Page:Mexico in 1827 Vol 1.djvu/451

Rh country, by each person, in the same time, averaged thirty-two dollars and three reals.

It is probable, therefore, that a contraband trade to a very great extent was carried on; and consequently, that the consumption of the home manufactures was never so nearly equal to that of the European manufactures, as would appear by the registered amount of both.

Still, it would be an extraordinary fact, that, in a country so thinly peopled as Mexico, any sort of competition between the rude industry of the natives, and the produce of European machinery should have existed, did not the monopoly of Veracruz sufficiently explain the circumstances, under which this competition took place.

This port was conveniently situated for the supply of the Capital, and the more central parts of the Table land; but the distance rendered it nearly inaccessible to the Northern States, there being few residents in Dŭrāngŏ, Sŏnōră, New Mexico, or the Eastern Internal Provinces, rich enough to afford a supply of articles, the value of which, in addition to the high duties, and the two hundred per cent, profits of the importer, was enhanced by a land carriage of from three, to five, hundred leagues.

The great majority of the population was consequently compelled to seek, in its own industry, a substitute for those necessaries, which it was unable to procure from the manufacturing nations of the Old