[December 29, 1831?]

It is not difficult for the immagination to determine what must be the future destiny of Texas. Should the Mexican Government adopt a correct policy as to this country, it will form one of the most powerful states of their confederation, for under a judicious system it would not be [to] the interests of Texas to separate. But should the reverse of this, unfortunately be the ease, a speedy and total separation will naturally follow as a matter of course, and an independent government will probably be the result. The permanent and substantial interests of both Mexico and the U. S. of the North, would be promoted in very many respects by the establishment of an independent republic in the middle ground. Such a new nation would remove the line of immediate contact which now exist between the two great republics, and do away with those innumerable small incidents and vexatious causes of complaint and excitement which always will arise on the border limits of large nations remote from the seat of Govt. Too feeble to be feared by either of its neighbors, it would opperate as a kind of sacred and necessary barrier against the encroachments of either. Texas would form a compact nation, and under the patronage and protection of both the U. S. and of M. could sustain a respectable standing unless it should enfeeble itself by the system of negro slavery. By the existing constitution and laws this worst of evils is totally prohibited. Should this wise policy be abandoned and Texas become what Louisiana is the receptacle of the redundant and Jail delivered Slaves of other countries, it must from necessity have a prop to lean upon and become dependent, as a slave state it probably could not stand alone. The annexation of such an extencive country to the U. S. would be a measure of such doubtful policy, that it would no doubt be opposed by reflecting men from all the states and especially by the eastern and Atlantic ones on the ground that it would endanger the union by too great an extension of Territory to the Southwest.