Lamy of Santa Fe (16 page)

Waiting for Machebeuf, he went ahead with his preparations.

ii
.

S.S. Palmetto

F
ROM A LOOK AT A MAP,
he could see where his course would take him next, and from a search of the New Orleans newspapers—the
Picayune
and the
Commercial Bulletin
—he could work out a schedule of the Gulf steamship sailings. ‘For Galveston and Matagorda Bay—Regular N. Orleans and Texas U.S. Mail Line of Low Pressure Steamships,” read the announcement of the shipping line of Harris and Morgan, 79 Tchoupitoulas street. “The public are respectfully informed that hereafter a steamship of this line will leave New Orleans for Galveston and Matagorda Bay on the 5th, 10th, 15th, 20th, 25th, and 30th of every month.” Additional announcements advertised the “Superior coppered and copper-fastened Steamship
PALMETTO,
J. Smith, Master,” to leave “as above” for “Galveston, Indianola, and Port Lavaca.” An added note stated that passengers for all points in Matagorda Bay—
which was where Lamy was going—would be landed at Indianola. Ships would dock several hours at Galveston for unloading and loading of passengers and freight, during which time through-passengers would be required to stop on shore. Lamy could plan to spend his day in Galveston with Bishop Odin. At the end of his sea voyage, he could look forward to the transshipment of his luggage and other cargo from the port at Indian Point, also called Indianola, and to his passage overland to Port Lavaca, Texas, where Gulf steamers could not dock.

Bishop Odin knew from Archbishop Blanc that Lamy was coming, and wrote practical suggestions for the entire trip, dispatching these to Blanc by an eastward run of the
Palmetto
.

Odin would be “charmed” to see Lamy at Galveston, only regretting that the hospitality he could offer would not match that of Blanc at New Orleans. He wished it were possible to accompany Lamy as far as the western boundary of the Galveston diocese—at that time the region of El Paso—or at least to San Antonio, but duties and lack of funds had to prevent this. He confirmed that the quickest way for Lamy to go must be by one of the Gulf steamers from New Orleans to Galveston, and from there to Port Lavaca. The ships docked at Galveston in the morning, and resumed their voyage in the evening, arriving at Port Lavaca at mid-morning the next day. He wished Lamy would spend a week with him, leaving his first ship and taking the next one west-bound—same expense. If he were to do that, he should send all his luggage straight through to Port Lavaca, addressed to Major Kerr, though the ship's captain would no doubt plan instead to unload all at Indianola, twelve miles over a wretched road from Port Lavaca. From Lavaca, he should transport all his belongings to San Antonio by “Mexican or German carts,” which would cost up to a piastre and a half per hundredweight. Lamy and his companions—at first, he expected to have three priests with him—should then go direct by the stage coach to San Antonio. Odin advised that he not buy mules at New Orleans, as the Gulf voyage would be hard on them; better to buy them at San Antonio, where, if they were not so powerful as United States mules, they were anyhow less expensive. As for the overland trip from San Antonio to El Paso, Odin had little to suggest, except that Lamy should conclude arrangements with the United States quartermaster to travel with an Army train, and buy whatever he needed at San Antonio, where merchandise was plentiful. He ought to engage a Mexican waggon to carry his books, vestments, and altar vessels. If Lamy was not used to riding a horse, he should buy at New Orleans a travelling carriage, and then, perhaps after all, two mules used to the traces. Odin had made a journey of two thousand miles during the
previous summer using only one horse all the way, but the season was good, the grass abundant; but now in winter, and crossing the plains westward, there was little grass, water, or wood. Only mules could subsist on the land. In any case, said Odin, “I am an old enough Texan to predict” for Lamy “great fatigue and many obstacles on his hard journey, and I whole-heartedly wish him a good and heavy purse.…”

It was excellent advice, and Lamy followed most of it. All it lacked was a useful plan for a calamity no one could foresee. At New Orleans, Lamy discussed accommodations on an Army ship with the commander of troops who would sail for Indianola, and later form part of the overland train with which Lamy would travel. The officer said the Gulf voyage was offered to him
gratis
, a great saving. Lamy accepted, even though it must mean leaving New Orleans ahead of Machebeuf.

He made his farewells in early January. His sister, at the hospital, was by now extremely ill. Their leave-taking was particularly sad. Marie, at the Ursulines, would see her uncle again when his travels permitted him to return to New Orleans. He bought a beautiful small carriage for his later land journey, but no mules. When he went to embark on the Army transport, he found that he had missed her sailing by two hours. The consequences would be unhappy.

