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622 painted in the very strongest colours. It must be a satisfaction therefore to the shareholders of the United Company to know that their prospects at Zacatecas were rated very high, their contracts pronounced to be unexceptionable, and their mines excellent. All, however, added, that it was to be regretted that a second Anitua could not be found to undertake the management. The present Director, Don Joaquin Iparriguirri, is a skilful miner, but has lost much of his former activity by age; and, at the time of my visit, Mr. Schoolbred, who had been recently associated with him, was too new in office to give that impulse to the system, which it appeared to require. It was thought that, under Mr. Anitua, what had been done in a year and a half might have been accomplished in much less time.

The little mine of Lŏrētŏ, (like Sĕchō at Guanajuato, an entirely new undertaking,) borders upon that of Malanoche. It is situated upon a separate vein, and had, when I saw it, not only covered the advances made upon it by the Association, but began to yield a clear profit. The ores improved as the workings increased in depth, and they must now have reached the level at which the neighbouring mine of La Barguena, (worked to a much greater extent than Loreto,) was found to be extremely productive.

Besides the mines already enumerated, the United Company possesses that of San Acasio, situated