te destiny of Texas, though he was by no means
an adventurer, and had come into the beautiful land by a sequence of
natural and business-like events. He was born in New York. In that city
he studied his profession, and in eighteen hundred and three began its
practice in an office near Contoit's Hotel, opposite the City Park. One
day he was summoned there to attend a sick man. His patient proved to
be Don Jaime Urrea, and the rich Mexican grandee conceived a warm
friendship for the young physician.

At that very time, France had just ceded to the United States the
territory of Louisiana, and its western boundary was a subject about
which Americans were then angrily disputing. They asserted that it was
the Rio Grande; but Spain, who naturally did not want Americans so
near her own territory, denied the claim, and made the Sabine River
the dividing line. And as Spain had been the original possessor of
Louisiana, she considered herself authority on the subject.

The question was on every tongue, and it was but natural that it
should be discussed by Urrea and his physician. In fact, they talked
continually of the disputed boundary, and of Mexico. And Mexico was then
a name to conjure by. She was as yet a part of Spain, and a sharer in
all her ancient glories. She was a land of romance, and her very name
tasted on the lips, of gold, and of silver, and of precious stones.
Urrea easily persuaded the young man to return to Mexico with him.

The following year there was a suspicious number of American visitors
and traders in San Antonio, and one of the Urreas was sent with a
considerable number of troops to garrison the city. For Spain was well
aware that, however statesmen might settle the question, the young
and adventurous of the American people considered Texas United States
territory, and would be well inclined to take possession of it by force
of arms, if an opportunity offered.

Robert Worth accompanied General Urrea to San Antonio, and the visit
was decisive as to his future life. The country enchanted him. He was
smitten with love for it, as men are smitten with a beautiful face.
And the white Moorish city had one special charm for him--it was seldom
quite free from Americans, Among the mediaeval loungers in the narrow
streets, it filled his heart with joy to see at intervals two or three
big men in buckskin or homespun. And he did not much wonder that the
Morisco-Hispano-Mexican feared these Anglo-Americans, and susp