during the time that the large estates were neglected, and while the canals of irrigation and the silver mines were in ruins, was of the most limited character; and the very indigent circumstances to which it reduced the majority of those who ranked above the leperos must also have diminished the population of the republic much below that of the vice-kingdom under Ravillagigedo.
Since 1840, notwithstanding the frequent wars, Mexico, in favored localities, may have slightly increased in population; but this increase is more than balanced by the Indian wars of the northern departments, which have depopulated large tracts of country, sometimes extending across one tier of states even into the heart of Durango and Guanajuato; so that I hazard nothing in affirming that the population of the whole country must be less to-day than it was in 1794, notwithstanding that Humboldt sets down an estimate of 5,800,000 for the year 1803, and 6,500,000 for the year 1808. I might go farther, and affirm that the constant insecurity of life and property in all but the central parts of the republic is such as to keep down the natural increase of a population never prolific, being made up of a combination of uncongenial races—whites and Indians, whose intermixture leads to sterility.
The census shows two fifths of the population to be pure Indians, mostly laborers: this class would have been the one most likely to have increased since the Revolution, had there remained the same amount of employment and wages as formerly. In consequence of the abolition of monopolies, the articles necessary for the comforts of life became much cheaper and more easy of attainment to the laboring classes, which would tend to increase the number of this class. These Indians, moreover, had remained to a great extent free from the deleterious intermixture of white blood. But the pure Indian, compared