AN ECONOMIC STUDY OF MEXICO. 159 



ico ; and, in a country so destitute of water and fuel, it is difficult 

 to see how there ever can be. In almost all cases where the employ- 

 ment of machinery is indispensable, mule or donkey power seems to be 

 the only resource ; as is the case in the majority of the mines and sil- 

 ver-reducing works of the country not a pound of ore, for example, 

 being crushed through the agency of any other power, in connection 

 with the famous mines of Guanajuato. Many years ago an English 

 company bought the famous Meal del Monte mine, near Pachuca, 

 which is reported to have yielded in a single year, with rude labor, 

 $4,500,000. It was assumed that two things only were requisite to 

 insure even greater returns ; namely, the pumping out of the water 

 which had accumulated in the abandoned shafts, and the introduction 

 of improved machinery for working at lower levels. Large steam-en- 

 gines and other machinery were accordingly imported from England, 

 and dragged up by mule-power from Yera Cruz, at immense cost and 

 labor. But the new scheme proved utterly unprofitable, and after 

 some years' trial was abandoned. The expensive machinery was sold 

 for about its value as old iron ; the mines reverted to a Mexican com- 

 pany ; the old methods were again substantially introduced, and then 

 the property once more began to pay. 



Deposits of coal of good quality are from time to time reported as 

 existing, and readily accessible. But the fact that the Mexican Cen- 

 tral Railroad supplies itself from the coal-fields of Colorado, nearly 

 fifteen hundred miles from the city of Mexico, and that the Vera Cruz 

 Railroad imports its coal from England, is in itself sufficient evidence 

 that no coal from any Mexican mine has yet been made practically 

 available for industrial purposes. In Central Mexico, wood commands 

 at the present time from twelve to sixteen dollars per cord, and coal 

 from fifteen to twenty-one dollars per ton. 



According to the best information available, the number of facto- 

 ries of all kinds using power, in the republic, is about a hundred, rep- 

 resenting a valuation of some $10,000,000, and employing about 13,000 

 hands. Their range of manufacturing is exceedingly limited, and 

 comprises little besides the coarser cottons and woolens, the coarser 

 varieties of paper, a few (cloth) printing and dye works, milling (flour), 

 and the manufacture of unrefined sugar. The textile factories (cotton 

 and wool) are said to contain 250,000 spindles and 9,500 looms. 



No country affords such striking illustrations as Mexico of the fal- 

 lacy and absurdity of the so-called "pauper-labor " argument for "pro- 

 tection " ; or of the theory, which has proved so popular and effective in 

 the United States, for justifying the enactment of high tariffs, that the 

 rate of wages paid for labor is the factor that is mainly determinative 

 of the cost of the resulting product ; and that, therefore, for a coun- 

 try of average high wages, the defense of a protective tariff against a 

 country of average low wages, is absolutely necessary as a condition 

 for the successful prosecution by the former of its industries. 



