and Zipangon. In my second voyage, I have discovered fourteen hundred islands, and a shore of three hundred and thirty-three miles, belonging to the continent of Asia." This West Indian Zipangon produced golden fragments, or spangles, weighing eight, ten, and even twenty, pounds.

Before the discovery of the silver mines of Tasco, on the western slope of the Mexican Cordilleras, in the year 1522, America supplied only gold to the Old World; and, consequently, Isabella of Castile was obliged, already in 1497, to modify greatly the relative value of the two precious metals used for currency. This was doubtless the origin of the edict of Medina, which changed the old legal ratio of 1: 10.7; yet Humboldt has shown, that, from 1492 to 1500, the quantity of gold drawn from the parts of the New World then known, did not amount, annually, to more than about one thousand pounds avoirdupois; and the Pope, Alexander VI, who, by his famous bull, bestowed one-half the earth upon the Spanish kings, only received, in return, from Ferdinand the Catholic, some small fragments of gold from Hayti, to gild a portion of the dome of the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore-a gift that was suitably acknowledged in a Latin inscription, in which the of fering is set forth as the first that had been received by the Catholic sovereigns from India.

Although the income of treasure must have increased somewhat, yet the working of the American mines did not yield three millions of dollars yearly, until 1545. The ransom of Atahualpa amounted, according to Gomara, to about 425,000 dollars of our standard, or 52,000 marks of silver; whilst the pillage of the temples at Cuzco, if Herrera is to be credited, did not produce more than 25,700 marks, or a little more than a quarter of a million of our currency.†

It has been generally imagined, that the wealth of the New World immediately and largely enriched the Spanish kings, or their people, and that the sovereigns, under whose auspices the discovery was made, participated, at once, in the treasures that were found in the possession of the Indian rulers. Such, however, was not the case. The historian, Ranke, in his essay on the Spanish finances, has shown, by new documents and official vouchers, the small quantity of the precious metals which the American mines and the supposed treasures of the Incas, yielded. It is probable, that the conquerors did not make ex

* See Humboldt's essay on the production of gold and silver, in the Journal des Economites for March, April and May, 1838.

+ See Humboldt's essay on Precious Metals, ut autea, in note, in the American translation, given in volume 3d of the Bankers' Magazine, page 509.

See Ranke, Fursten und Volker, vol. 1, pages 347, 355.

act returns to the court of their acquisitions, or that the revenue officers, appointed at an early period of American history, were not remarkable for the fidelity with which they transmitted the sums that came into their possession as servants of the crown, and thus it happened that neither the king of Spain nor his kingdom was speedily enriched by the New World. Baron Humboldt, in one of his late publications, gives an interesting extract from a letter written by a friend of Ferdinand the Catholic, a few days after his death, which exhibits the finances of that king in a different light from that in which they have been hitherto viewed. In an epistle to the bishop of Tuy, Peter Martyn says, that this "lord of many realms-this wearer of so many laurels-this diffuser of the Christian faith and vanquisher of its enemies-died poor, in a rustic hut. While he lived, no one imag ined that, after his death, it would be discovered that he possessed scarcely money enough, either to defray the ceremony of his sepulture, or to furnish his few retainers with suitable mourning!"*

The adventurers in America were, doubtless, enriched and duly reported their gains to friends at home; but Spain itself was not improved by their acquisitions.

The rise in the prices of grain, and other products of agriculture or human industry, about the middle of the sixteenth century, and especially from 1570 to 1595, indicates the true beginning of the plentiful flow of the precious metals to the Old World, in consequence of which their value diminished and the results of European industry increased in price. This is accounted for by the commencement of the beneficial working of the American mines about that period. The real opening of the mines of Potosi, by the Spanish conquerors, dates from the year 1545; and it was between this epoch and 1595, that the splendid masses of silver, from Tasco, Zacatecas and Pachuca, in New Spain; and from Potosi, Porco and Oruro, in the chain of Peruvian Andes, began to be distributed more uniformly over Europe, and to affect the price of its productions. From the period of the administration of Cortez to the year 1552, when the celebrated mines of Zacatecas were just opened, the export from Mexico rarely reached, annually, in value, 100,000 pesos de oro, or nearly $1,165,000. But from that date it rose rapidly, and, in the years 1569, 1578 and 1587, it was already, respectively, 931,564, 1,111,202 and 1,812,051, pesos de oro.†

Pet. Mart. Epist., lib. xxix, No. 556, 23d January, 1516.

The peso de oro is rated by Prescott at $11 65, and by Ramirez at $2 93. See M. Ternaux-Compans's Original Memoirs of the discovery of America (Conquest of Mexico, page 451). Compans publishes in this, for the first time, an official list, sent, between 1522 and 1587, by the viceroys of New Spain, to the

During the last peaceful epoch of the Spanish domination, Baron Humboldt calculates the annual yield of the mines of Mexico at not more than 23,000,000 of dollars, or nearly 1,184,000 pounds avoirdupois, of silver, and 3,500 pounds, avoirdupois, of gold. From 1690 to 1803, $1,330,772,093 were coined in the only mint of Mexico; while, from the discovery of New Spain until its independence, about $2,028,000,000; or, two-fifths of all the precious metals which the whole of the New World has supplied during the same period, were furnished by Mexico alone.* It appears, from these data, that the exhaustion of the mines of Mexico is contradicted by the geognostic facts of the country, and, as we shall hereafter show, by the recent issues of Mexican mints. The mint of Zacatecas alone, during the revolutionary epoch, from 1811 to 1833, struck more than $66,332,766; and, in the eleven last years of this period, from four to five millions of dollars were coined by it every year, uninterruptedly.

The general metallic production of the country, which was, of course, impeded by the revolutionary state of New Spain, between 1809 and 1826, has arisen, refreshed from its slumber, so that, according to the last accounts, it has ascended to perhaps twenty millions, annually, in total production, in consequence of the prolific yield of the workings at Fresnillo, Chihuahua and Sonora, independent of the abundant production at Zacatecas.†

The Mexican mines were eagerly, and even madly, seized by the English, and even by the people of the United States, as objects of splendid speculation, as soon as the country became settled; but, in consequence of bad management, or the wild spirit of gambling, which assumed the place of prudent commercial enterprise, the holders of stock were either disappointed or, sometimes, ruined. Subsequently, however, the proprietaries have learned, that prudence and the experience of old Mexican miners, were better than the theoretical principles upon which they designed producing larger revenues than had ever been attained by the original Spanish workmen. Their imported,

mother country. The Pesos of gold must be multiplied by a mean of $11 65, in order to give their value in dollars. See Bankers' Magazine, ut autea, page 594, in note. See Prescott's History of the Conquest of Mexico, vol. 1, page 320. Ramirez, in his Notes on the Spanish translation of Prescott's History of the Conquest, rates the peso de oro at $2 93. This result is reached by a long financial calculation and course of reasoning. See La Conquista de Mejico, vol. 2, at page 89 of the notes at the end of the volume.

This is Humboldt's estimate in the essay cited in this section. We think it rather too large, yet give it upon such high authority. See our general table of Mexican coinage.

It will be recollected, that all that is extracted from the mines is not coined.

modern machinery and engines, for voiding the shafts and galleries of water, are the chief beneficial improvements introduced since the revolution; but the enormous cost of transporting the heavy materials, in a country where there are no navigable rivers extending into the heart of the land, and where the usual mode of transportation is on the backs of mules, by wretched roads over mountains and through ravines, has often absorbed large portions of the original capital, before the proprietors even began to employ laborers to set up their foreign engines. Many of the first British and American adventurers, or speculators, have thus been ruined by unskillful enterprises in Mexican mines. Their successors, however, are beginning to reap the beneficial results of this expenditure; and, throughout the republic, steam engines, together with the best kinds of hydraulic apparatus, have superseded the Spanish malacates.

