during 1875; but the march of improvement, which had commenced on the advent of the Party of Reform, continued its uninterrupted progress.
In December, 1874, a decree of Congress gave to Señores Camacho and Mendizabel a concession for a railroad to Leon. This was the initiatory movement which has resulted in that grand enterprise, a railroad from the capital of Mexico to her northern frontier, at El Paso. Already, in 1873, the question of granting subsidies to railroads to be built by American capitalists had been discussed in Congress. The English railroad, from Vera Cruz to the capital, received an annual benefaction of $560,000; and but for this aid would never have been built, or, if built, could not have been operated. A lottery was established in aid of the new enterprise, called the "Lottery of the Central Railroad." Roads, railways, and telegraph lines continued to be built and started, until, to-day, Mexico is covered with a network of wires, and dissected in every portion by real and projected roads. Under the wise and energetic government of Señor Lerdo, the peace of the country had been preserved and commerce protected. Mexico now began to assert her ancient claim to be considered among the great exporting nations of the world. In the fiscal year ending in 1875,, exports from the port of Vera Cruz amounted to $16,375,586, of which $14,000,000 were in silver ore and gold.
[A. D. 1876.] Towards the end of 1875 it became apparent that the state of peace could not long continue; in fact, the year that brought to us, of the United States, the hundredth anniversary of our independence, was to find unhappy Mexico again plunged into civil war. The inspiring genius of this unfortunate movement, which had for its object the overthrow of the heads of government, was General Porfirio Diaz, who, from a place of security on
