Latest from Texas

 

The steamer Undine arrived here yesterday morning, bringing us Galveston papers to the 23^rd inst.  The following communication from Capt. Grice embraces the latest news from Corpus Christi, with a narration of anything of interest which occurred on the voyage.  It will be seen that up to the time when the Undine left Corpus Christi there was nothing there of war but the rumors.

 

                                                          On Board Steamer Undine

                                            Ascending Mississippi River, Aug. 26, 1845.

 

We left Corpus Christi on the 18^th inst.  All is quiet at the United States encampment.  Gen. Taylor had succeeded in removing all the troops of the 3d and 4^th regiments of Infantry and a large proportion of the public stores to Corpus Christi, where his head-quarters are at present established.  A breastwork of earth had been thrown up and nearly completed.  A few pieces of ordnance, procured in the town, were brought into requisition.  No certain information concerning the advance of the Mexicans had been received; but it was rumored that Arista was assembling a large force at Matamoros and along the Rio Grande.  The U. S. Dragoons, under command of Col. Twiggs, had crossed the Colorado, and were on their march to Corpus Christi – all well.  A company of Mexican traders were expected in the next day.  The location of the encampment is salubrious and pleasant, being immediately upon the beach of the bay, and open to the sea breeze.  The health of the camp was good.

 

We left Aransas Bay at 6 o’clock, on the evening of the 21^st.  The schooner Florida, with coal, &c., from New Orleans, had just arrived; schooner Rosella, Shipman was preparing for sea, to leave in a few days; steamer Monmouth repairing at St. Joseph’s Island.  The wreck of the schooner Swallow, on Aransas bar, had been stripped of her masts, sails, rigging, &c., and some of her cargo saved.  A sale was to take place on the 22d inst.

 

We arrived at Galveston on the 23d inst., replenished wood and water, and left at noon on the 24^th.  The steamship John S. McKim was in port, and advertised to leave at 8 o’clock that afternoon.  The ship Constellation, Capt. Jackson, and the brig Reaper, Capt. Bretton, were also in port – the former loading for Genoa to sail in five days.

 

At 5 o’clock in the afternoon of the 24^th inst., when about forty-five miles east of Galveston, we experienced a very heavy squall of wind and rain from the south-east, accompanied by vivid flashes of lightning and a constant roar of thunder, which continued for the space of fifty minutes.  This was followed by a dismal night and a heavy sea; however, we received no injury.

 

On the morning of the 28^th, at 10 o’clock, we passed the S. W. Pass of Vermilion Bay.  We saw a steamer at anchor near the light-house, which was supposed to be the White Wing, bound for Aransas, although no smoke nor signs of moving were discernible.

 

Nothing off the S. W. Pass of the Mississippi river bound in.

 

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The latest news which we see from Austin is to the 13^th inst.  The Convention was still in session, but it was anticipated that their labors would close on the 23d inst., Saturday last.

 

The Houston Telegraph of the 20^th contains the letter of E. Allen, acting Secretary of State, to the Hon. Ashbel Smith, informing him of the rejection by the Senate of the preliminary propositions to negotiate a treaty with Mexico on the basis of the separate independence of the Republic, and telling him, that under such circumstances it is unnecessary for him any longer to continue to discharge the duties of minister to the European Governments.  Why, we thought that Ashbel Smith had told the editors of the New York Journal of Commerce that the purpose of his very hasty, but very mysterious, visit to England was — not to carry on or keep open diplomatic relations, but to close them in a becoming manner; although it now appears he was “driving away,” or, in the more polished Houstonic phrase, coquetting with those European Governments until advised by his locum tenens that he might come home, as all future labor to defeat Annexation would be but labor in vain.

 

News of the arrival of the Dragoons, under the command of Col. Twiggs, at San Antonio, had reached Galveston.  They performed their march at the rate of twenty miles per day, and with very little sickness among their number – 450.  They are expected to join the army at Corpus Christi under Gen. Taylor.

 

A committee of the Convention, to whom the subject was referred, state that the expenses of the new State Government for the first year will be $44,500.  They estimate the next revenue for a year at $47, 492.25; and by raising the tax on land, which they suggest, from one-tenth of one per cent to one-fifth of one per cent, thus equalizing it with the specific tax, they estimate that the yearly revenue will be $65,492.52.

 

The idea of annulling the present Constitution, and of forming a Provisional Government until Texas assumes its position as a State of the Union, which was bruited by many, has not been entertained by the Convention; nor do we hear anything of the formation of the territory into two States, about which some of our Northern contemporaries seemed to be so very much troubled.

 

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