ourtenay entered the room, he told me he expected that the
parson was planning some new iniquity, for he had seen him just then
crossing the river in a dug-out. As everything was to be feared from
the rascal, after the circumstance of the saddle-bags, we resolved that
we would keep a watch; we dragged our beds near the window, and laid
down without undressing.

To pass away the time, we talked of Captain Finn and of the Texians.
Mr Courtenay related to me a case of negro stealing by the same General
John Meyer, of whom my fellow companion, the parson, had already talked
so much while we were travelling in Texas. One winter, Mr Courtenay,
returning from the East, was stopped in Vincennes (Indiana) by the depth
of the snow, which for a few days rendered the roads impassable. There
he saw a very fine breed of sheep, which he determined to introduce upon
his plantation; and hearing that the general would be coming down the
river in a large flat boat as soon as the ice would permit, he made an
agreement with him that he should bring a dozen of the animals to the
plantation, which stood a few miles below the mouth of the Ohio, on the
other side of the Mississippi.

Meyer made his bargain, and two months afterwards delivered the live
stock, for which he received the price agreed upon. Then he asked
permission to encamp upon Mr Courtenay's land, as his boat had received
some very serious injury, which could not be repaired under five or six
days. Mr Courtenay allowed Meyer and his people to take shelter in a
brick barn, and ordered his negroes to furnish the boatmen with potatoes
and vegetables of all descriptions.

Three or four days afterwards he was astonished by several of his slaves
informing him the general had been tampering with them, saying they were
fools to remain slaves, when they could be as free as white men, and
that if they would come down the river with him, he would take them to
Texas, where he would pay them twenty dollars a month for their labour.

Courtenay advised them, by all means, to seem to accede to the
proposition, and gave them instructions as to how they were to act. He
then despatched notes to some twenty neighbours, requesting them to come
to the plantation, and bring their whips with them, as they would be
required.

Meyer having repaired his boats, came to return thanks, and to announce
his departure early on the following morning. At eleven o'clock, when
he thought everybody in the