antonio. He has written also a history of Bandera County.
Martin McHenry Kenney (1831–1907) was born in Illinois and at the age of three came to Texas with his parents, members of Austin’s colony. He was a forty-niner, captain of a company in the Confederate Army, a Texas Ranger, and for thirteen years Spanish translator of the State of Texas. He was a diligent student of Indian life and knew the Indians at first hand. He wrote “The History of the Indian Tribes of Texas,” which is included in Wooten’s Comprehensive History of Texas.
Edgar B. Kincaid is a ranchman of Uvalde County.
Edith C. Lane is an active member of the El Paso Archaeological Society.
E. G. Littlejohn is well known among Texas historians. He is the author of Texas History Stories, familiar to many school children of the state. He is secretary of the Texas Historical Society at Galveston and principal of the Alamo School.
Adele B. Looscan, president of the Texas State Historical Association, has made many valuable contributions to the history of Texas and has largely encouraged the cultivation of literature in this state. Her home is in Houston.
Roscoe Martin is a student at the University of Texas.
J. W. Morris is a lawyer at Freeport. He has written various legends of the coast country that have been published in the Freeport Facts.
L. W. Payne, Jr. has perhaps done more than any other man to keep alive the Texas Folk-Lore Society. He was the first president of the Society, having been largely instrumental in founding it, and has been a constant contributor to its Publications. Dr. Payne is now gathering the folk-songs of Texas for a proposed volume. He is Professor of English at the University of Texas.
Fannie Ratchford is assistant in the Wrenn Library, in connection with which she has done interesting research.
Mrs. Bruce Reid, of Port Arthur, has put a series of legends into story form for children. She acknowledges her inspiration to Mrs. E. C. Carter, until recently Chief Librarian of the Memorial Library at Port Arthur. In this library Mrs. Reid’s folk-stories are read and told to children. Mrs. Reid has made extensive studies of birds.
R. E. Sherrill, a business man of Haskell, has written a history of Haskell County. Working through the public schools, he has stimulated a lively interest in the history and lore of his county.
John P. Sjolander, a veteran of seventy-three years, will long be remembered as a pioneer Texas poet. He was born of a noble family in Sweden, was educated in England, and came to Texas more than half a century ago—as a seaman. For a long generation he has lived at Cedar Bayou, cultivating poetry and the art of life. He has translated many folk-songs from the Swedish and has contributed to various magazines of this country and Sweden. A sketch of his life by Hilton R. Greer is to be found in Library of Southern Literature. Only some of his “Rhymes of Galveston Bay” are here reprinted.
J. S. Spratt, recent student of the University of Texas, lives at Mingus in Palo Pinto County.
Mary A. Sutherland is the author of The Story of Corpus Christi, an interesting history not only of her home city but of the lower Nueces country. She contributed to the Publications of 1923.
Victor J. Smith, a member of the faculty of the Sul Ross State Normal College at Alpine, is the acknowledged representative of the Texas Folk-Lore Society for the Big Bend country. He combines anthropology and folk-lore and contributed an article of such blend to the 1923 Publications.
As editor of The American Sketch Book, which she brought to Texas from the north and continued to edit under the sub-title of Texas Pioneer Magazine, Bella French Swisher was during the eighteen eighties rather prominent in Texas literary circles. Her romantic nature took her to California, to the stage, and to a young husband. She died some fifteen years ago.
In the note to “The Devil and Strap Buckner” something is said of the author’s life. Nathaniel Alston Taylor was born in North Carolina, 1835. He graduated from the University of Virginia, came to Texas, and served as colonel in Polignac’s Brigade during the Civil War. After the war he settled in Houston.
Louise von Blittersdorf is an enthusiastic worker in the Texas Folk-Lore Society. Her home is in Austin, and she is a student in the University of Texas.
J. O. Webb, Superintendent of Schools at Alvin, is writing a history of Galveston for his Master’s thesis at the University of Texas.
