I recollect one case of a mule that had worked in a team under the saddle, not only for some time at Corpus Christi, where he was broken, but all the way to the point opposite Matamoras, then to Camargo, where he got loose from his fastenings during the night.  He did not run away at first, but staid in the neighborhood for a day or two, coming up sometimes to the feed trough even; but on the approach of the teamster he always got out of the way.  At last, growing tired of the constant effort to catch him, he disappeared altogether.  Nothing short of a Mexican with his lasso could have caught him.  Regulations would not have warranted the expenditure of a dollar in hiring a man with a lasso to catch that mule; but they did allow the expenditure “of the mule,” on a certificate that he had run away without any fault of the quartermaster on whose returns he was borne, and also the purchase of another to take his place.  I am a competent witness, for I was regimental quartermaster at the time.

While at Corpus Christi all the officers who had a fancy for riding kept horses.  The animals cost but little in the first instance, and when picketed they would get their living without any cost.  I had three not long before the army moved, but a sad accident bereft me of them all at one time.  A colored boy who gave them all the attention they got —­besides looking after my tent and that of a class-mate and fellow-lieutenant and cooking for us, all for about eight dollars per month, was riding one to water and leading the other two.  The led horses pulled him from his seat and all three ran away.  They never were heard of afterwards.  Shortly after that some one told Captain Bliss, General Taylor’s Adjutant-General, of my misfortune.  “Yes; I heard Grant lost five or six dollars’ worth of horses the other day,” he replied.  That was a slander; they were broken to the saddle when I got them and cost nearly twenty dollars.  I never suspected the colored boy of malicious intent in letting them get away, because, if they had not escaped, he could have had one of them to ride on the long march then in prospect.

CHAPTER VI.

Advance of the army—­crossing the Colorado—­the Rio Grande.

At last the preparations were complete and orders were issued for the advance to begin on the 8th of March.  General Taylor had an army of not more than three thousand men.  One battery, the siege guns and all the convalescent troops were sent on by water to Brazos Santiago, at the mouth of the Rio Grande.  A guard was left back at Corpus Christi to look after public property and to take care of those who were too sick to be removed.  The remainder of the army, probably not more than twenty five hundred men, was divided into three brigades, with the cavalry independent.  Colonel Twiggs, with seven companies