Mexican Mines. 231. 



subterraneous surveyors [geometres). Instead of stopping the 

 course of the water, and bringing it by tlie shortest road to 

 the shaft where the machines are placed, they frequently direct 

 it to the bottom of the mine, to be afterwards drawn off at a 

 great expense. In the district of mines of Guanaxuato nearly 

 two hundred and fifty workmen perished in the space of a few 

 minutes on the 14th of June 1780; because, not having mea- 

 sured the distance between the works of San Ramon and the 

 old works of Saiito C/uisto dc Burgos, they had imprudently 

 approached this last mine while carrying on a drift in that 

 direction. The water of which the works of Santo Christo 

 were full, flowed with impetuosity through this new gallery of 

 San Ramon into the mine of Valenciana. Many of the work- 

 men perished from the sudden compression of the air, which, 

 in taking vent, threw to great distances pieces of timber and 

 large masses of rock. This accident would not have happened, 

 if, in regulating the operations, they could have consulted a 

 plan of the mines. 



" After the picture which we have just drawn of the actual 

 state of the mining operations, and of the bad management 

 which prevails in the mines of New Spain, we cannot be asto- 

 nished at seeing works which for a long time have been most 

 productive, abandoned whenever they reach a considerable 

 depth, or whenever the veins appear less abundant in metals. 

 We have already observed, that in the famous mine of Valen- 

 ciana the annual expenses rose in the space of fifteen years 

 from 90,000/. to 180,000/. sterling. Indeed, if there be much 

 water in this mine, and if it require a number of whims to 

 draw it off, the profit must, to the proprietors, be little or 

 nothing. The greater part of the defects in the management 

 which I have pointed out, have been long known to a re- 

 spectable and enlightened body, the Tribunal dc Mineria of 

 Mexico, to the professors of the School of Mines, and even to 

 several of the native miners, who, without having quitted their 

 country, know the imperfection of the old methods : but we 

 must repeat here, that changes can only take place very slowly 

 among a people who are not fond of innovations. It is a pre- 

 judice to imagine that the wealth of the mines of New Spain 

 renders unnecessary the intelligence and the ceconoray which 

 are requisite in other mines*." 



The oidy mine in Mexico in which pumps of any kind had 

 been tried is that ofMoran, in the district of Real del Monte; 

 of which M. Humboldt gives the following account: 



" The mountains of the district of mines of Real del Monte 



• Selections, &c. p. 194—197. 



contain 



