ep in the yielding soil, while a
scorching sun shone over him and not a breath of air relieved his
sufferings. At times, a verdant forest loomed up along the heated
horizon, fringed by limpid lakes, and our wearied columns moved on
gaily, cheated, again and again, by the hope of shade and water.
Suddenly the beautiful groves dwindled into jagged clumps of thorns or
aloes, and the fairy lakes changed to salt and turbid lagunes. "The
wormwood star had fallen on every thing and turned the waters to
bitterness." The plant whose piercing spines and sword-like leaves have
entitled it to the name of the "Spanish bayonet," was the hermit shrub
of this dreadful Zaharah. Around its roots the snakes lurked and
crawled. Whenever the soldiers' path was unimpeded by these annoyances,
scarifying his limbs as he advanced, the ground seemed heated and
sinking like the _scoriae_ of Vesuvius. Man and beast sank exhausted
and panting on the earth. The want and value of delicious water are
never known till we pass a day like this under the burning rays of a
tropical sun, toiling on foot over a scorched and arid soil without
refreshment! At length the word ran along the line that it was
approaching a lake whose waters were not salt. "Under the excitement of
hope the faint and exhausted infantry pressed onward with renewed life,
while, some miles ahead, the artillery were seen to halt enjoying the
luxury of _water_. As the soldiers reached it all discipline was
forgotten; their arms were thrown down, and they rushed boldly in,
thrusting their heads beneath the waves in their desire to quench the
thirst that was consuming their vitals."[98]

Such is the natural aspect and character of the desolate region between
the Nueces and the Rio Grande,--a chequered wilderness of sand and
verdure,--fit only for the wild beasts that inhabit it, and properly
described in former days, as a suitable frontier between the great
republics of North America.

* * * * *

On the 21st of March, all our forces concentrated on the Arroyo
Colorado,--a salt stream or lagune nearly one hundred yards broad, and
so deep as to be scarcely fordable,--situated about thirty miles north
of Matamoros. Had the enemy attacked us here his assault would have been
formidable, wearied as were our troops with the distressing marches of
previous days. Bold, bluff banks, twenty or thirty feet high, hem in the
stream, whose borders, on both sides, are lin