CHAPTER XVII.
THE GRASS FIGHT, AND WHAT FOLLOWED.
The victory at Concepcion, as was natural, greatly strengthened thecause of the Texans, and immediately afterward the number of volunteersin the army increased. Seeing this, Austin moved his command stillcloser, and settled into a regular siege of San Antonio. The scouts,under Colonel Bowie, surrounded the town, to give warning of theapproach of any reinforcements for General Cos, who remained within,still barricading the streets and wondering how soon the revolutionistswould attack him.
In the meantime, a general meeting of citizens and political leaderswas held at San Felipe, and at this convention, as it was termed,Austin was elected as a commissioner to seek aid in the United States.This left Austin's place in the army vacant, and General EdwardBurleson, an old Indian fighter, was selected to fill the position.
General Cos was boxed up in San Antonio with a force estimated at fromtwelve hundred to sixteen hundred men. Many of his soldiers belonged tomounted companies, and it became a problem, not only how to feed themen, but also how to feed so many animals. There were rations to holdout for some time, but little forage. To make the matter still moredifficult for the Mexican commander, Bowie and others ordered all thegrass in the immediate vicinity of San Antonio burnt. This caused oneor two small fires among the huts on the outskirts of the town, andcame near to starting a panic.
At last General Cos felt that he must either have forage for hissoldiers' horses, or else slaughter them, and he hired bodies of theMexican farmers to go out, during the night, to gather such grass ascould be gotten within a reasonable distance of the town. These bodiesof men invariably went out under the protection of one or morecompanies of cavalry.
The expeditions after forage brought on what was called the GrassFight. Among Bowie's scouts was an old frontiersman called Deaf Smith,and one day when Smith was out he discovered a body of farmers andcavalry, about a hundred strong. The panniers of the horses and muleswere stuffed with grass, but as the body was a long way off, Smithmistook them for some troops come to reinforce General Cos, andsupposed the stuffed panniers to be filled with silver to pay off theBexar garrison.
Without waiting to make certain about his discovery, Deaf Smith rodepell-mell into the camp of the Texans. "The reinforcements are coming!"he shouted. "Ugartchea is here!"
"Ugartchea! Ugartchea!" was the cry taken up on all sides, and it wasnot long before Colonel Bowie set off with a hundred of the best Texanhorsemen to intercept the supposed newcomers.
The Mexicans saw them approach, but it was too late to get back intoSan Antonio, and while a few of the farmers managed to escape, theMexican cavalry took up a position in the bed of a dry creek. Theplight of those outside of the city was seen by those within, andGeneral Cos instantly despatched more cavalry to the relief, and alsotwo pieces of artillery.
The creek, which was in reality a deep gully, was overgrown on eitherside with tall brush, and Bowie had some difficulty in bringing up hiscommand to a firing position. But some of the scouts could not be heldback, and rushing up they speedily laid several of the Mexicans low.
"Now then, fire on them!" shouted Bowie, when the proper range wasobtained; but the Texans had scarcely opened up, when the relief guardof the Mexicans swung into position behind the Texans, and they foundthemselves caught between two fires. They wheeled about, and chargedthose behind them, who speedily scattered in every direction, leavingtheir dead and dying behind them.
In the meantime, the main body of the Texan army was coming up, and,arriving at the gully, they drove out the cavalry, killing a dozen ormore of them, and capturing many mules and horses, and a large quantityof grass, the so-called "silver" which was supposed to fill thepanniers, and which caused many a laugh for long afterward. The loss tothe Texans was small.
In the midst of the conflict one of the officers dashed up to AmosRadbury. "Lieutenant, several Mexicans are escaping in yonderdirection," he said, pointing with his sword. "You will take adetachment of twelve men, and go after them."
"I will, major," answered the lieutenant, and saluted. He was soon onthe way, with Poke Stover, and eleven others, for Poke happened to benear him when the order was given. The Mexicans they had been sent tocapture were four in number, and one of them looked like an officer ofconsiderable rank.
"I think we can ride them down, Poke," observed Lieutenant Radbury, ashe dashed over the prairies at the full speed of his mustang.
"Well, we kin give 'em a putty tough ride fer it, anyhow," drawled thefrontiersman.
"We must catch them, if possible, before they gain yonder timber land."
"Thet's so. If we don't, it won't be no easy work to locate 'em in thebrush."
