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_28th April_ (Tuesday).--We crossed the river Guadalupe at 5 A.M., and
got a change of horses.

We got a very fair breakfast at Seguin at 7 A.M., which was beginning
to be a well-to-do little place when the war dried it up.

It commenced to rain at Seguin, which made the road very woolly, and
annoyed the outsiders a good deal.

The conversation turned a good deal upon military subjects, and all
agreed that the system of election of officers had proved to be a great
mistake. According to their own accounts, discipline must have been
extremely lax at first, but was now improving. They were most anxious to
hear what was thought of their cause in Europe; and none of them seemed
aware of the great sympathy which their gallantry and determination had
gained for them in England in spite of slavery.

We dined at a little wooden hamlet called Belmont, and changed horses
again there.

The country through which we had been travelling was a good deal
cultivated, and there were numerous farms. I saw cotton-fields for the
first time.

We amused ourselves by taking shots with our revolvers at the enormous
jack-rabbits which came to stare at the coach.

In the afternoon tobacco-chewing became universal, and the spitting was
sometimes a little wild.

It was the custom for the outsiders to sit round the top of the
carriage, with their legs dangling over (like mutes on a hearse
returning from a funeral). This practice rendered it dangerous to put
one's head out of the window, for fear of a back kick from the heels, or
of a shower of tobacco-juice from the mouths, of the Southern
chivalry on the roof. In spite of their peculiar habits of hanging,
shooting, &c., which seemed to be natural to people living in a wild
and thinly-populated country, there was much to like in my
fellow-travellers. They all had a sort of _bonhommie_ honesty and
straightforwardness, a natural courtesy and extreme good-nature, which
was very agreeable. Although they were all very anxious to talk to a
European--who, in these blockaded times, is a _rara avis_--yet their
inquisitiveness was never offensive or disagreeable.

Any doubts as to my personal safety, which may have been roused by my
early insight into Lynch law, were soon completely set at rest; for I
soon perceived that if any one were to annoy me the remainder would
stand by me as a point of honour.

We supped at a little town called Gonzales at 6.30.

We left it at 8 P.M. in a