GUANAJUATO AND THE BAXIO. 1 5 



the wonderful mine of Valenciana, which has produced $800,000,000, and has 

 been worked ever since the Conquest. No traveller can afford to miss Guana- 

 juato since it has been rendered accessible by steam, if he would care to become 

 informed upon the mining resources of the Republic. Guanajuato sustained a 

 terrible part in the tragedy of the revolution; and the Castle of Grenaditas still 

 stands to point out where many brave men perished. When in 1810 the patriot 

 priest Hidalgo led his rabble of Indians to this city, the Spaniards intrenched 

 themselves in this Castle of Grenaditas, where they bravely sustained a long siege. 

 Finding it to be impossible to carry the fortress by storm, a brave Indian, it is said, 

 took a great flat stone upon his back, and, unharmed by the bullets rained upon it 

 from above, reached the castle-gates, and set them on fire. The garrison was put 

 to the sword. The year following, Hidalgo was defeated by the Spanish com- 

 mander, and, fleeing to Chihuahua, was captured and shot ; and his head and the 

 heads of his companions, brought here and hung up on four hooks, are still shown 

 at the four corners of the castle. The victorious Calleja also took vengeance 

 upon the inoffensive inhabitants of Guanajuato for harboring the insurgents, and 

 slaughtered them without mercy, till the fountains of the city were choked with 

 blood. 



The region through which the road passes after leaving Silao is known as the 

 Baxio, "so celebrated in Mexico, both as the seat of the great agricultural riches of 

 the country and the scene of the most cruel ravages of the civil war." 



There are great plains here, in places dry and verdureless, but generally fertile 

 and well cultivated. The ranchos are of large size ; the haciendas being perfect 

 fortresses, loop-holed and battlemented. 



Irapuato, In the centre of this district, is an old market-town, with no notable 

 buildings save its churches; then comes Salamanca, at 333 kilometres, and finally, 

 Celaya, at 292 from Me.xico. Great fields of corn, and some olive-orchards, 

 indicate the fertility of the valleys now passed through. Celaya contains 30,000 

 inhabitants, and is a city of importance, with large factories and intelligent laborers. 

 It is supplied with water at blood-heat, by an artesian well 400 feet deep ; and in 

 this place, and other manufacturing towns near, there is an abundant supply. 



In the district of Guanajuato, said Mr. Evans, who travelled with the Seward 

 party across Mexico in 1S69-70, " within a circuit of fifteen miles there is estimated 

 to be, at this time, $40,000,000 worth of silver ore which will yield $25 to the ton ; 

 but, owing to the expense of reducing it there, it will not pay for working at all, and 

 is now lying valueless on the surface of the ground. A railroad of about a hundred 

 miles, through a wonderfully rich valley, offering no engineering obstacles of any 

 amount, would connect the two cities, and enable the builder to bag $20,000,000 

 in profits on this ore already out, to say nothing of the future." 



Since this, the then unexpected event of a railroad has been realized, though not, 

 probably, his sanguine prediction regarding the working of the silver waste. Two 

 great railways pass through Celaya, as the Mexican National here crosses the Cen- 

 tral on its route from San Luis Potosi to Acambaro and Mexico. Celaya has twelve 

 churches ; while its principal factory cost, including machinery, $400,000. 



QuERETARO is the first place in the State bearing the same name, and is 246 

 kilometres from Mexico. It contains 48,000 inhabitants. Queretaro has the repu- 

 tation of being the loveliest to the eye of any city outside the valley of Mexico. The 

 first object claiming attention, should you approach it from the south, would be its 



