Page:Vol 5 History of Mexico by H H Bancroft.djvu/581

Rh of finance availed himself of the gloomy prospects to extort from the bondholders a large abatement on the usuriously swollen capital, together with a reduction of the interest from five to three per cent, in consideration of a draft on the United States treasury for two and a half million pesos. The total of the regular foreign debt, contracted at London, was thereupon fixed at £10,241,650, with an assignment on the custom-houses for the payment of the interest.

Encouraged by this successful transaction, Minister Payno proceeded with somewhat blind confidence to consolidate the interior debt into one fund, with uniform bonds, and an interest of three per cent. This was decreed by law of November 30, 1850, under which, in conjunction with an insufficient representation of creditors, a rather arbitrary discount was imposed upon the different classes of debt, the remainder being allowed an interest of three per cent from the fund assigned of twenty per cent on the custom-house revenue, with an annual redemption of $300,000.