Texas was at this time a State, acting independently of Mexico, yet unacknowledged as such by the mother country. The Texans, inspired by the difficulties of their situation, and surrounded by political influence in the United States, agitated the question of coming into the Union. The result was that General Santa Anna, then President of Mexico, made preparations which contemplated the reassertion of the national government in the revolted province. This naturally made the southern border line of Louisiana, the Sabine, an object of attack, and as General Taylor had, with the idea of being left in peaceful retirement, asked to be in command in Louisiana, he unconsciously placed himself in the very position that was to call him into a more active and important field of duty than had yet been entrusted to him. Mrs. Taylor, meantime, painfully unconscious of the drama that was opening before her, calmly and full of content, went about her domestic duties. A garden was planted, and she cherished the first signs of the growing vegetation with almost childish delight. Her old friends among the citizens of the neighborhood made friendly visits. Miss Betty, who was now in the very perfection of her blooming womanhood, was popular with the young ladies of her age and station. The “old General” was here and there, according to his habits; one day away attending to some military matter, then enjoying what seemed to him an endless source of interest, the examination of the workings of plantation life. He began, in fact, to assume the airs of an agriculturist; invested what means he had in a cotton farm on the Mississippi, and looked forward to the time when his income would be large and liberal for the pursuits of peace. All this time to the south of General Taylor’s military department there were signs of trouble, and one day he received from the Adjutant-General of the Army a letter, which announced that there was great danger of a hostile incursion of Indians on the southern border of his department. The letter thus concluded: “Should the apprehended hostilities with the Indians alluded to break out, an officer of rank—probably yourself—will be sent to command the United States forces to be put in the field.”