EEVENUE AND INCOME. 
143 
Santa Anna, who, it is well known by the people of the United 
States, is one of the shrewdest and most sagacious statesmen 
whom the Mexican Republic has ever produced. "We have said 
that what would conduce to the interest of the owners of the 
grant would also conduce to that of Mexico herself, by connect- 
ing railroads, which, from the necessities of the case, and in 
order to supply the wants of commerce, would be constructed. 
The topography of the contiguous portions of the Mexican 
Republic exhibits such favorable features that at a comparatively 
small outlay, roads can be built which will bring into the lap of 
the Isthmus the mineral resources and dyes of Oaxaca, the 
indigo of Guatimala and Chiapas, the sugar and cotton of Yera 
Cruz, and the tobacco, coffee, and chocolate of Tobasco. But 
apart from this, the sources of income, derivable from the in- 
troduction of " such articles as are intended for consumption 
in the interior," together with " the one-fourth part of the net 
produce of the dues that are paid for the right of transit," would 
be to Mexico an abundant, sure, and never-failing support. 
Instead, then, of languishing as now, under the burden of her 
foreign debt, with blockaded ports and ruined trade, her treasury 
would be replenished, and her people stimulated to enterprises 
of the most magnificent character. The world would then 
behold two of the most powerful nations on its surface allied by 
a common interest, and bound hand in hand in the fellowship of 
republicanism, controlling, extending, and protecting the com- 
merce of every land and sea. Bonds of union would thus be 
forged which no political contingency could destroy ; and 4 the 
star of empire, which, in its westward course, has so long lingered 
on the brow of the Cordillera, would rise again, under the de- 
veloping power of free institutions, and pass to its culminating 
point in the Oriental world.' 
"We cannot, in a work like this (which is intended more as a 
manual of reference to the advantages that are placed at the 
disposal of the projectors of the Tehuantepec railroad, than an 
enumeration of their importance as far as present and prospec- 
tive value is concerned), dilate on the profits which would, in a 
comparatively short time, accrue from the single source of way 
trade alone. Sufficient has been said to show beyond cavil or 