W. P. Webb perhaps knows more about Texas Rangers and frontier outlaws than any other man living. He has written various articles on Texas history and Texas folk-lore; at present he is working on a book having to do with Texas Rangers. Mr. Webb is Adjunct Professor of History at the University of Texas.
Mrs. S. J. Wright is the author of San Antonio de Béxar, Historical, Traditional and Legendary, which contains a number of legends pertaining to San Antonio. Mrs. Wright is a leader in Texas women’s club work. San Antonio is her home.
NOTES
[1] History and Legends of the Alamo and Other Missions in and around San Antonio, by Adina De Zavala, San Antonio, 1917; San Antonio de Béxar, Historical, Traditional, Legendary, by Mrs. S. J. Wright, Austin, 1916; Combats and Conquests of Immortal Heroes, by Charles Merritt Barnes, San Antonio, 1910. The last named of the three books is now very scarce; the other two are obtainable at reasonable prices.
[2] See Bolton, H. E., Texas in the Middle Eighteenth Century, p. 4. I am indebted also to Mrs. Mattie Austin Hatcher, Archivist in History at the University of Texas, for information in her unpublished (1923) book on The Opening of Texas to Foreign Settlement, particularly Chaps. II and V.
[3] Brewster County, in which mines were worked, was not in the old Mexican state of Texas and Coahuila.
[4] Sutherland, Mary A., The Story of Corpus Christi, Houston, 1916, pp. 2–3. Mrs. Sutherland does not give her authority.
[5] Bolton, H. E., Texas in the Middle Eighteenth Century, p. 9; Priestley, H. I., José de Galvez (University of California Publications in History, 1916), p. 288. According to Priestley, some presidios were established by the Spanish in America to protect the special interests of large landholders.
Don Pedro de Terreros, banker and wealthy mine owner of Mexico, who advanced the money for the establishment of the Mission of San Saba, may not have been so altruistic as Bancroft, Dr. Dunn, and Dr. Bolton have all implied. The government must bear the cost of military protection for the mission. With government protection and Indian labor, the mines at San Saba, which Miranda had in his famous reports made so promising, would richly pay any individual working them. Don Pedro had an interest in the mines. The Terreros records, if extant, might throw a great deal of light on the subject.
[6] About $11 around for each man in the Texas army, besides $3000 that was voted to the Texas navy. There was $11,000 in specie in Santa Anna’s military chest. His “finery and silver” were auctioned off at $1600 and his rich saddle at $800. See “An Account of the Battle of San Jacinto,” by J. Washington Winters, Texas State Historical Association Quarterly, Vol. VI, pp. 139–144; “Memoirs of Major George Bernard Erath,” by Lucy A. Erath, Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Vol. XXVI, pp. 266–269.
[7] Austin Papers in University of Texas archives. Information given by Mrs. Mattie Austin Hatcher, Archivist.
[8] See “The Legend of the San Saba, or Bowie, Mine.”
[9] Dr. Barker, in treating of “Land Speculation as a Cause of the Texas Revolution,” Texas State Historical Association Quarterly, Vol. X, p. 76 ff., ignores all idea that reputed mineral riches had anything to do with the land speculation.
An unfounded but popular view to the contrary is offered by Captain Marryat, who says: “The dismemberment of Texas from Mexico was affected by the reports of extensive gold mines, diamonds, etc., which were to be found there.”—Narrative of the Travels and Adventures of Monsieur Violet in California, Sonora, and Western Texas, Leipzig, 1843, p. 147.
[10] Prescott, Conquest of Mexico, Book V, Chapter III. I am aware of the fact that some historians question the loss of any great treasure.
[11] Prescott, Conquest of Peru, Philadelphia, 1874, I, pp. 420–422; 453 ff. Also, Bandelier, A. F., The Gilded Man, p. 19.
[12] Bandelier, p. 26.
[13] Zahm, J. A. (H. J. Mozans), Through South America’s Southland, New York, 1916, p. 361.
