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AMERICAN HIS'IORICAL ASSOCIATION
At the present crisis however a thought hns struck me, that a movement might be mnde highly beneficial to the colony, in strict pursuance of the views and policy of the :Mexican government and in accordnnce with your own. A movement, which England must approve and to which the U. States can raise no substantial ob- jections, ns it will have a direct tendency to perpetuate a :friendly understnnding between the three powers, my efforts in the service of Mexicnn Independence, ancl .to suppress subsequent revolt, in Texas, are also well known to you and the government. With this project in view, which I will hereafter more fully detail, I was on the eve of visiting the city of l\iiexico to confer with the general government on the subject. But thinking perhaps that your powers were already amply sufficient to authorise a beginning and having made up my mincl to abandon the plan~11nless it should meet with your approbation, it was thought most adviseable to con- sult you in the first place. Since my first visit to Texas in 1812 it has been my uniform opinion that, this section of the country is destined to become the strongest arm of the :Mexican Republic. At thnt early period I fixed on the site you now occupy, as the future seat of government unless the opposite point on this side the river bottom should be deemed more eligible on account of_wood and water. .A. military lookout post at fort Bolivar, a trading establishment nt the head of the navigation on the Buffalo Bayou connecting these settlements with your Town on this side and se- curing the trade and attachment of the Indians and whites on the waters of the Trinity, nncl extending the same line on the other side to the navigable waters of the St. Bernard. ,Yith this view let the Mexican government open a land office at St. Felipe de Austin with full powers to make indefeasible complete grants of land to actual settlers nt a price certain for any quantity not exceeding 640, or 1,000 acres, let them invite the Mexicans in the interior to move down and settle in Texas, and J)ermit foreio-n emio-rants of good e e, character and small capital with industrious habits to settle per- manently among them, whose attachment will ex necessitate 1·ei be stronger in favor of their adopted country than any other, and my word for it, in three or foU1· years we wi11 give a spur to commerce and agriculture greatly enhancing the price of lands, and converting the present drone like apathy that broods over those delightful- regions into the busy hum of the beehive in 1tiay. This done, I will undertake to establish the trading house on the Buffaloe and make a settlement of some 100 or more persons, a.nd it will not be material with ·me whether slavery is tolerated or not. • • Be so good as to inform me whether you approve of the experi- ment, and if so whether you deem it within the scope of your
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