CONTENTS
CHAPTER I. THE CITY IN THE WILDERNESS.
CHAPTER II. ANTONIA AND ISABEL.
CHAPTER III. BUILDERS OF THE COMMONWEALTH.
CHAPTER IV. THE SHINING BANDS OF LOVE.
CHAPTER V. A FAMOUS BARBECUE.
CHAPTER VI. ROBERT WORTH IS DISARMED.
CHAPTER VII. A MEETING AT MIDNIGHT.
CHAPTER VIII. MOTHER AND PRIEST.
CHAPTER IX. THE STORMING OF THE ALAMO.
CHAPTER X. THE DOCTOR AND THE PRIEST.
CHAPTER XI. A HAPPY TRUCE.
CHAPTER XII. DANGER AND HELP.
CHAPTER XIII. THE ARRIVAL OF SANTA ANNA.
CHAPTER XIV. THE FALL OF THE ALAMO.
CHAPTER XV. GOLIAD.
CHAPTER XVI. THE LOADSTONE IN THE BREAST.
CHAPTER XVII. HOME AGAIN.
CHAPTER XVIII. UNDER ONE FLAG.
“What, are you stepping westward?” “Yea.”
Yet who would stop or fear to advance, Though home or shelter there was none, With such a sky to lead him on!” —WORDSWORTH. “Ah! cool night wind, tremulous stars, Ah! glimmering water, Fitful earth murmur, Dreaming woods!” —ARNOLD.
In A. D. sixteen hundred and ninety-two, a few Franciscan monks began to build a city. The site chosen was a lovely wilderness hundreds of miles away from civilization on every side, and surrounded by savage and warlike tribes. But the spot was as beautiful as the garden of God. It was shielded by picturesque mountains, watered by two rivers, carpeted with flowers innumerable, shaded by noble trees joyful with the notes of a multitude of singing birds. To breathe the balmy atmosphere was to be conscious of some rarer and finer life, and the beauty of the sunny skies—marvellous at dawn and eve with tints of saffron and amethyst and opal—was like a dream of heaven.
One of the rivers was fed by a hundred springs situated in the midst of charming bowers. The monks called it the San Antonio; and on its banks they built three noble Missions. The shining white stone of the neighborhood rose in graceful domes and spires above the green trees. Sculptures, basso-relievos, and lines of gorgeous coloring adorned the exterio