In haste, he made new arrangements for his passage and the shipment of his carriage for the following day, 6 January 1851. The Harris and Morgan liner
Palmetto
was sailing and he would be on board. She carried “829 bbls. flour, 147 do whiskey, 4 do brandy, 110 sacks corn, 100 do coffee, 70 boxes cheese, 110 kegs lard, and sundries.” Lamy's trunks and boxes held his sizable collection of books, his ecclesiastical objects, and clothing.

If it was not openly talked about, there were those who knew that the
Palmetto
, for all her “superior” low-pressure head of steam and her copper-fastening, had been condemned as unseaworthy; yet the Harris and Morgan line continued her scheduled operations.

Having left a letter for Machebeuf with orders to follow as soon as possible to meet him in San Antonio, Lamy saw New Orleans recede under the nacreous skies of the delta as the
Palmetto
on schedule was piloted away from the sloping levees and the tangles of moored shipping there. The three black towers of the cathedral rose highest on the city's skyline. Low brick warehouses lined the waterfront. The river was heavy with earth roiled by the current. He was leaving much behind to which he was devoted—but he was carrying with him much experience to give him confidence in the unknown lands of his mission. One always saw the strange through the vision of the familiar. Any departure was likely to make the heart go somewhat heavy. The
city grew smaller and smaller—the three black spires stood clear, but steadily diminished. On the low right bank: little habitation, wide grassy flats, groves of trees. The
Palmetto
steamed along cautiously, for the river was always full of heavy debris—logs, foundered small boats—which were carried along just under the opaque surface by the current. Presently, on the left bank: Jackson Barracks, with its reminders of the battle of New Orleans a generation ago.

At the rate of her movement, the
Palmetto
must take a long while to reach the open Gulf. Looking back to New Orleans—and even beyond—time, distance, had strange new aspects, as if related to another life. The clouds of the littoral were low and changed slowly, light seemed different in a long progression of changes; at Nine Mile Bend, the city was lost to view. Only the future was in sight, and that only in the faulty imagination. The New Orleans
Commercial Bulletin
for 6 January 1851 listed that the “steamship
Palmetto
, Smith (master), for Galveston, Harris & Morgan,” had cleared the harbor, and before nightfall, the ship paused at Pilot-Town downriver, at the mouth, a community of plank shacks, marsh grass, long wooden jetties, where the pilot was discharged in a row-boat for shore. Captain Smith took over, the
Palmetto
turned westward in the Gulf in the long twilight.

iii
.

Interlude at Galveston

O
N
8 J
ANUARY
in the morning, she tied up at Galveston for a day's dockside work. Lamy went ashore to find Bishop Odin.

When they met that morning, Odin saw his visitor as
“ce cher Seigneur,”
and was at once animated with extensions of his original advices and also with new persuasions. He listened to Lamy's immediate plans. Lamy intended to hurry to Santa Fe, make a brief appearance there, ostensibly to secure his throne, and then leave very soon for Europe to recruit a band of clergy upon whom he could lean from the very beginning of his” mission.

Odin disagreed with this program, and could not help saying what he would do in Lamy's place. He made a well-argued case for his differing view, and he urged it upon Lamy with all the force of experience
and shrewdness. It would, he said, be a mistake to go to Santa Fe initially without the support of from six to a dozen zealous and entirely devoted newly imported priests. He explained his reasons. In New Mexico, Lamy would find scandalous native clergy, and a public, especially among the Anglo-Americans, who were waiting for reforms with the arrival of the new bishop. What could Lamy do alone and without support? If he should have occasion to banish a recalcitrant priest, without having someone to replace him, might not the people protest, and perhaps insist on keeping the excommunicated priest in defiance of their bishop? If he should succeed with God's grace in peacefully taking possession of his see, would it not be more suitable to remain at his post, at least for a few years? A brief appearance, followed by a long absence, might do immense harm to his mission.

