Page:Mexico in 1827 Vol 2.djvu/661

Rh the weight), 4,291 arrobas. The wheat raised averages 4,749 cargas (of 300 lbs.), but this is much exceeded by the annual produce of Fresnillo, where 7,230 cargas are the registered return.

The town likewise contains the largest manufactory of coarse cloth that I met with in Mexico. It is called the Obrage de Pĭmĕntēl, and gives employment to 350 men and women within the walls of the establishment. Five thousand arrobas of wool are consumed in it annually; and the cheapness of this essential article (which seldom rises above twelve reals the arroba, and may often be purchased as low as seven), enables the proprietor, whose principal business consists in a Government contract, to deliver his cloth in Queretaro at the same price as the manufacturers of that town, who can seldom obtain wool under fourteen reals the arroba.

The colours principally used are red, green, yellow, and blue. For the first, cochineal is employed as a dye, at the rate of about 4½1bs. for a piece of cloth forty varas in length, and weighing 60lbs.; such being the quality and dimensions fixed by the terms of the contract. Indigo produces an excellent blue. For the yellow, two dyes are employed; one, extracted from the seed of a parasitic plant, found in abundance upon the Peruvian pepper-trees in the Baxio, and called Săcătlăscāl; the other, Pālŏ Mŏrălētĕ, a Tierra Caliente tree, brought principally from Amătlān de las Cañas. The Săcătlăscāl is much the strongest dye of the two, only 6¼lbs,