etreating Mexicans had set fire to the edifices to prevent our
occupation; and, as General Taylor considered this a direct and
vexatious evidence of hostility, and was unwilling to be trifled with by
the tools of the military authorities of Matamoros, he dismissed the
deputation with the information that he would answer the protest when he
was opposite the city.

The cavalry was forthwith pushed on to the burning town in time to
arrest the fire which consumed but three or four houses; yet the
inhabitants had already fled, and the officer, who committed the
incendiary act under the orders, it is said, of General Mejia, was
nowhere to be found.

As our troops entered the village they were gratified to find that the
transports from Corpus Christi had exactly answered their land movement,
and that the steamers had arrived in the harbor with the convoy close in
their rear, only a few hours before our forces entered from the desert.
General Taylor immediately directed the engineers to examine the ground
with a view of tracing lines of defence and strengthening a position,
which he decided should form the great depot of our forces.

* * * * *

Point Isabel is approached from the sea through the Brazos de Santiago.
It is a wild and desolate sea coast, defended by bars and strewn with
wrecks. In former years, a small Mexican village and fort, containing a
couple of cannons, stood upon the Brazos Point, but during one of those
terrific storms which ravage the Mexican coast, the sea rose above the
frail barrier of shifting sand, and when the tempest subsided, it was
discovered that the village and fortification had been engulfed beneath
the waves. Few places are more inhospitable on the American coast than
the bar of Brazos. There is no friendly shore under whose protecting lee
ships may seek safety during the awful hurricanes that so often descend
upon them without a moment's warning. But when a vessel has fairly
passed the entrance, she moves along securely over the waters of the
bay, and anchors under cover of the sand hills to the left whilst her
passengers and freight are landed in boats or lighters.

On a bluff promontory jutting out into the bay and sloping gradually
inland, stands the village of Isabel. Its houses denoted the character
of its people. The spars of wrecked vessels, a few reeds, and the
_debris_ of a stormy shore, thatched with grass and sea weed, formed the
materials of wh