MINING IN SOUTH AMEliRA. 



and other speculations in England, is particularly 

 obvious — for instance, in the provinces of Rio de la 

 Plata ; for as one there rides over many hundred 

 miles of rich land, which is imowned, and almost 

 unknown, one cannot but reflect, that while, from 

 want of population, industry, &C.5 such riches are 

 lying on the surface unvalued, considerable diffi- 

 culties would necessarily oppose the extraction of 

 wealth from the bowels of the earth, by labour and 

 machinery ; and these difficulties, in many parts of 

 the provinces, would be so great, that it might sa- 

 tisfactorily be proved that the silver extracted from 

 such mines would not be worth its weight in iron 

 by the time it reached England ; while the iron 

 which was sent from England would cost more than 

 its weight in silver by the time it reached the mine. 



The following is a rough memorandum of some 

 of the difficulties, physical, moral, and political, 



because the object of farming being to make the receipts exceed 

 the expenditure, it may happen (from its particular situation 

 for manure, markets, &c.) that bad land is worth more per acre 

 than good land. 



