, destitute of funds, were compelled to borrow,
upon the strength of pay due, of their more fortunate companions, or of
the Shylocks, in search of victims, that polluted the camp. Sick
soldiers, directed by their surgeons to return to the United States, had
either to remain and die, or to submit to exorbitant exactions from
unfeeling villains in their pension certificates and pay accounts,
though the law requires the paymasters to cash them in specie.

"On the first landing of the 3d and 4th infantry at Corpus Christi,
"Kinney's Rancho," though a lawless, smuggling town, under the vigorous
sway of its martial proprietor, was as quiet and peaceful as a village
in New England. But every fresh arrival of troops was followed by some
portion of that vast horde of harpies, that are ever to be found in the
train of all armies, ready to prey upon the simple and unsuspecting
among the soldiers. In a short time, hundreds of temporary structures
were erected on the outskirts of the "Rancho," and in them, all the
cut-throats, thieves, and murderers of the United States and Texas, seem
to have congregated. No sight could have been more truly melancholy than
that of their bloated and sin-marked visages, as they lounged through
the purlieus of this modern Pandemonium. The air, by day, was polluted
with their horrid oaths and imprecations,--and the savage yells,
exulting shouts, and despairing groans of their murderous frays, made
night hideous. But, not content with confining their hellish deeds to
their own worthy fraternity, they laid their worthless hands on the
troops. Many of the soldiers, enticed to their dram-shops, were drugged
with stupefying potions, and then robbed of their hard earnings, or
murdered in cold blood."

General Taylor, looking to the probability of a movement against Mexico,
warned the department that a ponton train was indispensable in a country
wherein streams abounded and wood for bridges was scarce; but it was not
despatched until after the next meeting of congress.

"Six months after the army had taken the field, there were not teams and
wagons enough to transport one half of the troops; so that, in case of
hostilities, had a forward movement been ordered, it could only have
been effected by detachments, and, in consequence, that most fatal of
all military errors would have been committed, of permitting the enemy
to attack and beat in detail. The few teams furnished, it is natural to
think, were the cho