The land, moreover, was claimed by the Mexicans and others who were already settled upon it. The quarrels between these and the newcomers became in course of time so bitter that the Mexican government, during an absence of Hayden Edwards in the United States, took back his grant and ordered him and his two brothers to leave the country. Edwards had put all of his private fortune into his venture, and this act of tyranny goaded him and his colonists to fury. Finding vain all their appeals to the governor, they took up arms and declared they would make of Texas an independent republic. They called themselves Fredonians; and banding together, they entrenched themselves in the old stone fort at Nacogdoches. Thence they sent an appeal to Austin’s colonists for help. Both Austin’s colonists and the Cherokee Indians, upon whom they counted for support, refused to join them. News came that a Mexican army was marching against them; their own fighting force was less than two hundred men. They saw the weakness of their position; and the Fredonian war, as it was called, ended after a skirmish or two, in the surrender of the Fredonians. Edwards and his colonists left Texas, and returned angry and disgusted to Louisiana (1826). This was a small foretaste of Mexican justice. But troubles far graver than the Fredonian war were at that moment brewing for Texas. 3. ORDERS AND DISORDER. Until 1824 Texas had been a province of Mexico, with her capital at San Antonio. In that year, however, the general government decreed the union of Texas with Coahuila; and the capital of the new state was fixed at Saltillo (Sal-tee′yo), a distant town in Mexico. A department chief was the only official stationed at San Antonio. The colonists were much displeased at this change. Instead of a ride, when necessary, to San Antonio, where there were friends and familiar faces, torch-lit plazas, music, and _fiestas_ to welcome the traveler, it meant a long and perilous journey through a strange land, among people who regarded all Americans with an eye of sullen distrust. [Illustration: MAP OF TEXAS With Parts of the Adjoining States COMPILED BY STEPHEN F. AUSTIN PUBLISHED by H. S. TANNER PHILADELPHIA 1835 High-resolution Version]