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Show THE GREAT INDUSTRY. Pedro Alvaraddis the richest - man in Mexico. There was a story that he offered to pay the national debt; that is denied, but it is believed that he might do it ' He is the owner of the Palmilla mine, which has been in his family for 200 years. It brings him an income of $15 000 00 annually. A miner familiar with its conditions says if operated by Americans the mine would, probably produce $20,000,000 a year. And that reminds us that mining has been from the beginning about the most legitimate work in the world except raising bread, j Superficial readers of history tell us that old . Rome fell because of corruption. Old Rome fell because be-cause her mines in Spain and in Asia Minor gav) out. Then followed very much the same state of affairs af-fairs that we had in this country between 1872 and I . 1896. , - By legislation the Congress of . the United States destroyed half the money of the world; what was left drifted to a few handstand there began the sub ordination of free men and the ruin of young women. wo-men. ' - The same result followed in Rome, only it took longer. They did not have half -the money in the f "world destroyed but their annual supply grew less and less until it ceased. A great many of the titled families of Europe - . owe their titles and their influence to the money taken ta-ken from the mines of South America and Mexico, . between 1720 and 1800. Never before ware countries " rated so much, by their wealth as they are now; never before were individuals rated by their wealth so much as at present. While mines are yielding as they are now they are a leaven to business and will make it secure unless un-less men grow utterly reckless and reduce their bnsi ness to a South Sea bubble level. In Europe, when great families received fortunes ; from the mines of the New "World, the money was . . kept in the family. . Titles were bought or earned, houses were founded that still endure, and digni-' digni-' ties were acquired, so to speak, by indirect purchase. That cannot very well be done in this country, but it is still true that as the volume of money in the c6un-try c6un-try regulates prices and gives standing to business, the fact that the mines of the United States are adding add-ing so much to the wealth of the country that they keep all other forms of property at high prices, and everything like prudent management will continue ; the prosperity which the country now enjoys. |
