or had messages of introduction; but either with or without such
recommendations, we always found a hearty welcome and hospitable reception,
and it was rare that we were allowed to pay for our entertainment.

We arrived one day at a clearing which lay a few miles off the way from
Harrisburg to San Felipe de Austin, and belonged to a Mr Neal. He had been
three years in the country, occupying himself with the breeding of cattle,
which is unquestionably the most agreeable, as well as profitable,
occupation that can be followed in Texas. He had between seven and eight
hundred head of cattle, and from fifty to sixty horses, all mustangs. His
plantation, like nearly all the plantations in Texas at that time, was as
yet in a very rough state, and his house, although roomy and comfortable
enough inside, was built of unhewn tree-trunks, in true back-woodsman
style. It was situated on the border of one of the islands, or groups of
trees, and stood between two gigantic sycamores, which sheltered it from
the sun and wind. In front, and as far as could be seen, lay the prairie,
covered with its waving grass and many-coloured flowers, behind the
dwelling arose the cluster of forest trees in all their primeval majesty,
laced and bound together by an infinity of wild vines, which shot their
tendrils and clinging branches hundreds of feet upwards to the very top of
the trees, embracing and covering the whole island with a green network,
and converting it into an immense bower of vine leaves, which would have
been no unsuitable abode for Bacchus and his train.

These islands are one of the most enchanting features of Texian scenery.
Of infinite variety and beauty of form, and unrivalled in the growth and
magnitude of the trees that compose them, they are to be found of all
shapes--circular, parallelograms, hexagons, octagons--some again twisting
and winding like dark-green snakes over the brighter surface of the
prairie. In no park or artificially laid out grounds, would it be possible