Texas: the rise, progress, and prospects of the Republic of Texas, Vol.1 Page: 413 of 432

                                
CHAP. V.]

EMPRESARIO SETTLEMENTS.

359

States, and the constitutional independence of all
and each one of them."*    On the 24th of March,
1825, a State colonization law was passed, under
which grants in Texas were made to many Empresarios.
 On the 4th of June Mr. Austin contracted
for the settlement of 500 foreign families within the
'following boundaries; commencing on the west
bank of the river San Jacinto, at the termination of
the ten league reserve from the Gulf of Mexico,
thence following up the right bank of said river to
its head; thence due north to the road leading to
Nacogdoches from Bexar; thence following said road
westwardly to a point whence a line due south will
strike the Labaca; thence following down the east of
the Gulf of Mexico; thence eastwardly along the
said ten league line parallel with the coast, to the
place of beginning. In the same year Robert Leftwich
(an American) contracted for the introduction
of 200 families. This contract, after much controversy,
at length fell to the Nashville Company of
Tennessee, by their agent, the Empresario Sterling
C. Robertson, of which company Leftwich was the
original agent. Green Dewitt (an American) likewise
contracted, in 1825, for settling 300 families
in the district lying south-west of Austin's Colony.
In 1826 Benjamin R. Milam (an American)
contracted for the introduction of 300 families in the
district lying between the Red River and Nacogdo*
" El Estado de Coahuila y Tejas se compromete solemnemente
a obedecer y sostener, a toda costa, los Supremos Poderos
de la Federacion, su Union Federal con los demos Estados,
y la Independencia Constitutional de todos y cada uno de elles."