Therefore, continued Odin in the warmth of his conviction and the pleasure of his foresight, he must counsel Lamy to go—immediately—not to Santa Fe, but to France (as Bishop Rappe had also advised), and to bring back with him a number of priests who would absolutely be needed. Moreover, during such a journey to France, he could perfect himself in the study of Spanish, so that he could speak the language adequately upon at last entering his mission. Yet more—he could procure new vestments and the rest to replace the old rubbish which he would find in all the New Mexican churches, and he would thus instantly correct a great scandal in that country. Odin himself had been shocked, on his own journeys up the Rio Grande, on seeing the filth of the churches in which he had officiated. Time and again he had had to use his own portable vestments rather than the dirty and torn ones offered him locally. To go on, then—on arriving at Santa Fe (under the ideal plan so far proposed), Lamy would not need to take any precipitate action, but could await the moment when conscience and prudence should move him to act. If there were incorrigible priests, he would have replacements for them. In a parish—there were many such—where the congregations were too large, he could add one of his new young priests. Even if all the clergy of New Mexico were worthy of his trust, the new priests could be sent about to hold missions, which were greatly needed in that land where the word of God was never preached.

Lamy was hearing a rich account, through what was urged, of what was needed. Polite and respectful, in his usual habit, he heard Odin to the end.

Preaching, even in imperfect Spanish, on his Rio Grande travels, Odin had found that it was impossible to imagine the joy with which his little exhortations had been received. If Lamy's new men did no
more than simply teach, this would be a work which would bear fruit. He might deceive himself, but Odin would hate to see Monseigneur Lamy go west without stout reinforcements, and above all Odin could not bring himself to believe that it would not be actually imprudent to absent himself too soon from his apostolic vicariate after having merely shown himself there. No doubt the mission would briefly suffer by a delayed arrival after a trip to France, but Odin thought it better to keep the
status quo
for five or six months rather than to go there at once without the means to introduce necessary reforms.

The bishop of Galveston at last rested his case. In the end, the eloquent arguments made no difference—Lamy must follow his own intention, and, indeed, would not even stay out the week and take the next boat west, as Odin urged, but would reboard the
Palmetto
that evening and sail on for Port Lavaca and the overland trail to San Antonio and Santa Fe.

Lamy was Odin's peer as a bishop—there was no question of orders to be given by the older man. Resignedly, Odin turned to other matters, described conditions to the west, and assigned three Mexican villages near El Paso del Norte which lay in his jurisdiction, under Lamy's episcopal care. It was obvious that places so remote could hardly be well administered from Galveston. Lamy would see them on his westward journey. They were Socorro del Sur, Isleta del Sur, and San Elizario, on the north bank of the Rio Grande. Lamy accepted the charge. The two prelates parted as sailing time drew near.

But Odin did not give up easily. Three days after Lamy left him, he wrote to Blanc at New Orleans, having told Lamy he would do so, outlining the advices he had urged upon Lamy, and suggested that if the archbishop agreed with them, he might make this known to Lamy, who would in any case have to delay two months at San Antonio waiting for the departure of an Army supply train, and such time could be used to go to France. Ships regularly sailed for French ports from New Orleans. Moreover—Odin thought of everything—if the vicar general whom Lamy would await in Texas should call on Blanc, why not send him straight off to San Antonio, where he could remain until Lamy's return from France, using the time himself to learn Spanish and come to know the kind of people whom he would evangelize in New Mexico?

On the evening of 8 January 1851, the
Palmetto
made her way out of Galveston, scheduled to arrive off the mouth of Matagorda Bay on the ninth, and once again Lamy was on board.

iv
.

The Wreck at Indianola

T
HE
G
ULF OF
M
EXICO COAST
of Texas described a long southwestward curve from Sabine, past Galveston, to Brownsville at the mouth of the Rio Grande. At about midpoint of the curve lay Matagorda Bay. Like most of the coastal region, it was separated from the great Gulf by long, extremely narrow islands of sand and sea grass broken by occasional small inlets giving access from the open sea to the mainland harbors. The land—old sea beds almost at the level of the Gulf—was flat, and shaped into dunes by the wind. Greasewood grew there sparsely, and occasional rows of tall palm trees—the palmetto—stood with their tousled heads trained inland by the sea winds. On cold mornings a silvery fog diffused the sun into a pale disc. Winter there was the season of the lesser Canada goose, the egret, and the avocet. Looking to land from the sea was like looking toward another sea, so level was all, and so lost in vapory distance. The coastwise vessels paralleled in their passage the long curve of the occasionally broken rope of sand islands. The temper of the sea close to shore, where the water grew shallower in a long gradual rise of the Gulf bottom, was affected by weather both from out at sea and from far inland. In January 1851, pilots at the Gulf ports reported tides to be much lower than usual, because of strong northerly winds, which made entrance through the inlets to the bays more difficult than ever.