SECTION II.
THE MINING SYSTEM OF MEXICO BEFORE 1810; CHANGES WHICH OCCURRED FROM THAT TIME TILL 1823, WHEN THE IDEA OF FOREIGN COMPANIES WAS FIRST SUGGESTED. THE NUMBER OF THESE COMPANIES NOW ESTABLISHED IN MEXICO, WITH SOME ACCOUNT OF THEIR OUTLAY; — THE EXTENT OF THE UNDERTAKINGS IN WHICH THEY ARE ENGAGED; — THE DIFFICULTIES WHICH THEY HAVE HAD TO ENCOUNTER; — THEIR PROGRESS; — MORE PARTICULARLY DURING MY RESIDENCE IN MEXICO; — AND STATE. IN 1827.
It is unnecessary for me to commence an inquiry respecting the present state of the Mining establishments of Mexico, by reverting to an epoch too distant to throw any light upon the character of the Mining laws now in force. I shall therefore merely observe that, after a period of considerable confusion and obscurity, during which all mining questions were decided by an appeal to a heterogeneous code introduced by Charles V., and composed of old Flemish and German laws, of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, an entirely new form was given to the Mining institutions of New Spain, in the year 1777, by the establishment of a Supreme Council of Mines, (denominated the Real Tribunal General del importante cuerpo de Mineria de Nueva España,) which was followed by the publication of a new Code of laws, (called Las Ordonanzas de Mineria,) and by the creation of Thirty-seven