"Whenever these superb countries, which are so greatly favored by nature," says Humboldt, in his essay on gold and silver, in the Journal des Economites, "shall enjoy perfect peace, after their deep and prolonged internal agitations, new metallic deposits will necessarily be opened and developed. In what region of the globe, except America, can be cited such abundant examples of wealth in silver? Let it not be forgotten, that, near Sombrerete, where mines were opened as far back as 1555, the family of Tagoaga (Marquises de Apartado) derived, in the short space of five months, from a front of one hundred and two feet in the out-cropping of a silver mine, a net profit of $4,000,000; while, in the mining district of Catorce, in the space of two years and a half, between 1781 and the end of 1783, an ecclesiastic, named Juan Flores, gained $3,500,000, on ground full of chlorid of silver and of colorados!"

One of the most flourishing establishments, in 1842, was the Zacatecano-Mejicano mining company of Fresnillo. Its one hundred and twenty shares, which originally cost $22,800, were still held by Spaniards and Mexicans. These mines were originally wrought by the State of Zacatecas; but, in 1836, Santa Anna took possession, by an alleged right of conquest, and rented them, for twelve years, to this successful company. In the first half year of 1841, they produced $1,025,113, at a cost of $761,800, or a clear profit of $263,313.

Mexico, under the colonial system, with the immense product of her mines, and notwithstanding the richness of her soil for agricultural purposes, became almost entirely a silver producing country. The policy of Spain was, as we have already often stated, to be the workshop of the New World, while Mexico and Peru were the treasuries of the Old. The consequence of this was natural. Mexico, one of

the finest agricultural and grazing lands in the world, but with no temptations to export her natural products (for she had no markets for them elsewhere) and no roads, canals or rivers, to convey her products to sea-ports for shipment, even if she had possessed consumers in Europe, at once devoted herself to her mines, which were to her both wealth and the representatives of wealth. Her agriculture, accordingly, assumed the standard of the mere national, home-consumption, while the pastoral and horticultural interests followed the same law, except, perhaps, within late years in California, where a profitable trade was carried on by the missions in hides and tallow. From this restrictive law of exportation we, of course, except vanilla, cochineal, and a few other minor articles.

The sources of the wealth of the principal families of Mexico will, consequently, be found in her mines; and an interesting summary of this aristocracy is given by Mr. Ward, in his "Mexico in 1827," to prove the fact. The family of Regla, which possessed large estates in various parts of the country, purchased the whole of them with the proceeds of the mines of Real del Monte. The wealth of the Fagoagas was derived from the great Bonanza of the Pavellon at Sombrerete. The mines of Balanos founded the Vibancos. Valenciana, Ruhl, Perez-Galvez and Otero, are all indebted for their possessions to the mines of Valenciana and Villalpando, at Guanajuato. The family of Sardaneta, formerly Marquises de Rayas, took its rise from the mine of that name. Cata and Mellado enriched their original proprietor, Don Francesco Matias de Busto, Marquis of San Clemente. The three successive fortunes of the celebrated Laborde, of whom we shall speak, hereafter, when we describe Cuernavaca, were derived from the Canada, which bore his name, at Tlalpujahua, and from the mines of Quebradilla and San Acasio, at Zacatecas. The beautiful estates of the Obregones, near Leon, were purchased with the revenues of La Purisima and Concepcion, at Catorce; as was also the estate of Malpasso, acquired by the Gordoas from the products of La Luz. The Zanbranos, discoverers of Guarisamey, owned many of the finest properties in Durango; while Batopillas gave the Bustamentes the opportunity to purchase a title and to enjoy an immense unincumbered income.*

Nevertheless, some of the large fortunes of Mexico were made either by trade or the possession of vast agricultural and cattle estates, in sections of the country where there were either no mines, or where mining was unprofitable. The Agredas were enriched by commerce;

* Ward's Mexico in 1827, vol. ii, p. 151.