[14] For full accounts of the El Dorado history and legends, see Adolphe F. Bandelier’s The Gilded Man, New York, 1893, and Z. A. Zahm’s (H. J. Mozans) The Quest of El Dorado, New York, 1917. Both are readable and distinguish well between history and legend. Bandelier is the more scholarly of the two writers.
[15] Zahm, J. A. (Mozans), Through South America’s Southland, pp. 353–362.
[16] Bandelier, The Gilded Man, “The Seven Cities,” p. 125 ff.
[17] Skinner, Chas. M., Myths and Legends of Our New Possessions, Philadelphia, 1902, p. 103.
[18] Bandelier, The Gilded Man, “The Amazons,” p. 113 ff.
[19] Bolton, H. E. (Editor), Spanish Explorations in the Southwest, New York, 1916, pp. 130, 156, 184, 186.
[20] Ibid., p. 130.
[21] Ibid., pp. 283–284.
[22] Bancroft identifies the “mountain of silver” with “the famous iron mountain near the city of Durango.”—History of the North Mexican States and Texas, I, p. 100.
[23] Bolton, Spanish Explorations, pp. 313–317.
[24] Lummis, Chas. F., The Enchanted Burro, p. 161 ff.
[25] Zahm, J. A., The Quest of El Dorado, p. 6.
[26] Ibid., pp. 197–200.
[27] Bandelier, The Gilded Man, “Quivira,” p. 223 ff.
Dr. Bolton points out that the Spanish searched in Texas for “the Kingdom of Gran Quivira, where ‘everyone had their ordinary dishes made of wrought plate, and the jugs and bowls were of gold’”; also “for the Seven Hills of the Aijados, or Aixaos, where gold was so plentiful that ‘the natives not knowing any of the other metals, make of it everything they need, such as vessels and the tips of arrows and lances.’”—“The Spanish Occupation of Texas, 1519–1690,” by Herbert E. Bolton, Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Vol. XVI, pp. 1–2.
[28] The Alhambra, “The Journey.”
[29] Bandelier, The Gilded Man, p. 223 ff.
[30] See “The Snively Legend,” infra.
[31] Webber, Chas. W., The Gold Mines of the Gila, New York, 1849, especially pages 189–191 and 196–197. Webber concludes the book with an actual proposal to readers to join him in an expedition after the treasure. He had been a ranger with Jack Hays a short time and he claims to have gotten his information about the San Saba deposits from the talk of men in camp. Use is made of the same legendary material in Webber’s Old Hicks the Guide, 1848.
[32] Galveston Weekly Journal, May 13, June 6, June 16, 1853.
[33] “The Hunt for the Bowie Mine in Menard,” in Frontier Times, Bandera, Texas, October, 1923, pp. 24–26. The article is full of concrete evidence not to be questioned.
[34] San Antonio Express, October 21, 1923, p. 1.
[35] For good satire on Texan credulity in Mexican mines, see On A Mexican Mustang Through Texas, by Alex E. Sweet and J. Armory Knox, Rand, McNally and Co., New York, 1892, pp. 439–452.
[36] Bolton, H. E., Spanish Explorations in the Southwest, pp. 283–284.
[37] “Miranda’s Expedition to Los Almagres and Plans for Developing the Mines,” a Spanish transcript from original documents in the archives of Mexico, now in the history archives of the University of Texas, “1755–1756, A. G. I. Mejico, 92–6–22, N′ 16A.” See also another transcript from original sources: “Report on Disposition of San Saba,” listed “1767, A. G. I., Guad., 104–6, 13.”
[38] “Miranda’s Expedition to Los Almagres,” etc. Vide ante.
[39] For a succinct history, see Dunn, William E., “The Apache Mission of the San Saba River,” Southwestern Historical Quarterly, XVII, 379–414; also, Bolton, H. E., Texas in the Middle Eighteenth Century, pp. 78–93.
[40] Bolton, supra, p. 83.
