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Page:Travels in Mexico and life among the Mexicans.djvu/434

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426

TRAVELS IN MEXICO.

The Mexican Central runs through the centre of the table land, which already supports a population of nearly four million inhabitants. The following is a list of the cities upon the line, not including those of less than eight thousand inhabitants, with their population,[1] the State capitals being marked with stars.

*Aguascalientes 35,000
*Chihuahua 16,000
*Durango 28,000
*Guanajuato 63,000
*Guadalajara 93,875
*Mexico 260,000
*Queretaro 48,000
*San Luis Potosi 45,000
*Zacatecas 64,000
Paso del Norte 8,000
San Juan del Rio 11,000
Tula 10,000
Salamanca 19,450
Irapuato 21,311
Lagos 20,000
Celaya 30,000
Silao 38,000
Sayula 16,000
Tepic 14,000
Salvatierra 8,000
Leon 82,000
________
930,636

In round numbers, probably a million.

The feasibility of this vast project has already been demonstrated, in the almost triumphal advance from the valley of Mexico to the valley of the Rio Grande. Of the region traversed Humboldt says: "So regular is the great plateau (formed exclusively by the broad, undulating, flattened crest of the Mexican Andes), and so gentle are the slopes where depressions occur, that the journey from Mexico to Santa Fé, New Mexico (about twelve hundred miles), might be performed in a four-wheeled vehicle. . . . . The two extremities, Mexico City and Santa Fé,

  1. Verified from the Anuario of Mexico for 1882.