THE HARBOUR OF GUAYMAS. 135 
latter. It is too small ever to become a commodious first- 
class port; its situation is bad, for it is too far up the Gulf 
of California (being 1,500 miles from San Francisco and 1,000 
from San Diego), whilst a railroad to it from the North would 
leave the richest portion of Sonora untouched. As regards 
distance, supposing that the main Southern line were con- 
structed along the 32nd parallel, and a branch thence by the 
shortest practicable route to Guaymas, it would then be 
2,812 miles distant from New York, against 2,935 between 
New York and San Francisco by the 35th parallel route, 
the difference being but 123 miles in favour of Guaymas. 
Sonora, therefore, must be developed independently by 
local railways radiating from the coast inland to those 
sections of country which, on their own merits, are deserving 
of them. 
The present trade of Guaymas is such that the three 
merchantmen which unloaded there during 1867 supplied 
more goods than the demand required. In Hermosillo, as 
well as Guaymas, all the store-houses of the merchants were 
glutted with goods, and the general complaint was that there 
were no buyers. Large quantities of Sonora wheat and flour 
used to be shipped from this port to San Francisco, San 
Pedro, Mazatlan, and other places along the coast. Now, 
none goes anywhere, except to the last-named port, and not 
very much there, since the monthly steamer has been pro- 
hibited from carrying it. Mazatlan has at least six times 
the trade of Guaymas, because the back country is well 
peopled, whereas Northern Sonora is almost uninhabited. 
Comfortably packed away on board the John L. Stevens, 
one of the fine Pacific steamers, which, with their roomy 
berths upon deck and good ventilation, are palaces of comfort 
compared with our boasted “Cunarders,” we steamed between 