[41] This is an interesting but somewhat confusing document. It was printed in 1905 and is already so rare as to be almost unobtainable. It is in neither the Texas State Library nor the Library of the University of Texas. I am indebted to Mr. E. W. Winkler for use of his presentation copy. Mr. Hunter was living at Mason when he issued the pamphlet and had a rare first-hand knowledge of the ground and of traditions as well as access to some original documents.
[42] Op. cit., p. 47.
[43] History of San Antonio and the Early Days of Texas, compiled by Robert Sturmberg, San Antonio, 1920, Chap. III.
[44] “Report on Disposition of San Saba.” Vide ante.
[45] Op. cit., p. 48.
[46] See, for instance, “The Lost Gold Mines of Texas May Be Found,” by W. D. Hornaday in the Dallas News, January 7, 1923.
[47] U. S. Geological Survey, Bulletin 450, “Mineral Resources of the Llano-Burnet Region, Texas,” by Sidney Page, Washington, Government Printing Office, 1911.
But note the following dispatch in the San Antonio Express, February 26, 1924, p. 5:
“AUSTIN, Tex., Feb. 25—Sam Young, Llano banker, was in Austin Monday and reports much activity in that region in the mineral line. Young says experts think they have found gold in paying quantity, also graphite, and that capital now is being interested in the deposits with the early prospects of real mining and shipping of valuable ores and probably the refined products. Many small deposits of precious metals have been found near Llano in recent years, but the new finds are said to be large enough to warrant exploitation and give that section a new and valuable industry.”
Thus history never tires of repeating itself; thus the dream of treasure once dreamed lives on.
[48] Fournel, Henri, Coup d’oeil ... sur le Texas, Paris, 1841, p. 23, speaks “des richesses metalliques depuis longtemps signalées par les Espagnoles.” I am unable now to verify the reference, but I am sure that Gustave Aimard introduces the subject in one of his romances, probably The Freebooters.
Of course the rumor of the mines had a wide vogue in Spain, where the viceroy’s reports went direct.
An English novel published in 1843 has this sentence: “The Comanches have a great profusion of gold, which they obtain from the neighborhood of the San Seba [sic] hills, and work it themselves into bracelets, armlets, diadems, as well as bits for their horses, and ornaments to their saddles.”—Marryat, Captain, Monsieur Violet, etc., p. 175.
[49] As examples of fictional uses of the legend in America, see Webber, Charles W., The Gold Mines of the Gila, New York, 1849, pp. 189–191; Webber, Old Hicks the Guide, New York, 1848. In this last named book, the use is so vague and general that no particular pages can be cited. Other examples are “The Llano Treasure Cave,” by Dick Naylor, The Texas Magazine, Vol. III, pp. 195–204, reprinted in the Dallas Semi-Weekly Farm News, with T. B. Baldwin as the name of the author, July 11 and July 14, 1922; The Three Adventurers, by J. S. (K. Lamity) Bonner, Austin, (no date given).
[50] Sowell, A. J., Early Settlers and Indian Fighters of Texas, pp. 405–408.
[51] “Several days previous to the fight it was currently reported in Camp that there was a quantity of silver coming from Mexico on pack mules to pay off the soldiers of General Cos. Our scouts kept a close watch, to give the news as soon as the convoy should be espied, so that we might intercept the treasure. On the morning of the 26th, Colonel Bowie was out in the direction of the Medina, with a company, and discovered some mules with packs approaching. Supposing this to be the expected train, he sent a messenger for reinforcements.”—Baker, D. W. C., Texas Scrap Book, p. 92.
[52] The Battle of Calf Creek, 1831, in which eleven Texans fought one hundred and sixty-four Indians under the leadership of Chief Tresmanos of the Lipans. Only one of Bowie’s men was killed. Rezin P. Bowie wrote an account of the battle that has often been quoted in Texas histories. The account by James Bowie seems not so well known. It is to be found in John Henry Brown’s History of Texas, Vol. I, pp. 170–175.
[53] A signed article on the Calf Creek fight in the Dallas News, January 28, 1923.
