Page:Vol 2 History of Mexico by H H Bancroft.djvu/572

552 New Galicia as early as 1543, beginning with those of Espíritu Santo. Mines not only of gold and silver but of tin, copper, mercury, iron, and other metals were brought to light and drew many Spaniards to the province from Mexico and Spain. Before the end of the century some of them, under the wasteful system then in vogue, showed signs of exhaustion, but many good mines, abandoned during the northern excitement, were afterward profitably worked.

There is little to note in the events of New Galicia, during the last half of the century, save fluctuations created by mining excitements and the vague allusions to minor revolts and their suppression. The revolts were to a great extent owing to abuses by encomenderos, who tore the natives from their homes to work in mines and on plantations, and assisted in reducing the already depleted province. The outrages of Guzman and the Mixton war are said to have destroyed half the population. Following these came a series of epidemics which ravaged the country on different occasions between 1541 and 1590, especially in 1545 and the two following years, and left but one tenth