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General Mejia, feeling keenly the moral support we were giving the Liberals, and hard pressed by the harassing attacks of Cortinas and Canales, had abandoned the place, and Caravajal, because of his credentials from our side, was in command, much to the dissatisfaction of both those chiefs whose differences it was intended he should reconcile.

Caravajal made too many professions of what he would do in short, bragged too much but as there was no help for the situation, I made the best of it by trying to smooth down the ruffled feathers of Canales and Cortinas.

The day after I got to Brownsville I visited Matamoras, and had a long interview with Caravajal. The outcome of this meeting was, on my part, a stronger conviction than ever that he was unsuitable, and I feared that either Canales or Cortinas would get possession of the city.

In the meanwhile Major Young had come to New Orleans, and organized there a band of men to act as a body-guard for Caravajal, the old wretch having induced him to accept the proposition by representing that it had my concurrence.

Caravajal so discreetly replied and used such convincing arguments, that he influenced Roldan and three or four of the other leaders to agree to wait upon the admiral and endeavour to come to an agreement: But this being disliked by the rest, when Roldan and three others were getting on horseback to go along with Caravajal to the admiral, the rabble surrounded them, declaring they would not allow them to go, and that if any agreement was to be made it should be drawn up in writing, that all might know what was proposed to be done.

As there were strong suspicions that the men who were to land with John Anthony meant to join the rebels, he ought not to have allowed them to land, or should have been more earnest in his endeavours to recover them. Caravajal circulated a report that he had come to the Indies as coadjutor to the admiral, so that nothing might be done without him, lest the admiral might commit some offence.

By the time the party got across the Gulf and over to Brownsville, Caravajal had been deposed by Canales, and the latter would not accept their services. This left Young with about fifty men to whom he was accountable, and as he had no money to procure them subsistence, they were in a bad fix.

By their advice he sent Caravajal and Ballester to treat. Roldan answered that since they had not brought with them the Indians he had demanded, he would enter into no conference for an accommodation.

Caravajal promptly appeared, but he did not impress me very favorably. He was old and cranky, yet, as he seemed anxious to do his best, I sent him over to Brownsville, with credentials, authorizing him to cross into Mexico, and followed him myself by the next boat. When I arrived in Brownsville, matters in Matamoras had already reached a crisis.