[54] “Command El Cañon and Los Almagres to deliver up their known treasures,” wrote De Mézières in an effort to stimulate Spanish activity in Texas.—Bolton, H. E., Athanase de Mézières, II, 297.
[55] Vol. I, No. I, October, 1923, p. 25.
[56] Santa Anna, according to Brown, did cross into Texas at Laredo, but he went to San Antonio, not Goliad. See Brown, John Henry, History of Texas, Vol. I, p. 569 ff. Another Santa Anna chest is said to have been dropped off near Lockhart on the road to Nacogdoches. Of course, Santa Anna never went from San Antonio to Nacogdoches.
[57] This latter explanation is more probable. The feminine Santa is never apocopated in Spanish, and caja is feminine.
[58] A tale common to both legend and roguery. I have a copy of a letter written in 1911 by a prisoner in Madrid to an American at Aguas Calientes, Mexico, in which the prisoner offered to share $273,000 concealed on the American’s land, provided the American would send funds for passage of the prisoner and his wife.
[59] “The company, being six months’ men, were discharged at Fort Merrill on the Nueces, on the 4th day of May, 1851, but reorganized as a new company for another six months the next day.”—Brown, John Henry, History of Texas, Vol. II, p. 356. See a report to the Secretary of War: Sen. Ex. Doc. 1, 32d Cong., 1st Session, Serial 611.
[60] See, for instance, “The Mission de Los Olmos, near Falfurrias,” by Marshall Monroe, reprinted from the Houston Chronicle, in Frontier Times, January, 1924, pp. 44–45.
[61] Sutherland, Mary A., The Story of Corpus Christi, Houston, 1916, pp. 2–3.
[62] A euphemism of the Texas Rangers.
[63] Old-timers still call much of the “Magic Rio Grande Valley” by nothing else than The Sands.—Editor.
[64] This last legend was printed in the Dallas Times-Herald, October 22, 1922, and in other papers over the state about the same time, I having given it to the press in the hope of creating a wider interest in legends.
[65] The mine is often referred to as the “Nigger Ben Mine.” I have not been able to learn why, but I have a guess. In the early seventies a half-breed negro-Mexican named Ben Hodges, but known as “Nigger Ben,” went up the trail to Kansas with a herd of Texas cattle. “Nigger Ben” remained in the vicinity of Dodge City and became a notorious, almost legendary, fraud. He claimed to possess a Spanish grant to lands on the Rio Grande on which were located wonderfully rich mines. It would be very much in the manner of legend to blend “Nigger Ben’s mine” with another mine on the Rio Grande claimed by another negro. For an account of “Nigger Ben,” see Wright, Robert M., Dodge City the Cowboy Capital, Wichita, Kansas, 1913, pp. 273–280.
[66] Raht, Carl, The Romance of Davis Mountains, El Paso, 1919, pp. 331–334.
[67] In Hunter’s Frontier Magazine, October, 1916, I, 6, 177–179. Further testimony to the existence of “the Sublett Mine,” given by an old buffalo hunter and prospector named Dixon, is printed in Frontier Times, March, 1924, Vol. I, No. 6, pp. 1–3. Dixon heard of the mine in 1879 from his sweetheart, daughter of a Mescalero Apache chief.
[68] Bolton, H. E., Athanase de Mézières, II, 33–34; see also p. 47; also, Vol. I, p. 104.
[69] Shipman, Daniel, Frontier Life: 58 Years in Texas, 1879, pp. 23–26.
[70] Edward, David B., History of Texas, Cincinnati, 1836, pp. 44–45.
[71] See Bolton, H. E., Texas in the Middle Eighteenth Century, pp. 89–90, for an account of the Parrilla Expedition.
[72] Ibid., 129, 414. See also Bolton’s De Mézières, II, 187–238.
[73] After having written the above, I was informed by Mr. Joseph B. Thoburn, secretary of the Oklahoma Historical Society, that he had received a letter from Dr. Bolton identifying “Old Spanish Fort” with the fortification attacked by Parrilla.
[74] See page 99.
