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can reach; and to the South, the plains of Irapuato and Salamanca, exhibit the delightful spectacle of a rich and populous country. The Cierro de los Llanitos, and the Puerto de Santa Rosa, are the most elevated summits of this group of mountains. Their absolute height is from 2,800 to 2,900 metres *, but as the neighbouring plains which are part of the great central table land of Mexico, are more than 1800 metres † above the level of the sea, these porphyritic summits appear but as inconsiderable hills to the eyes of a traveller accustomed to the striking appearance of the Cordilleras. The famous vein of Guanaxuato, which has alone, since the end of the sixteenth century, produced a mass of silver equal to fourteen hundred millions of francs, crosses the southern slope of the Sierra de Santa Rosa.

In going from Salamanca to Burras and Temascntio, we perceive a chain of mountains, bounding the plains which stretch from the South-east to the North-west. The crest of the vein follows this direction. At the foot of the Sierra, after passing the farm of Xalapita, we discover a narrow ravin dangerous to pass, at the period of the great

*From 8985 to 9313 feet. Trans.
+5904 feet: Trans.

£57,754,620 Sterl. Trans.

swells called the Cañada de Marfil, which leads to the town of Guanaxuato. The population of that town, as we have already observed, is more than 70,000 souls. One is astonished to see in this wild spot, large and beautiful edifices in the midst of miserable Indian huts. The house of Colonel Don Diego Rul, who is one of the proprietors of the mine of Valenciana, would be an ornament to the finest streets of Paris and Naples. It is fronted with columns of the Ionic order, and the architecture is simple and remarkable for great purity of style. The erection of this edifice, which is almost uninhabited, cost more than 800,000 francs *, a considerable sum in a country where the price of labour and materials are very moderate.

The name of Guanaxuato is scarcely known in Europe; and yet the riches of the mines of this district is much superior to that of the metalliferous depository of Potosi. The latter was discovered in 1545 by Diego Hualca an Indian, and has produced according to information *

* £33,000, Sterl. Trans.

+ Extract from a book of accounts of the Royal Treasury of Potosi, made on the spot, by Mr. Frederic Mothes (Razon de los reales derechos que se han cobrado en las caxas reales, de la plata que ha producido el Cerro de Potosi). This manuscript memoir in my possession gives the produce of Potosi every year from 1558 to 1789. The treasury books contain no information relative to the years anterior to 1556, although two miners of Porco, Juan de Villaroel and Diego Centeno, began to work this vein in the year 1545.

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never yet made public, in the space of two hundred and thirty-three years, 788,258,512 double piastres, which, reckoning eight piastres and a half to the marc, gives the 92,736,294 marcs of silver*, viz.

Piastres.

From 1556 to 1578- 49,011,285 or 1579 to 1736-611,399,451

1737 to 1789-127,847,776

788,259,512

sum of

Marcs of silver.
5,766,033

- 71,929,347

15,040,914

92,736,294

During these three periods then there has been extracted from the Cerro de Potosi an

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The produce of the vein of Guanaxuato, however, is almost the double of that of the Cerro de Potosi. There is actually drawn from this vein, for it alone furnishes all the silver of the mines of the district of Guanaxuato, in average years from five to six hundred thousand marcs of silver, and from fifteen to sixteen hundred marcs of gold.

*60,864,359 lb. Troy. Trans.
172,015lb. Troy. Trans.
300,524 lb. Troy. Trans.

$ 189,837 lb. Troy. Trans.

Gold Produce of the District of Mines of Gua

naxuato.

Gold extracted by Amalga

mation.

Periods. Castellanos. Tomines. Grauos. Castellanos. Tomines. Granos

Gold extracted by Smelting.

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Silver Produce of the District of Mines of Guanaxuato.

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