An Active Settlement
Gen. Houston lives, when at home, at Huntsville, Texas; the inhabitants mostly live, says Humboldt, Beeswax, Borax, or some of the other historians, by hunting. The wolves act as watchmen at night, relieved now and then by the Ingins, who make the wig business brisk by relieving straggling citizens of their top-knots. A man engaged in a quiet smoke, sees a deer or bear sneaking around, and by taking down his rifle, has steaks for breakfast, and a haunch for next day’s dinner, right at his door. Vegetables and fruit grow naturally; flowers come up and bloom spontaneously. The distinguished citizens wear buck-skin trowsers, coon-skin hats, buffalo-skin overcoats, and alligator-hide boots. Old San Jacinto walked into the Senate last winter—fresh from home—with a panther-skin vest, and bear-skin breeches on! Great country, that Texas.