Page:Vol 5 History of Mexico by H H Bancroft.djvu/367

Rh was sent thither by sea. His army barely amounted to 3,500 men, but during his encampment at Corpus Christi, General Taylor had pursued a rigid course of discipline and drill, and when he took the field, his force, in organization and efficiency, was for its size probably the best ever seen in the United States. The equipments of the soldiers, too, were superior to

those of the enemy, and the supplies of all materials for war abundant and good.

The march to Matamoros was uninterrupted except by wordy demonstrations of hostility at the Arroyo Colorado, about thirty miles north of that city. Here Taylor was notified that his passage of the river would be regarded as a declaration of war and would be