ing, as we know it, although the facilities are at hand, in the labor, the cattle and feeding, as well as in the tastes of the people, who use it largely in their cuisine. At the capital a pound of American cheese costs 62½ cents (five reals). The finest butter and cheese in the world could be produced on the beautiful and abundant alfalfa. Our people should look into these openings for enterprise, particularly as the Mexicans themselves would be constant patrons.
The refining of salt is another much needed industry, for which ample material exists in immense deposits that are in the same condition to-day as when the conquerors came. A five-cent sack of American table salt costs three reals, while what is generally used is in the crudest state possible, requiring to be washed, dried in the sun, and then ground on the metate before it is ready for use.
Bacon and ham are both imported, the United States now furnishing the greater part. The price is never less than five to six reals a pound, even at the capital.
Finer hogs can be produced in no country, and with mountains forever snow-covered, and railways offering inducements to shippers, pork packeries and meat-canning establishments could easily be established and made a paying investment. No improvement can be made on the lard, which is beautifully white and sweet; but the supply in no wise reaches the demand, as shown by the price, which I have never known to be less than from twenty-five to thirty-seven cents, or three reals a pound.
Wheat is one of the best products of the soil, and flouring-mills convert it into excellent flour, but either the mills are not numerous enough or the supply of wheat is deficient, as prices are exorbitant—the cheapest I have seen costing three dollars and a half for fifty pounds.
Fond as the Mexicans are of dainties and delicacies, the cracker and wafer, so indispensable in our dietary, are not made in the country, with the exception of one or two factories at the capital from which they are supplied at three reals a pound. Factories of this kind would develop the general taste and doubtless also prove profitable.
