The day we started was the first time the horse had ever been under saddle.

I had, however, but little difficulty in breaking him, though for the first day there were frequent disagreements between us as to which way we should go, and sometimes whether we should go at all.
At no time during the day could I choose exactly the part of the column I would march with; but after that, I had as tractable a horse as any with the army, and there was none that stood the trip better.

He never ate a mouthful of food on the journey except the grass he could pick within the length of his picket rope.
A few days out from Corpus Christi, the immense herd of wild horses that ranged at that time between the Nueces and the Rio Grande was seen directly in advance of the head of the column and but a few miles off.
It was the very band from which the horse I was riding had been captured but a few weeks before.

The column was halted for a rest, and a number of officers, myself among them, rode out two or three miles to the right to see the extent of the herd.

The country was a rolling prairie, and, from the higher ground, the vision was obstructed only by the earth's curvature.