Page:Mexico in 1827 Vol 2.djvu/119

Rh Section have placed the establishment on a footing, at once economical and effective. He deducts one-half of the produce for expences, which leaves 1,857,402 dollars, to repay the Adventurers for their advances, which is to be done before any division of profits with the Mexican proprietors takes place, and might, consequently, be effected in four years from the present time; (the outlay being three and a half millions, and the mines covering now their own expences:) and he then takes half that sum again, (or 928,701 dollars,) as the interest to be paid, or rather the profits to be derived from the speculation during the duration of the contracts, if the mines do not prove totally unworthy of their former reputation.

This calculation, like all others upon the same subject, is open to objections. Delays may occur, and the most reasonable hopes may be disappointed; but it has for its basis the records of what has been, and it assumes nothing but the possibility of restoring things to what they were, before a great political convulsion compelled the owners of the most flourishing mines to abandon their works.

To the activity and judgment which were displayed, at the time of my visit to Guanajuato, in the operations by which the result, to which Mr. Williamson looks, was to be produced, I can myself bear witness; and, in the opinion of the natives, such was the progress already made, that a Barr, or share, in the Valenciana, which, in 1825, was not