In Texas with Davy Crockett

The two sat down upon chairs in the corner to discuss this new aspect. The men’s cabin was crowded with all sorts of travelers; and the clatter and rumble of voices went on with the regularity of the engine’s throb. Almost every walk of life was represented among the passengers. Planters on the way down the river to Natchez or New Orleans; sharpers on the lookout for some easy means of gaining money; slave dealers, the sellers of plantation requirements, steamboat men, drovers, adventurers and desperadoes on their way to the new country—Texas.

These latter were easily known by their dress and manner. Some were elegantly attired in the fashion of the time, others wore flannel shirts and wide-rimmed hats, and had the legs of their trousers stuffed into long leather boots. Still another class possessed the hunting shirt, deerskin leggings and coonskin cap of the backwoodsman. All were armed with pistol, knife and rifle; and all had the free, loud, independent ways of their kind.