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100 as well as a concurrence of other favourable circumstances, in order to reach their natural level. Every calculation respecting them must, therefore, take as its basis the supposition, that public tranquillity will not be disturbed, nor the ordinary course of nature interrupted by any unusual visitation, (such as pestilence or famine,) with which the New World is occasionally afflicted. It is upon this supposition, that the gentlemen, of whose authority I shall presently avail myself, have proceeded in their communications with me; and it is upon a similar understanding alone, that I can venture, in justice to them, or to myself, to lay before my readers the result of our joint inquiries. I trust, however, that due weight will be given to this observation, and I shall consequently proceed, at once, with my task; not with a wish to encourage delusive hopes, but merely in order to show the nature of the expectations that may reasonably be entertained by those who have embarked so large a stake in the mines of New Spain.

Captain Vetch, the Director of the Real del Monte Mining Association, in a Report dated the 26th September, 1826, after stating the produce of the mines of Count Regla, during the fifty years in which they were in full activity, to have been Twenty-six millions and a half of dollars, calculates that, by working the two great veins, (La Biscaina and Santa