OCR Text |
Show 420 WESTERN WILDS. versy, reader, find the key to the whole history of Texas as connected with other governments. Its settlement cost the lives of many thousand good men. The Comanches were then, as now, a race of nomadic thieves ; the Lipans and Carankawaes dominated the country between the Rio Grande and Col-orado. Other tribes were the Caddoes, Cenis and Nassonites. Texas had neither boundaries nor a name. The origin of the latter nobody knows, but it is supposed to be from an Indian word meaning " good hunting- ground," and was long spelled indifferently Tehas, Tejas, Tekas or Texas, which differ very little in Spanish pronunciation. Even now the residents are known as Tejanos ( pro. Teh- hah- noes) by the Mexicans. La Salle started northward with a considerable company, to open communication with Canada ; and was murdered by two of his men. The survivors quarreled among themselves; the murderers were in turn assassinated; others were drowned or captured, and of all that colony onlv five lived to see France again. Those left on the / / Lavaca were surprised by the Indians, part killed, and the rest carried into captivity, whence in old age they were reclaimed by the mission-aries. Thus ended the first settlement in Texas. Soon after the Spaniards planted missions and military posts in the south- west, but drought and hostile Indians drove them out, and for twenty years the country had not one white inhabitant. In 1712 Louis XIV granted to Anthony Crozat all Louisiana, as far west as the Rio Grande, and sent out an embassy, which was captured by the Spaniards. " The year of Missions" in Texas was 1715, when the Spaniards began again to plant them in the country. Thereafter it was permanently occupied by Spain, and its various sections known as the New Philippines and New Estremadura. For some fifty years now we have the Mission Period, as in all Spanish American countries. Those in Texas were controlled by zealous Franciscan priests, who spent a life- time in toil to convert the savage natives. At each mis-sion was a presidio, or commandant's head- quarters, with officers enough for two hundred and fifty men, though the latter rarely num-bered so many. The first move was to capture by force or stratagem a hundred or more Indians. On these kindness and persuasion were exhausted, and they were taught all the ceremonies of an exceedingly ceremonial religion. When sufficiently trusty they were sent out to persuade others in ; abundance of food was insured them, agriculture was taught, all the feasts and fasts were scrupulously observed, and at some missions the daily exercises in prayer and other services occupied |