[75] See Roberts, Capt. Dan W., Rangers and Sovereignty, San Antonio, 1914, pp. 185–186.
[76] Bolton, H. E., Texas in the Middle Eighteenth Century, pp. 114, 391; Cf., also, pp. 90, 414.
[77] According to Charles M. Skinner, Myths and Legends of Our Own Land, Vol. II, pp. 279–280, the Hessian troops, after the surrender of Burgoyne, packed their plate, pay, and jewels into a howitzer and buried it somewhere near Dalton, Massachusetts.
[78] I have never heard the details of the legend, though I have heard of it from several sources. Mr. E. G. Littlejohn sends in a legend clipped from the Galveston News of 1909, in which a Spanish prince, besieged by Indians about the year of 1700, cast a great quantity of “gold, silver, and jewels” into Brand Rock Water Hole, of Peña Creek in Dimmit County.
[79] Wooten’s Comprehensive History of Texas, Vol. I, p. 292; Brown, John Henry, History of Texas, Vol. II, pp. 46, 66, 67.
[80] In 1816, Luis de Aury, well known in Texas history as a slave smuggler and privateer, was, by the incipient republic of Mexico, made civil and military governor of the province of Texas. He stationed himself on Galveston Island and among other acts made an alliance with the romantic Colonel Perry. See Bancroft, H. H., History of the North Mexican States and Texas, Vol. II, 34–39. Dyer, J. O., The Early History of Galveston, Galveston, Texas, 1916, pp. 4–9, has a rather detailed account of Aury.—Editor.
[81] The Republic of Fredonia was announced December 16, 1826.—Editor.
[82] Manuel Flores, Mexico-Indian agent, with a party of twenty-five men, was met by Lieutenant James O. Rice, with seventeen men, near Austin, May 14, 1839, and Flores was killed. Burleson shortly afterward met and defeated Vicente Cordova, Flores’ aid. See Yoakum, History of Texas, Vol. II, 257–261.—Editor.
[83] According to his own statement, Mr. J. O. Webb of Alvin, Texas, who is writing a history of Galveston, has never met the name of Steinheimer in his researches.—Editor.
[84] For a history of his first expedition, see any Texas history, but particularly “The Last Stage of Texan Military Operations Against Mexico, 1843,” by William Campbell Binkley, in the Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Vol. XXII, pp. 260–271. Perhaps a juster estimate of the motives of Snively is to be found in J. W. Wilbarger’s Indian Depredations in Texas, Austin, 1889, pp. 51–58.
An excellent account of the highly romantic second expedition is “Reminiscences of the Schnively Expedition of 1867,” by A. Whitehurst, Texas State Historical Association Quarterly, Vol. VIII, pp. 267–271.
[85] Smithwick, Noah, The Evolution of a State, p. 267.
[86] Brown, John Henry, History of Texas from 1685 to 1892, St. Louis, Vol. II, p. 291.
[87] Bolton, H. E., Texas in the Middle Eighteenth Century, pp. 140–141.
[88] Ibid., 260–261.
[89] Ibid., 138, 227.
[90] Ibid., 268–269.
[91] Ibid., 275–276.
[92] The legend may be compared with that of La Vaca de Lumbre (the Fiery Cow) of the City of Mexico, fabled to come forth at midnight from the Potrero de San Pablo and gallop through the streets like a blazing whirlwind, breathing from her nostrils smoke and fire. Janvier connects the story of La Vaca de Lumbre with that of the goblin, El Belludo de Grenada, “who comes forth at midnight from the Siete Suelos Tower of the Alhambra and scours the streets pursued by hell-hounds.” See Janvier, Thomas A., Legends of the City of Mexico, “La Vaca de Lumbre,” Harper Brothers, New York, 1910.—Editor.
[93] Skinner tells a tale of two young men who were digging for a treasure chest supposed to have been lost by a Spanish galleon at New London, Connecticut, in 1753. “They had dug down to water-level when they reached an iron chest, and they stooped to lift it—but, to their amazement, the iron was too hot to handle! Now they heard deep growls, and a giant dog peered at them from the pit-mouth.”—Chas. M. Skinner, Myths and Legends of Our Own Land, II, 282–283.
