SPECIAL ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The task of preparing this volume has been truly "a labor of love", but the reward is the fact that it supplies "a long-felt want". Many have aided the author by supplying necessary data, and in encouraging completion of the work. To all such I am grateful, and happy to acknowledge their favor.

To one gentleman, Dr. Wm. E. Howard of Dallas, Texas, the noted collector of Texiana, and authority on Southwestern history, Texas and early Spanish-Mexican letters and documents, I am especially indebted for valuable suggestions and substantial aid in arranging, and in securing publication of the volume.

Others, too, to whom the author is under lasting obligations for contributions and cooperation, can only be mentioned by name; but our appreciation is none the less expressed. Among those are: