The Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1837-1867, 1848-04-08

. Besides, experience shows us that things OF
this sort may be sprung upon Congress and tn
people. II was so in the case of Texas. j
was 80 in the Twenty eighth Congress. Th'
members Of that Congress were not chosen e
decide the question Of Annexation or no An
nexaton. They came in on other grounds,po
litical and party--and were supported for req
sons not connected with this question-Whu
! then? And the Administration sprung upoI
! them the question of Anne xation. 1t obtain
/ ed snap judgment upon it, and carried the
measure ofAnnexatio That is indubtable
as could show by many instances, of which
/ shall state only one.
Four gentlemen from the State of Conncc-
ticut were elected before the question arose,
! belonging TO the dominant party. They had
not been here long before they were committed
10 annexation; and when IL was known in
Connecticut that Annexation was in contemp-
lation, rcmonstTances, private, public, and leg
islative, were uttered in tones that any one
could hear that could hear thunder. Did they
move them' Not nj all. Every one voted for
Annexation! The election came on, they were
all turned out 60 man. But what did those
care for that, who had the benefit ofthcir votes?
Such ngencics-ift be not more proper to call
them such instrumentulities-re respect no
longer than they continue TO be useful.
Sir, we take New Mexico and California
who is weak enough TO suppose that there is
an endi Don't we hear il avowed every day,
that il would be proper also to take Sonora,
Tamaulipas and other provinces, States OF
Northern Mexico' Who thinks that the hun
ger for dominion will stop here of itself 1t
is said TO be sure that our present acquisitions
will prove so lean and unsatisfactory that we
shall seek no farther. In my judgment, we
may as well say of rapacioGs animal, that if
lie has made one unproductive hunt, he will
not try for 4 better foray
But further. There are some things one
can argue against with temper, and submit to,
ifoyerruled, without modification. There are
other things that seem TO affect ones con-
seriousness of being n sensible man, and to i'm
ply disposition to impose upon his common
sense. And of this class of topics, pretcnc-
es, have never heard of nythng, and can
not conceive Of anything more ridiculous in
itself, more absurd, and more aifrontive to all
sober judgment, than the cry that we are get
ting indemnify, indemnity, by the acquisition
of New Mexico and California. | hold that
they are not worth dollar and we pay for
them vast sums of money! We have expend-
ed, as every body knows, large treasures in
the prosecution of the war; and now what is
to constitute this indemnity? What do gentle
men mean by il? Now sir, let us see hoy this
stands a little We get country--we get IN
the first instance, cesson, or an acknowledge.
ment of boundary, Il care not which way you
stale ~ Of the couTiry between the Nueces
and the itio Gr0pdc. What this country is,
man in the other House major GAINEs,) He
says the whole country is worth nothing:
"The country from the Nueces to the val
ley ofthe Rio Grande is poor, sterile, sandy,
and barren-wth not single tree of any size
or value on our whole route. The only tree
which we saw, was the musquit tree, and very
few of these. The musqut is small tree, re-
sembling old and decayed peach tree. The
whole country may be truly called a perfect
waste, inhabited, and unhabitable. There is
not drop of running water between the two
rivers, except in the two small streams of San
Salvador and Santa Gartrudus, and these only
contain water in the rainy season. Neither of
them had running water when we passed
them. The chapparal commences within forty
or fifty miles ofthe Rio Grande This is poor,
rocky, and sandy; covered with prickly pear,
thistcs, and almost every sticking thng--con-
stituting n thick and perfectly impenetrable
underground. For any useful or agricultural
purpose, the country is not worth a sous.
$50 far as we were able to form any opinion
of this desert upon the other routes which had
been travelled, its character every where be-
tween the two rivers, is pretty much the same.
We learned that the routes pursued by Gener-
al Taylor, south of ours, was through coun-
try similar to that through which we passed;
as also was that travelled by General Wool
| from San Antonio to Presdio, on the Rio
! Grande. From what we both saw and heard,
the whole command came to the conclusion
which have already expressed-that it was
worth nothing. ! have no hesitation in saying
| that would not hazard the life of one valua-
bic and useful man for every foot of land be.
tween San Patriotic and the valley of the Rio
! Grande The country is not now and can
ne yer be of the slightest raiac''
lie has been there lately. He is compe.
tent observer. He is contradicted by nobody
And so far that country is concerned, take
it for granted that it is not worth a dollar.
Now of New Mexico--.what of that Forty.
nine iftieths, at least, of the whole of New
Mexico, are barren waste--a desert, plain oil
mountain with no wood, no timber:--little
faggots for lighting n fire carried thirty oil
| forty miles on mules-there is no natural fall
of rains there as in temperate climates. 1t is
Asiatc in scenery togethcr-enormousl
high mountains, running up, some OF them
10000 feet-with narrow valleys at their has
es, through which streams sometimes trio le
| along. A strip-a garter winds along throug l
which runs the Rio Grande, from far away
up the Rocky Mountains, to latitude SO
a distance of three or four hundred miles
| There these 10000 persons are. In the noun
tains on the right and left, are streams which
ODE ing the natural tendency as laterals, shoult
flow into the Rio Grande, and which, in Ger
tain seasons, when rains are abundant, do some
of them, actually reach the Rio Grande-whilt
the greater part always, and all for the great
CIR part OF the year, never reach outlet Il
the sea, but are absorbed in the sands and des
ert plains ofthe country. There is no cult
vation there There is cultivation where Their,
is artificial watering or irrigation, and no where
else Men can live only in the narrow vale,
and in the gorges Oft the Mountains which
rise around it--and not along the course of tn,
streams which lose themselves in the sands.
| Now there is no public domain in New Mex
ico,-not foot of land, to the soil of which