812
AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION.
who might Accompany him into the Province- On the death of my Father I proceeded to Nachitochcs And met the said Commis- sioner who was The Honble Don Erasmo Seguin the present Deputy in Congress from this Province And Accompanied him to San An- tonio de Bexar where we Arrived in August 1821 On as full an investigation of the nature of the Grant to my Father as the interpretations I received would enable me to make I found that the permission to introduce And settle the 300 families in this Province was complete And that the Governor had authority from the Commandant Gen 1 to designate the quantity of Land for each family- After much Conversation with the said Governor as to the quantity of Land And As to the place for the settlement he by an official a.nswer to a Letter of mine dated the 19 th day of August 1821 Authorised me to promise the quantity of Land stated in my first publication relative to this settlement which was 640 acres for the head of a family, 320 for his wife and 160 for each child etc And also gave me written Authority to explore the Prov- ince and select the place for the Colony- "Tith this object I ex- plored the Guadalupe from the Tuscoset road to its mouth and thence along the Coast untill the Labacca Compelled us to bear up to the road which we followed to the Colorado and explored some distance down it and the Brasos- The result of this Trip was a determination to settle on the Brasos And Colorado- And nccord- mgly on my arrival at N achitoches in October I informed the Gov- ernor thereof And Also informed him that as the land which I was to receive for myself would be no compensation for my labors and expences in an enterprize of such magnitude I must receive some- thing from the Settlers or I could not proceed with the Business- Accordingly on my arrival in New Orleans sometime in November I published the terms of settling in this Colony and explicitly Stated that those who settled under the said permission to my Father must. pay me 12½ cts per Acre which would be in full for all e:xpences of Surveying and every thing else- I was particular to make these terms as public as possible that no one might come without knowing distinctly the Conditions of his reception- They were republished in most of the vVestern papers And I considered it from that mo- ment in the nature of an absolute contract between me and the settlers- I Bound myself on the one hand to procure for them a complet,e Title for a certain specific quantity of Land according to the size of their family for which they were to pay me a certain specific sum which was to be in full for all expences of Surveying and All others whatever they mi:ght be, And all this was done with the lmowledge of the then Governor of the Province and besides if I had believed
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