widely publicized order of April 13 to all the brigades of the Army Corps of the North that any person apprehended in trading with the Texan enemy was to be sentenced to ten years military service in one of the regular companies on the frontier, and that all goods and effects seized under these circumstances coming from Texas were to be declared "spoils of war."[7]  The Texan commissioners were instructed not to commit Texas in the slightest degree to participation in any domestic war in Mexico, nor were they to intervene in any political movement in that country or to consent to any request for Mexican troops to invade Texas, "either under the pretext of chastizing the savages or any other."

At the same time, Lamar addressed a letter to General Arista, declaring

. . . the Government of Texas has witnessed with regret the sectional and border war now existing and which has existed several years past on the adjoining frontiers of Texas and Mexico, and which of late divested of almost every feature of a National contest between the two countries, has become little other than a system of predatory incursion and foray, attended with no other results than the pillage and ruin of exposed and unoffending citizens and settlements. This state of things is not only destructive of the interests of important sections of both countries, but is disreputable to the character of enlightened and honorable people, and should not be suffered to continue any longer. Degrading the profession of arms into robbery and murder, this species of warfare can only lead to crime and individual sufferings, without tending in the least degree towards the adjustment of the difficulties between the two nations.

He pointed to the negotiations then in progress in Mexico whereby it was hoped that permanent peace could be brought about -- "a consideration sufficient of itself to induce a suspension of all hostilities for the present, and even more particularly for the abolishment of a petty and provoking mode of warfare, which is calculated to engender personal feuds and revengeful feelings which may linger upon the border even after peace has been established."[8]

Although he was not successful in his mission, during the few days that he was in Texas Uribe learned of the departure of the Santa Fé