See also Pete Staples’ story of the ghost-dog as a guardian of treasure, page 54.—Editor.
[94] For a brief account of “Moro’s Gold,” see Rose, Victor M., Some Historical Facts in Regard to the Settlement of Victoria, Texas, Laredo [1883?], pp. 36–37.—Editor.
[95] Reprinted from The Coming Empire or Two Thousand Miles in Texas on Horseback, by H. F. McDanield and N. A. Taylor, A. S. Barnes and Company, New York, 1877, pp. 49–73.
[96] Benavides, Alonso de: The Memorial of Fray Alonso de Benavides, 1630, translated by Mrs. Edward A. Ayer; annotated by F. W. Hodge and Charles F. Lummis, R. R. Donnelley and Sons, Chicago, 1916, pp. 58–59.
[97] Casis, Lilia M.: “Letter of Fray Damian Manzanet to Don Carlos de Sigüenza Relative to the Discovery of the Bay of Espíritu Santo,” Texas State Historical Association Quarterly, II, pp. 282–283.
[98] Casis, ibid., pp. 311–312.
[99] A copy at St. John’s College, Fordham, New York.
[100] “Carta en que se da noticia de un viaje hecho a la bahía de Espíritu Santo, y de la población que tenian ahi los franceses.” In Buckingham Smith, Documentos para la historia de la Florida.
[101] Shea, John Gilmary: The Catholic Church in Colonial Days, New York, 1886, p. 197. Vol. I of A History of the Catholic Church Within the United States, 4 vols.
[102] Bolton, H. E., Southwestern Historical Quarterly, XVI, No. 1, July, 1912, pp. 8–9.
[103] Chapman, Charles E., The Founding of Spanish California, The Macmillan Company, New York, 1916, p. 333, footnote.
[104] Hodge also recounts the legend in his “Bibliography of Fray Alonso de Benavides,” Indian Notes and Monographs, Vol. III, No. 1, pp. 11–13.
[In addition to the references given by Mr. Heimsath, the following may be added. The story is told in the History of San Antonio and Early Days in Texas, compiled by Robert Sturmberg, and published by St. Joseph’s Society, San Antonio, 1920, Chapter IV. The legend is discussed in “Ven. Maria Jesus de Agreda: A Correction,” by Edmond J. P. Schmitt, Texas State Historical Association Quarterly, Vol. I, 121–124; also in a note by M. M. Kenney, ibid., I, 226–227.—Editor.]
[105] Yoakum, History of Texas, I, 184.
[106] Lubbock, Francis Richard, Six Decades in Texas (edited by Raines), Austin, 1900, p. 32.
[107] British Diplomatic Correspondence Concerning the Republic of Texas, edited by Ephraim Douglass Adams, Austin, “Crawford to Pakenham,” p. 13.
[108] Hudgins, Charles D., The Maid of San Jacinto, New York, 1900, pp. 12–13, footnotes.
[109] An old corruption of bore.—Editor.
[110] Cf. Southey’s “The Inchcape Rock.”—Editor.
[111] An adequate treatment, in a brief space, of the marriage customs of the Plains Indians is to be found in Chapter II of North American Indians of the Plains, by Clark Wissler, published by the American Museum of Natural History. The volume includes a good bibliography of works on Indian life.
[112] Author of Die Tochter Tehuans.—Editor.
