where there is great difficulty in procuring a sufficiency of water to keep it going. When I was at Moran, the pumps could only work three hours a day. The construction of the machine and the aqueducts cost 10,9377. sterling: they did not at first calculate on more than half of the expense, and they imagined the mass of water to be very considerable; but the year in which the water was measured being exceedingly rainy, it was believed to be much more abundant than it actually was. It is to be hoped that the new canal which was going on in 1803, and which will be 16,404 feet in length, will remedy this want of water, and that the vein of Moran (hor. 9 inclined 84° to the north-east), will be found as rich at great depths, as the shareholders of the mine suppose. M. del Rio, on my arrival in New Spain, had no other view but that of proving to the Mexican miners the effect of machines of this nature, and the possibility of constructing them in the country. This object has been in part attained; and it will be much more evidently attained when such a machine shall be placed in the mine of Rayas, at Guanaxuato, in that of the Count de Regla, at Real del Monte, or in those of Bolaños, where M. Sonneschmidt counted nearly 4000 horses and mules employed in moving the whims.

The mines of the district of Tasco, situated on the western slope of the Cordillera, have lost their ancient splendour since the end of the last century;

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for in their present state the veins of Tehuilotepec, Sochipala, Cerro del Limon, San Estevan, and Gautla, do not altogether

yield more than 36,923 lbs.

During the

troy of silver annually. During the year 1752 and the ten following years, the mines of Tasco were wrought with the greatest activity and success. This activity was owing to the enterprising mind of Joseph Laborde, a Frenchman, who came into Mexico very poor, and who in 1743 acquired immense wealth in the mine of la Cañada of the Real de Tlapujahua. We have already alluded to the reverses of fortune several times experienced by this extraordinary man. After building a church at Tasco, which cost him 87,5077. sterling, he was reduced to the lowest poverty, by the rapid decline of those very mines from which he had annually drawn from 130,000 to 200,000lbs. troy of silver. The archbishop having given him permission to sell a golden sun enriched with diamonds, with which he had adorned the tabernacle of the church of Tasco, he withdrew to Zacatecas with the produce of this sale, which amounted to 22,000. sterling. The district of mines of Zacatecas was then so entirely neglected, that it scarcely furnished 33,000 lbs. troy of silver annually to the mint at Mexico. Laborde undertook to clear out the famous mine of Quebradilla; in which undertaking he lost all his property, without attaining his object. With the small capital which re mained to him, he began to work on the veta

grande, and sunk the pit of La Esperanza; when a second time he acquired immense wealth. The silver produce of the mine of Zacatecas rose then to nearly 330,000 lbs. troy per annum; and though the abundance of metals did not long continue the same, he left at his death a fortune of nearly 125,000. sterling. He compelled his daughter to enter into a convent, that he might leave his whole fortune to an only son, who afterwards voluntarily embraced the ecclesiastical office. In Mexico, and every where else in the Spanish provinces, it is extremely rare to see children following the profession of their fathers; and we do not find there, as in Sweden, Germany, and Scotland, families in which the business of miner is hereditary.

The veins of Tasco and the Real de Tehuilotepec traverse barren mountains, furrowed by very deep ravines.

The mining districts of Tasco and of the Real de Tehuilotepec contain a great number of veins, which, with the exception of the Cerro de la Compaña, are all directed from the north-west to the south-east, hor. 7-9. These veins, like those of Catorce, traverse both the limestone and the micaceous slate which serves for its base; and they exhibit the same metals in both rocks. These metals have been much more abundant in the limestone. The mines have become extremely poor since it became necessary to work the veins in the

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micaceous slate. A very intelligent and very active miner, Don Vicente de Anza, wrought the mines of Tehuilotepec to the depth of 122 fathoms; and he cut two excellent levels for a length of 3,936 feet; but unfortunately he found that the same veins which had furnished considerable riches at the surface of the earth, were at great depths as poor in red silver ores, as they were abundant in galena, pyrites, and yellow blende.

An extraordinary event which happened on the 16th February 1802, completed the ruin of the miners of this district. The mines of Tehuilotepec, like those of Guautla, have at all times wanted the necessary water to put in motion the stamping mills and other machines which prepare the minerals for the process of amalgamation. The most abundant stream used in the works, issued from a cavern in the limestone rock called the Cueva de San Felipe. This rivulet was lost in the night between the 16th and 17th of February; and five days afterwards a new spring was found at five leagues distance from the cavern, near the village of Platanillo. It has been proved by researches of the greatest interest for geology, that there exists in this country, between the villages of Chamacasapa, Platanillo, and Tehuilotepec, in the bosom of calcareous mountains, a series of caverns and natural galleries, and that subterraneous rivers, like those of the county of Derby in England, traverse those galleries, which communicate with one another.

The veins of Tehuilotepec are in general western (spathgünge); they are from six to ten feet in extent, and being separated from the rock by a list of clayey loam, they form several lateral branches, which enrich the principal vein where they fall into it (se trainent). Their structure has this peculiarity, that the metallic mineral is rarely disseminated throughout all the lode, but is collected in a single band, which is sometimes near the roof, and sometimes near the wall of the vein. In general, the mineral depositories of Tasco and Tehuilotepec are extremely variable in their produce. As to the nature of the mass of which they are constituted, I perceived four very different formations of veins : viz.

1. Brown, red, and yellow oxides of iron, in which native and sulphuretted silver are disseminated in impalpable particles; cellular brown ironstone, specular iron, a little galena, and magnetic iron, and blue carbonate of copper. This formation, analogous to that of the pacos of Fuentestiana, and Pasco in Peru, is designated at Tehuilotepec, by the name of tepostel. It is found at small depths from the surface (in ausgehenden) in the mines of San Miguel, San Estevan, and La Compaña, near Tasco, as well as at the Cerro de Garganta, near Mescala. The tepostel is generally not so rich as the Pasco of Peru; but is so much the richer at Tasco, as the oxide of iron is more mixed with "azure of copper: it generally, however, does not