Texas Footprints

Kerr succeeds in colorfully relaying events in the lives of William Roberts and Elizabeth Pryor (her great-grandparents), who were among Stephen Austin's ``Old Three Hundred.'' These settlers were moved into the Texas colony in 1823; in subsequent years, William's father and Elizabeth's much younger sister were married (women were scarce). It is because of this marriage that William and Elizabeth met as children and later fell in love. And when it was time for William to fight in the Texas Revolution, Elizabeth accompanied him to the battlefields. The language is deliberately simple, but the lives these pioneers led were not; perhaps it is because the storytelling comes from the heart that its occasional weaknessesincluding some rather flat-footed writingare easily overlooked. Ages 8-12. (Dec.)