[113] Originally there were two Spanish sites in the Menardville vicinity, both founded in 1757: the presidio, San Luis de Las Amarillas, on the north bank of the San Saba River, and the mission, San Sabá, three miles south. In 1758 the Comanches destroyed the mission; then the presidio was strengthened and maintained until 1769. The remains of it are yet to be seen at Menard. The mission was established for the benefit of the Apaches; their hereditary enemies, the Comanches, from the north, regarded the Spanish policy of trying to Christianize the Apaches as an act of war. In the middle of the eighteenth century, it is hardly necessary to say, the Comanches and Apaches were not yet “remnants.” The Cheyennes and Arapahoes never got as far south as the San Saba. The whole story of the San Saba settlement is to be found in two monographs by William Edward Dunn: “Missionary Activities among the Eastern Apaches Previous to the Founding of the San Sabá Mission,” Texas State Historical Association Quarterly, XV, 186–200; and “The Apache Mission on the San Sabá River; its Founding and its Failure,” Southwestern Historical Quarterly, XVI, 379–414. Dr. Bolton in his Texas in the Middle Eighteenth Century, pp. 78–101, gives a succinct account of “The Apache Missions and the War with the Northern Tribes.”—Editor.
[114] Through the courtesy of Miss Nell Andrew, librarian of Texas Christian University, I have seen a poem by A. Clark, Jr., that relates a similar tale. A phantom lover on the Rio Grande diurnally meets his love. The poem is called “Legend of the Great River” and was published in Add-Rann (T. C. U.), Vol. IV, No. 8, 1898.—Editor.
[115] This legend is reprinted from a small pamphlet called Santa Anna Beautiful, published by Clay P. Morgan, Santa Anna, Texas, 1907. It is the only signed article in the pamphlet, which was designed for commercial purposes.
[116] Morphis, J. M., History of Texas, New York, 1874, pp. 510–513.
[117] Theodosia Burr Allston, daughter of Aaron Burr and wife of Joseph Allston, Governor of South Carolina, 1812–1814, set sail from Charleston in December of 1813 on the Patriot bound for New York. The vessel was never heard of again, and it is supposed to have been wrecked off the coast of Hatteras. “Some forty years afterward, however,” according to Lamb’s Biographical Dictionary of the United States, Vol. I, pp. 76–77, “a romantic story found credence and went the rounds of the press, to the effect that a dying sailor in Detroit had confessed that he had been one of a crew of mutineers who, in January, 1813, took possession of the ‘Patriot’ ... and compelled the crew and passengers to walk the plank.” The New International Encyclopedia says that “a tradition of uncertain origin” has the Patriot to have been taken by pirates.—Editor.
[118] Reprinted from The American Sketch Book (Texas Pioneer Magazine), Vol. I (Vol. IV), 1879, p. 146; “republished by request” in Vol. II (Vol. V), 1880, pp. 91–92.
[119] Wright, Mrs. S. J., San Antonio de Béxar, Austin, 1916, pp. 121–122.
[120] De Zavala, Adina, History and Legends of the Alamo and Other Missions, page 150.
[121] Note the striking resemblance in plot to Lanier’s ballad “The Revenge of Hamish.”—Editor.
[122] In a note to “The Aguayo Expedition into Texas and Louisiana, 1719–1722,” Texas State Historical Association Quarterly, Vol. XV, p. 39.
[123] Thrall, H. S., A History of Texas, New York, 1876, p. 37.
[124] Captain Rafael Martínez Pacheco, 1763, escaped unseen and unscorched from the presidio in which he was besieged. According to Mrs. Mattie Austin Hatcher, Archivist in History at the University of Texas, the legend is to be pieced out from the Bexar archives. For some facts of the case, see Bolton, Texas in the Middle Eighteenth Century, pp. 111–112.
[125] For a copy of the song, I am indebted to Mrs. V. M. Taylor of Angleton.
[126] “The Arms of God” by Claude M. Girardeau of Galveston, in The Texas Magazine, Houston, May, 1897, II, 431–434. About this time Mrs. Davis’ books seem to have been popular with readers of The Texas Magazine, two reviews of her work having appeared in it during the preceding twelve months.
[127] Davis (Mrs.), M. E. M., Under the Man-Fig, Houghton, Mifflin and Co., Boston, 1895, pp. 1–3. Reprinted by permission.
[128] Aimard, Gustave, The Freebooters, A Story of the Texan War,