The party of thirteen were all fair riders, but for once the numberseemed fated to be really unlucky. Less than quarter of a mile had beencovered when one of the mustangs, going at full speed, stepped into thehole of some wild animal, and pitched headlong with a broken leg. Therider behind the one to go down, pitched in on top of him, and in athrice there lay on the prairie a mustang so badly injured that he hadto be shot, and two men so bruised that further pursuit for them of theMexicans was out of the question.
"Halt!" cried Lieutenant Radbury, and brought the balance of hiscommand to a standstill. "Are you much hurt, Readwell?"
"I--I reckon not," was the answer, but when Readwell attempted to standup he found his foot and back badly strained.
"And you, Alton?"
"My left arm is bruised,--I don't know but what it is broken."
"The mustang is done fer," put in Poke Stover, after examiningReadwell's steed. "Might as well shoot him, and put him out of hismisery."
This was ordered by the lieutenant, and the command carried out on thespot. The second mustang was slightly injured, but could still beridden.
"Both of you had better go back, on the one mustang," said AmosRadbury. "And, Glenwood, you can go back with them, for fear they mayhave trouble with other Mexicans who may be wandering about."
So it was arranged, and this brought the lieutenant's force down to tenmen. The two parties separated without delay, and those in pursuit ofthe flying Mexicans went on as fast as before.
But the delay had given the enemy an advantage, and before the Texanscould come within good firing distance the four Mexicans reached thetimber. At the edge they came to a halt.
"They are going to fire on us, leftenant!" cried Stover.
"Down!" cried Amos Radbury, and the Texans had scarcely time to drop tothe sheltered sides of the steeds, a favourite trick with oldfrontiersmen, when a volley sounded out, and the bullets whistled overtheir heads. Another volley followed; then, as the Texans swept closer,and fired in return, the Mexicans disappeared into the timber.
Ordinary soldiers would have hesitated about following the Mexicansinto the forest, but all of the Texans were expert in woodcraft, andthought they could keep out of an ambuscade as well in the woods as outof it.
"Stover, supposing you and Dilberry go ahead and reconnoitre,"suggested the lieutenant. "I know I can trust you to keep out oftrouble."
"Certainly, I'll go ahead, if ye want me to," answered Poke Stover, inhis free and easy manner, and rode on with the other soldier mentioned.As soon as they got into the thickets of the timber, they dismounted,tied their steeds to a tree, and advanced on foot. In the meantime,Amos Radbury spread out the balance of his party into a line fiftyyards long, extending from a deep ravine on the right to a steep hillon the left. He felt that the Mexicans could not climb the hill verywell, for it was covered with large and loose stones, and to take theirponies down into the ravine would be equally difficult.
The advance of Stover and his companion was necessarily slow, for theyhad no desire to be picked off by some Mexican concealed behind a tree.Yet they kept on for a dozen rods before finding any trace of theenemy.
"The trail goes toward the ravine," said Stover, presently. "They arefollowing an old Comanche path."
"Right ye air," answered the
other frontiersman. "Years ago, them airComanches had a village in this ravine, erbout four miles from hyer."
"I've heard tell on it, Dilberry, though I never sot eyes on it myself.It war the home o' thet Bison Head, the wust of 'em as ain't dead yet."
Having made certain that the Mexicans had gone straight on for a goodlydistance, the two scouts so reported, and the entire party set offalong the ravine, which at some points was broad and shallow and atothers narrow and deep.
Suddenly the report of a gun rang out, coming from a point where theravine made an abrupt turn to the north. Several other reportsfollowed.
"They must be shooting at something," said Lieutenant Radbury. "Butthey are not aiming at us, for no bullets have come this way, so far asI can ascertain."
"Perhaps they are having a brush with some Indians," suggested anotherof the party. "They may--Hello, what's this coming along the trail? Awhite mustang, I declare, with a black blaze on his forehead. None o'those greasers rode that animal, I'm certain on it."
"A white mustang!" cried Amos Radbury, and then, as the animal camecloser, he gave a start. "It's the same, I declare!"
"The same?" queried Poke Stover. "What do ye mean, leftenant?"
"That mustang belongs to me. I was trying to break him in when the callto arms came. He must have gotten away from my boys. But what is hedoing away out here?"
That question could not be answered just then, and in another momentthe white mustang was out of sight. Then, as the firing ahead hadceased, the movement forward was continued.
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