BOYS OF LAKEPORT.

American Boys' Biographical Series
_Cloth. Illustrated. Price per volume_ $1.25.

AMERICAN BOYS' LIFE OF WILLIAM McKINLEY.
AMERICAN BOYS' LIFE OF THEODORE ROOSEVELT.

Stratemeyer Popular Series

_Fifteen Volumes. Cloth. Illustrated. Price per volume_ $0.75.

* * * * *

DEFENDING HIS FLAG. _Price_ $1.50.

[Illustration: "'REMEMBER THE ALAMO! DOWN WITH SANTA ANNA!'"]

Mexican War Series

FOR THE LIBERTY OF TEXAS

BY

EDWARD STRATEMEYER

Author of "With Taylor on the Rio Grande," "Under Scott in Mexico,"
"Dave Porter Series," "Old Glory Series," "Pan-American Series,"
"Lakeport Series," etc.

_ILLUSTRATED BY LOUIS MEYNELLE_

BOSTON
LOTHROP, LEE & SHEPARD CO.

Copyright, 1900, by Dana Estes & Company
Copyright, 1909, by Lothrop, Lee & Shepard Co.

_All Rights Reserved_

For the Liberty of Texas

SET UP AND ELECTROTYPED BY COLONIAL PRESS, BOSTON
Printed by BERWICK & SMITH CO., NORWOOD

PREFACE.

"For the Liberty of Texas" is a tale complete in itself, but it forms
the first of a line of three volumes to be known under the general
title of the "Mexican War Series."

Primarily the struggle of the Texans for freedom did not form a part of
our war with Mexico, yet this struggle led up directly to the greater
war to follow, and it is probably a fact that, had the people of Texas
not at first accomplished their freedom, there would have been no war
between the two larger republics.

The history of Texas and her struggle for liberty is unlike that of any
other State in our Union, and it will be found to read more like a
romance than a detail of facts. Here was a territory, immense in size,
that was little better than a wilderness, a territory gradually
becoming settled by Americans, Mexicans, Spaniards, French, and
pioneers of other nations, a territory which was the home of the
bloodthirsty Comanche and other Indians, and which was overrun with
deer, buffalo, and the wild mustang, and which was, at times, the
gathering ground for the most noted desperadoes of the southwest.

This territory formed, with Coahuila, one of the States of Mexico, but
the government was a government in name only, and the people of Texas
felt that it was absolutely necessary that they withdraw from the
Mexican Confederation, in order to protect themselves, their property,
and their individual rights, for, with the scheming Mexicans