Page:Mexico as it was and as it is.djvu/401

 increase the quantity of bribery and corruption, but would not add to the revenue a sum equal to their pay!"

The national debt of Mexico is one of very considerable importance, and may be divided into the two great classes of Foreign and Internal debt.

The amounts to $18,560,000; and in 1841 the customs were mortgaged to pay this sum, in the following subdivisions:

is still larger than this; and (including the above,) I will state the entire national responsibility, as it existed at the end of last year:

Until 1841, the whole of the revenue, except 11½ per cent, was appropriated to the payment of $18,550,000, while the remaining claims were entirely unprotected by securities. Shortly after the accession of Santa Anna to power, he suspended (by a decree of the 16th of February) the payment of the first five funds charged upon the customs, as stated in a preceding table, but reserved the active appropriation for the Tobacco and English interest debts. This, as may be well imagined, created great dissatisfaction among the mercantile classes, and among numbers of persons who had invested their capital in Government loans, with a reliance upon the revenues as a solemn pledge for their redemption. Santa Anna, however, withstood the torrent manfully. He was assailed by legations, newspapers, and individuals, but nothing could induce him to yield the