Santa Anna, after having expelled Iturbide, next overturned the federative system, restored the central power of the city of Mexico, and at the same time grasped the substance of absolute power, prudently avoiding the name of Emperor. Troops were sent to Texas, and these _ungrateful_ people were generously called upon, _to give up their religion and surrender their rifles_! The consequence was, that Coss and his fourteen hundred men were driven over the Rio Grande. People talk of the Texans having no cause of war, now I ask any one, who has a drop of American blood in his veins, to say, what he would think of an order by a military despot, to the people of Alleghany county for instance, _to give up their religion and their arms_? But then did not Mexico make grants of land to these ungrateful American settlers, and did not that entitle her to call upon those settlers to comply with her moderate requests?[1] It is true, Mexico did make grants of land in Texas; yes, of land which did not belong to her, for they were won from Spain by the Texan Americans themselves, who constituted nine tenths of the people of that part of the country. And what was the next movement on the part of Mexico? These grants were made during the federative system—Americans were invited on account of their valuable assistance in contending against the Spanish monarchy, and guarding the frontier against hostile Indians—but when they were no longer needed, when the lands improved by them, tempted the cupidity of the military despots, and when their sturdy habits of independence and love of liberty stood in the way of the despotic schemes of the military aspirants and plunderers of Mexico, the next thing was to expel, or exterminate, the ungrateful and hated North Americans. Santa Anna marched at the head of ten thousand men for this holy purpose. We may judge of the humane and civilized spirit of these barbarians, (for whom so much sympathy is ignorantly felt by some of our fellow citizens,) by the murder of Fanning and four hundred American Texans in cold blood, after a surrender as prisoners of war! This more than diabolical atrocity, is scarcely equalled by the murder of the Huguenots by the fanatical ruffian, Pedro Menendez. Footnote 1: