paid. Thence it must be transported to Mexico for sale as there was no nearer mint.[1] The labor was mainly performed by Indians, under Spanish overseers, nominally working for wages of from two to five pesos a month, yet practically held in bondage during much of the time and in many sections.[2] The severest toil, however, fell to the lot of negro slaves.
Notwithstanding the richness of the ores, the mining industry was well nigh paralyzed by the government monopoly of quicksilver, which restricted the production of that metal to the mines of Almaden in Spain. Rich deposits are said to have been discovered in Nueva Galicia, especially in the Sierra de Pinos, but its extraction was prohibited by cédula of 1730. The immediate effect was of course to make the price of quicksilver so excessive that only the most productive mines could be profitably worked, to say nothing of the occasional failure of the supply on account of interrupted communication with Mexico. But these were not the only disadvantages of the monopoly; for not only must the quicksilver be brought directly from the government officials, but must be bought only in large quantities. No subsequent transactions were allowed, nor any retail trade in this commodity. It was not enough, however, that quicksilver must be bought in large quantities and at exorbitant rates; the purchaser must at the same time become responsible for the payment of the tax on the amount of silver bullion which the supply purchased would enable him to produce! This was intended to prevent frauds in evading the payment of taxes and tithes; but the practical effect was that if the discoverer of a mine happened to be a man without means he was compelled to take others into partnership; and when the
- ↑ In 1607 a royal order was obtained ordering a mint to be established at Zacatecas, but nothing was done in the matter. Bernardez, Zac., 38; Villa Señor, Teatro, ii. 223.
- ↑ Dampier, Voyage, i. 269, speaks of some hundreds of Indian slaves who worked in the silver mines near Centizpac in 1686, carrying ore to Compostela and supplies back to the mines.
