Page:Mexico in 1827 Vol 1.djvu/50

24 ports of Mexico with the manufactures of their respective countries, will afford sufficient facilities for the exportation of her raw produce, to whatever extent it may be carried.

On the western coast, the case is different. From Ăcăpūlcŏ to Gūāymăs, (in the Gulph of California,) there is a series of magnificent ports, many of which no vessel has ever yet entered. Ăcăpūlcŏ itself (the finest harbour, perhaps, in the world,) is but little frequented; its importance ceased with the trade of the galleons, nor is it likely ever to recover its former fame. The China and India trade has taken a different line, most of the ships engaged in it discharging their cargoes at the ports of Săn Blās, Măzătlān, and Gūāymăs; the demand for China goods being found to be greater on the Northern, and Western part of the Table-land, which is not yet sufficiently supplied with European manufactures, than in the Capital, where the market is absolutely glutted. Many years, however, must elapse before the commerce of the Western coast of Mexico can acquire any thing like the importance of that carried on upon the Eastern side; for, as there is but little difference between the agricultural produce of the countries with which she can hold intercourse through the medium of the Pacific, (Gūāyăquil, Pĕrū and Chile, China and Calcutta,) and her own, all remittances must be made in specie; with the exception of the hides, tallow, and