In 1787, Tarve, having acquired a sufficient capital, and an intimate knowledge of the mining capabilities of the district, resolved to commence operations upon his own account, and to attack the vein of the Pavellon. With this view he set out for Mexico, in order to close his accounts with the Company, and to give up the management of the Veta Negra, which he had conducted with so much success. He was taken ill upon the road, and died at Zacatecas, but not before he had bequeathed his confidential mining "dependiente," Don Juan Martin de Ĭzmĕndī, as a precious legacy to his old patrons, and with him a knowledge of his projects with regard to the Pavellon.
In these Izmendi was supported by Don José Mariano Făgŏāgă; but the family being reduced by various misfortunes, and the mines of Veta Negra failing almost entirely at the same time, it was with the utmost difficulty that he obtained the means of carrying his plans into execution; and he only effected it at last, by disregarding the positive and repeated orders which he received to give up the work.
Tarve's favourite scheme was to drive a level from the Veta Negra in such a direction as to strike the vein of the Pavellon (which runs through much higher ground), a little below the spot where the bonanza of the preceding century had ceased, conceiving it probable that, in a vein which had produced such extraordinary riches above, the dete-
