CHAP.. XXI.

AMERICAN MINES.

121

extremity. Some was also found, but only to-wards the latter end of the seventeenth century,in the province ofChoco; which afterwards yielded,in proportion to its extent, a greater quantityof that metal than any other part of the globe,though its climate is one of the most unhealthy inthe whole of America .

The chief increase between 1500 and 1600 wasof silver from the viceroyalty of Mexico, where Mexico ,the production of Zaccatecas, Guanaxuato, andthe other mining-districts had advanced from thevalue of two million piastres to that of fivemillions, and at the latter part* of the century hadfar exceeded that annual average.

Although when the Spaniards conquered Mexico they appear to have annihilated the higher classes,yet the population which was left was quite suf-ficient to supply labourers, and recourse wasnever had to the cruel and costly practice ofimporting negroes from Africa to execute themost servile part of the work, as had been donein Peru , Buenos Ayres, and Columbia. The in-troduction of cattle and of vegetable productionsfrom Europe , which had been unknown before inMexico , afforded abundance of subsistence; andif the population did not increase it did not greatlydiminish under the Spanish yoke. The feudalismwhich was found in Mexico was rather of apaternal than a slavish character; and the samesystem was continued by the new proprietors of