.

The government of Mexico was glad to have the sturdy Americans upon its
frontier, to act as a bulwark against the Indians. All Texas, like the
Ohio Valley, was the favorite range of hard-fighting tribes; from the
cannibal Karankawas (six feet tall, and wielding long-bows that no
white man could draw) on the Gulf coast in the south, to the widely
riding Comanches and Apaches in the north, with the Wacos, the
Tawakonis, the Caddos, and others, in between.

The Spanish soldiery had made little progress against them. The
Mexican settlements were few, the missions built by the Spanish priests
had been destroyed; from San Antonio in the west to Nacogdoches in the
east the country still belonged to the red warriors.

They began to pillage and kill the Americans. Texas was another
Kentucky. But as in Kentucky and the Ohio Valley the Americans pushed
on and on. They were not the kind to quit.

Among the early Americans to make their homes in Texas were the Bowie
brothers: James, Rezin and Stephen. They were Georgians, but raised in
Louisiana. The United States claimed Texas as a part of the Louisiana
Territory that had been bought from France. Before ever Moses Austin
had obtained his grant of land, parties of American adventurers were
constantly invading, to seize the country which as yet seemed to belong
to nobody.

In 1819 James Bowie had landed, in just such a company, near Galveston;
and although the company was driven out he chose Texas for his home.
He traveled through it, lived at old San Antonio, entered into
business, at Saltillo, south of the Rio Grande on the present Mexican
border, was naturalized as a Mexican citizen, and in 1830 married the
daughter of Juan Veramendi, the vice-governor of the State of Coahuila
and Texas.

His brother Rezin also was now a Texan; Stephen came in a little later.

The two, Jim and Rezin, were famous for their bowie-knife, as well as
for their bold fighting qualities. The knife was an accident. The
first one had been invented by Rezin from a finely-tempered
blacksmith's file, for a hunting-knife, in Louisiana. When hammered
and drawn into shape it had a blade five and one-quarter inches long
and one and one-half inches wide; was so nicely balanced that it was
proved to be both a useful tool and a terrible weapon.

Rezin gave this first knife to his brother Jim, and ordered another for
himself. "Bowie's knife" gained much favor from those who tried it;
and speed