The Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association, Volume 8, July 1904 - April, 1905 Page: 70

70 Texas Historical Association Quarterly.
tions of the North; and [the father] of the second [was] the cele-
brated Don Luis de San Denis who brought the Spaniards into
Texas. It cannot be denied that in Demeciers are combined apt-
ness, training, and good education, as his writings show. But
what room is there for doubt that the French are pleasing to the
Indians? "While the soldiers," (this is the phraseology of the
letter of a missionary priest written in the year 1718) "mestizos,
half-breeds, mulattoes, and full-bloods, are engaged in vexing the
Indians, and co-operating in their thieveries and evil deeds, your
Frenchman will take off his shirt to give to them and to hold them
to their allegiance." And I have read many reports of this same
kind.
The concentration of forces in San Antonio de Bexar, the aban-
donment of the Adaes and Orcoquisac presidios, and all the meas-
ures which his Excellency the Marques de Ruby proposes, make for
the benefit of the Province of Texas.
If the clamors, the importunities, the representations, and the
appeals which have been made without ceasing by the governors of
the Provincias Internas, the captains of presidios, the reverend mis-
sionary fathers, and the citizens, had been listened to, each province
would have an army and each commandant a mine of gold.
The arguments of expediency with which they have always sup-
ported their individual plans, have taken the form of warnings of
the impending desolation of these dominions if troops and mission-
aries are not increased in number, new presidios created, families
and settlers sent out, war made on the heathen-and, finally, unless
the whole treasury of the King is put at their disposal, although,
burdened as it is with liabilities, its receipts do not in reality suffice
for necessary expenditures.
The Presidio of San Sabas has suffered two removals, and if at-
tention had been paid to the requests it would be necessary now
to remove it from the San Marcos River to the [Rio] del Norte.
That of San Agustin de Ahumada, up to the time when it disap-
peared in the ruins of its conflagration, a period of a little more
than nine years, had not attained a fixed location.
I transcribe literally the very sagacious expressions which are
contained in dictamens given by His Excellency the Marques de
Altamira in regard to the request of the Padre Fray Mariano de