Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 29.djvu/304

290 common rule. Thus, under date of April 9, 1886, an official of the Mexican National Railroad writes: "Goods destined for San Luis (i. e., via railway) pay a local tax in Laredo, Mexico, but on arrival at San Luis pay a municipal tax. These taxes are eternally changing, and are sometimes prohibitory. Take lumber, for example. Three months ago there was a municipal tax of thirty dollars per one thousand feet. This has now been reduced to one dollar per one thousand feet; but there is no certainty that the old tax will not be restored." Nor is this all. For the transit of every territorial boundary necessitates inspection, assessment, the preparation of bills of charges, and permits for entry; and all these transactions and papers involve the payment of fees, or the purchase and affixing of stamps. Thus, by section 377 of the tariff law of December, 1884, it is ordained "that the custom-house shall give to every individual who makes any importation, upon the payment of duties, a certificate of the sum paid, which certificate, on being presented to the administrator of the stamp-office in the place of importation, shall be changed for an equal amount in custom-house stamps. For this operation the interested party shall pay, to the administrator of whom he receives the stamps, two per cent in money (coin) of the total value of the stamps." All imports into Mexico at the present time are liable, therefore, to these multiple assessments; and the extent to which they act as a prohibition on trade may be best illustrated by a few practical examples.

In 1885, an American gentleman, residing in the city of Mexico as the representative of certain New England business interests, with a view of increasing his personal comfort, induced the landlady of the hotel where he resided (who, although by birth a Mexican, was of Scotch parentage) to order from St. Louis an American cooking-stove, with its customary adjuncts of pipes, kettles, pans, etc. In due time the stove arrived; and the following is an exact transcript of the bills contingent, which were rendered and paid upon its delivery: