6000 men in arms.

We may admit with great

probability that the actual population consists of

2,500 white Europeans.

65,000 white Creoles.

33,000 indigenous (copper-coloured).

26,500 Mestizoes, mixture of whites and Indians.

10,000 Mulattoes.

137,000 inhabitants.

There are consequently in Mexico 69,500 men of colour, and 67,500 whites; but a great number of the Mestizoes are almost as white as the Europeans and Spanish Creoles!

In the twenty-three male convents which the capital contains there are nearly 1200 individuals, of whom 580 are priests and choristers. In the fifteen female convents there are 2100 individuals, of whom nearly 900 are professed religieuses.

The clergy of the city of Mexico is extremely

numerous, though less numerous by one-fourth than at Madrid. The enumeration of 1790 gives

and without including lay brothers and novices 2,068. The clergy of Madrid, according to the excellent work of M. de Laborde*, is composed

This excellent work of Laborde, it is worth while to remark, received several contributions from M. de Humboldt. Trans.

of 3470 persons, consequently the clergy is to the whole population of Mexico as 1 to 100, and at Madrid as 2 to 100.

We have already given a view of the revenues of the Mexican clergy. The archbishop of Mexico possesses a revenue of 682,500 livres *. This sum is somewhat less than the revenue of the convent of Jeronimites of the Escurial. An archbishop of Mexico is, consequently, much poorer than the archbishops of Toledo, Valencia, Seville, and Santiago. The first of these possesses a revenue of three millions of livres t. However M. de Laborde has proved, and the fact is by no means generally known, that the clergy of France before the revolution was more numerous, compared to the total population, and richer as a body, than the Spanish clergy. The revenues of the tribunal of inquisition of Mexico, a tribunal which extends over the whole kingdom of New Spain,

* 18,4201, sterling. Trans.

125,000l. sterling. Trans.

Guatimala, and the Philippine Islands, amount to 200,000 livres*.

The number of births at Mexico, for a mean term of 100 years, is 5,930; and the number of deaths 5050. In the year 1802 there were even 6,155 births and 5, 166 deaths, which would give, supposing a population of 137,000 souls, for every 224 individuals, one birth, and for every 264 one death. We have already seen in the fourth chapter, that in the country they reckon in general in New Spain the relation of the births to the population as one to 17; and the relation of the deaths to the population as one to 30. There is consequently, in appearance, a very great mortality

*83341. sterling. Trans.

+ In France the relation of the births to the deaths is such that on the totality of the population only one 30th annually dies, while there is born one 28th. Peuchet Statistique, p. 2511' In cities this proportion depends on a concurrence of loc a and variable circumstances. In 1786 there were reckoned in London 18,119 births, and 20,454 deaths; and in 1802, at Paris 21,818 births, and 20,390 deaths.

and a very small number of births in the capital. The conflux of patients to the city is considerable, not only of the most indigent class of the people who seek assistance in the hospitals, of which the number of beds amounts to i100, but also of persons in easy circumstances, who are brought to Mexico because neither advice nor remedies can be procured in the country. This circumstance accounts for the great number of deaths on the parish registers. On the other hand, the convents, the celibacy of the secular clergy*, the progress of luxury, the militia, and the indigence of the Saragates Indians, who live like the Lazaroni of Naples in idleness, are the principal causes which influence the disadvantageous relation of the births to the population.

* From this mode of expression one would be led to imagine that the regular clergy did not live in celibacy. What they may contribute to the population more than the secular clergy will not be easy to ascertain, but their title is presumed to be precisely the same. Trans.