color in Xwindows

[Gerald S Stoller]

FreeBSD  4.3-RELEASE FreeBSD 4.3-RELEASE #0: Sat Apr 21 10:54:49 GMT 2001
    jkh at narf.osd.bsdi.com:/usr/src/sys/compile/GENERIC  i386

             I am trying to put color in some of my messages (I am using 
Xwindows ).  One place where I found mention of color is in the manual
page of the  ls  command (search in there for the string "COLOR".  I
picked a window and in it set  TERM  to  xterm-color  and exported it,
set  CLICOLOR  to a nonnull value and exported it, set  LSCOLORS  to the
default value mentioned there and exported it.  Did an  ls -l  but it
showed up as usual.  Then tried changing  TERM  to  cons25  (also
mentioned in the man page) and exported it.  Still nothing.
           Can anyone direct me to documentation that will tell me how to
insert color in messages, both the fone and the backgroun, or write to me
how to do it?  Thanks in advance.