130 Geograpbical notes on 



To build the Tehuantepec Railway we negotiated in London, in 

 1888, another gold loan for 3,000,000 pounds sterling at 5 per cent, 

 interest. 



The subsidies granted to railway companies were payable in sil- 

 ver, with a percentage of our import duties, but as they amounted to 

 a considerable sum their payment reduced the revenue considerably, 

 and the Mexican Government contracted in London in 1890 a gold 

 loan at 6 per cent, interest, with which it paid the subsidies due up to 

 that date to most of the railway companies. 



We had to issue besides in 1850 what we call domestic or interior 

 bonds, at 3 and 5 per cent, interest in silver, and we had other indebt- 

 edness of several kinds, caused by loans and other sources when the 

 revenue of the Government was not enough to pay its expenses. All 

 such debts have been consolidated into new bonds of 3 and 5 per 

 cent, interest, payable in silver. Such railway subsidies as were not 

 paid out of the proceeds of the loan of 1890 have been paid with bonds 

 drawing 5 per cent, interest, paying both capital and interest in silver. 



It is very onerous for Mexico when it is on a silver basis to pay in 

 gold the interest of its foreign debt, because we have to buy gold at 

 current prices, and it costs us now more than double its current price. 

 When silver was about 50 cents on the dollar, as compared with gold, 

 6 per cent, interest of our foreign debt, cost us 12 per cent., and of 

 course the further silver is depreciated the greater will be the cost of 

 paying the interest of our gold debts. 



President Diaz gives in his report of November 30, 1896, the follow- 

 ing data about the cost to the Mexican Treasury of buying exchange 

 to place in London the funds to pay us the gold interest on our foreign 

 debt : 



Fiscal year 1888-1889 $ 729,178.17 



" 1890-1891 2,314,477.77 



1891-1892 3,225,246.77 



1892-1893 5,101,223.57 



In the second part of this paper I will give a detailed statement 

 showing the different kinds of bonds and obligations which constitute 

 the Mexican debt, and here will only give the figures of the total 

 amount, which are the following : 



Sterling Mexican debt $114,675,895.49 



Debt payable in silver 88,549,111.80 



Total $203,225,007.29 



It is not possible to fix the exact amount of the debt of Mexico, 

 either in silver or gold, because of the daily changes in the price of 



