Chapter XIII: Part 13

[133] The reason some of the mustangs were alone was due to the fact that the stallion leader had driven the younger and weaker horses from the herd. Since these horses were young, they would naturally often have good form. The color is hard to account for. Many of the mustangs were vari-colored, but it is doubtful if there was ever a solid white horse.

[134] The poem appeared in The Democratic Review, XII, 367f., accompanied by a condensation of Kendall’s story taken from the Picayune.

[135] Destined to be preserved for generations yet in his offspring in Emerson Hough’s North of 36. Zane Grey has also introduced him into fiction, in The Last of the Plainsmen.—Editor.

[136] Spence, Lewis, Myths and Legends, Vol. VII (“Mexico and Peru”), p. 123.

[137] It should be remembered that some of the ancient peoples grouped with the Cliff Dwellers inhabited natural caves. See Goddard, Pliny Earle, Indians of the Southwest, Handbook Series No. 2, American Museum of Natural History, p. 38.

[138] History has disproved this once common tale of the Lively’s never having been heard of. See Garrison, George P., Texas (American Commonwealths), pp. 144–145.—Editor.

[139] Says Carl Raht in his The Romance of Davis Mountains, El Paso, Texas, 1919, p. 25: “According to these authorities [“Bandelier and other writers who have examined the records of the early Spanish explorers”]—and present-day research has failed to refute their statements—the buffalo never frequented the Rio Grande in the Big Bend region.” “I never saw a buffalo west of the Pecos”: quoted from an old buffalo hunter in Frontier Times, March, 1924, p. 1.

[140] Stevens, Walter B., Through Texas, St. Louis, 1892, pp. 28–29.

[141] Although not a legend, this letter illustrates the popular speculation and tradition concerning La Salle—his followers, his fort, his death, even his treasure—that once flourished, first among the Spanish and then among the Anglo-Saxon Texans, but that now seem to be subsiding. As many places as claimed “Homer dead” have claimed the last resting place of La Salle. One informant writes that some Henderson County folk imagine that La Salle’s grave is on the west bank of the Neches in their precincts and that they have made recent excavations in search of treasure supposed to lie in the grave. De León made more than one expedition in search of the French; he did find an old man who had been with La Salle. See A School History of Texas, by Barker, Potts and Ramsdell, Chapter II.—Editor.

[142] Rose, Victor M., Some Historical Facts in Regard to the Settlement of Victoria, Texas, Laredo [1883?], pp. 71–72.

[143] Marryat, Captain, Narrative of the Travels and Adventures of Monsieur Violet in California, Sonora, and Western Texas, Leipzig, 1843, p. 278.