NOTES AND FRAGMENTS.

Political Science Quarterly for December has a review of Hamilton's Colonial Mobile by Mr. Bugbee.

Mr. W. F. McCaleb, fellow in history at the University of Chicago for the third year, is busy writing a book in which he hopes to throw new light on that still obscure and perplexing episode, the Burr Conspiracy.

Mr. Eugene C. Barker has been appointed tutor in history in the University and Mr. E. W. Winkler fellow. The appointments are both well deserved. Mr. Barker is now doing special work on the Campaign of 1836, and Mr. Winkler is engaged on the history of the Cherokee Indians of Texas.

Mr. W. R. Smith, who went from the University of Texas to Columbia on a fellowship in history at the beginning of the session 1898-1899, is still at the latter. He is making a special study of the colonial history of South Carolina, and has spent several months in the cities of Columbia and Charleston gathering materials for a thesis.

Mr. William Corner, who for two years was one of the vice-presidents of the Association, and who deserves no little of the credit for its success, is lecturing in England on American and Mexican Indians. His lecture has been given before the Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, Hanover Square, London, and the Cambridge Antiquarian Society, Cambridge, and has been well received. Mr. Corner is pleasantly remembered by those with whom he has worked in the interests of historical science in Texas, and their good wishes follow him.

The diary of Moses Austin giving an account of his trip from Virginia to Louisiana (Missouri) in the winter of 1796-7 is to appear in the April number of the American Historical Review. It contains much interesting information relative to the condition of the country he traversed. The Editorial Board of the Review has agreed to send reprints to all members of the Association whose names were on the roll when the agreement to publish the diary in the Review was made. This will include four hundred and fifty of the older members. Others will doubtless be able to get the separates at a moderate price by ordering them from the Review in sufficient time.

The Morton Family.—Morton, whose name was probably William, sailed for Texas from Mobile with his family in 1822, in his own schooner; the vessel was wrecked on Galveston Island, but no one was lost; in his search for help, Morton encountered a party of the Lively immigrants at the mouth of the Brazos and with their help transferred his family and goods to the “falls” of the Brazos where he made a crop. ⁷⁴ Lewis' Journal mentions the wife of Morton, a step-daughter Miss Jane Edwards, a son “Tilly” about seventeen years old, and three daughters of thirteen, eleven, and seven or eight, respectively. Lewis thinks the son died that fall. ⁷⁵ Morton was a brick-maker and brick layer by occupation. ⁷⁶

Mrs. Dilue Harris, of Columbus, adds the following notes to the above: “In 1834 two or three of the Morton family lived on the east side of the Brazos opposite where the town of Richmond now stands. Mrs. Morton and two sons then lived at the Morton Ferry. The place was at that time called Fort Bend. Mr. Morton was drowned in 1833, during the overflow of the Brazos. One son, John Morton, married a Miss Shipman near the home of my father (Dr. P. W. Rose) in 1836. One of the sons died in 1839; the other was killed in Richmond in 1842 or 1843. Neither left any heirs. The mother died about this time. One daughter married a Mr. Little during the 20's and lived near my father's. Two sons of this daughter are now living in Colorado county.”