couragement of mining. It shall be composed of an attorney of the miners, another of the creditors of the fund instituted, and of a person commissioned by the Supreme Government. Their mode of election and powers will be detailed in the following articles.

ART. 2. The presidency of this board shall be held by turns by the three persons who compose it, alternating every year. The first year, the person commissioned by the Supreme Government shall be the president.

ART. 3. As soon as the present decree is published, the Supreme Government and the creditors of the funds of the establishment, shall proceed to appoint their respective Commissioners, and the miners residing in this Capital shall also on their part, appoint a commissioner ad interim.

ART. 4. The Governor of the department of Mexico shall call together and preside over the creditors and miners in separate meetings, in order that each class may appoint their respective commissioner conforming in voting to the existing laws and those in force in the present establishment.

ART. 5. When the board is formed, it shall require from the individuals who may withdraw the delivery by formal and exact inventory of whatsoever may appertain to the establishment, as also the surrender of the accounts for the whole time which has elapsed since the last were presented, and it will take care the same be laid before the tribunal of revision of accounts within the space of three months. It will hold its session in the buildings of the same establishment, and there also shall its office be located.

ART. 6. Three months after the publication of the present decree, the special attornies who may have been appointed in the mining districts by the meetings of minors, shall meet in this capital, under the presidency of the governor of the department, in order to elect the person who is to represent them in the board of encouragement, which election being completed, and the proprietary commissioner being put in possession, the one appointed ad interim shall retire. Three substitutes shall also be elected, who as well as the commissioner must be miners or suppliers of mines, (aviadores) who shall be substitutes for the proprietors in the order of their appointment, and shall also act as advisers in cases in which the board may desire to hear their opinion. If from any places the special attornies of the meetings cannot come, on account of their being very remote, or their inability to bear the expense of travelling and staying in Mexico, it will be sufficient that the meetings at the localities of mines send authority and instructions to a person in whom they have confidence, and who resides in this capital.

ART. 7. On the 31st of December 1844 this Board of Miners shall be renewed, in order to make a similar election, in the same manner as the creditors shall do, in regard to their attornies, and both shall have power to reelect the persons whose terms may expire, the renewal taking place successively every three years.

ART. 8. Each of the members of this board shall enjoy an annual salary

of $3000, which shall be paid out of the fund which this law establishes, and a half salary shall be paid to the substitutes when they enter upon duty through any legal impediment to the proprietor, and whenever the duty exceeds fifteen days.

ART. 9. The Board shall propose the reforms it may deem proper in the secretary's and other offices of the establishment. In the regulation of which mention will be made in the next article, the salary of all the persons whom it shall consider necessary for the office to employ shall be fixed, and in the appointment, under equal circumstances, preference shall be given to those retiring, who may receive a salary from the treasury.

ART. 10. The attributes of this Board shall be those which include an economical and faithful management of the funds mentioned in the present decree, in conformity with the regulations which it shall draw up and submit to the supreme government for its approval. In this regulation shall be decided:

1st. The manner in which quicksilver shall be obtained, distributed and sold, to the workers of metals, determining the cases and mode in which the working of quicksilver mines in the Republic is to be encouraged by rewards, or in any other way promoted.

2d. Everything relating to the redemption of the debt of the subscribed fund, according to what may be decreed in the item relating thereto.

3d. The government and direction of the Board itself and finally, it shall be an attribute and object of its most particular solicitude, to promote the encouragement of the branch, by its funds and by its school.

ART. 11. The Board, after hearing the director and professors of the school, shall submit to the Supreme Government for its approval the reforms it may think necessary in the ordinances of the said establishment.

ART. 12. The Board, in conjunction with the advisers, shall submit to the Supreme Government a ternary list for the appointment of director of the school, the individuals named in the ternary list to have the qualifications detailed in Art. 13. of title 1. of the ordinances of mining; it being understood that the Supreme Government shall be empowered to return the ternary list in order that a new one may be made, should it think proper so to do, and the President of the Board having in the votings the casting vote.

ART. 13. In the charge of the board of encouragement shall be all the property which may produce the funds mentioned in this law; that arising from the quicksilver which may be distributed, and the stock of quicksilver itself. The responsibility for everything comprised in the management, preservation and safe keeping, shall be jointly in the members of the Board. That of the management and distribution shall be confided to an auditor treasurer, whom the Supreme Government shall appoint on the submission of a ternary list by the board, at a salary which shall be fixed in the regulations, and shall be paid out of the funds of the establishment, he giving the

bonds which shall be designated in the same regulation; it being the duty of the said auditor treasurer to draw up and present the accounts for each year, and to be accountable for the quicksilver which the establishment may have on hand. For the custody and security of the property there shall be a chest with four keys, each of the commissioners holding one, and the auditor treasurer the other. The regulations which the board shall draw up for the management of the property shall be founded upon these bases.

ART. 14. The Board shall not have power to invest the funds which may come into its coffers in any other objects than those prescribed by the present law, or those for which it may obtain the previous authority of the gov ernment. In the ordinary repairs of the building, or other extraordinary expenses, it shall only have power to expend, without such permission, not exceeding $250 per annum.

ART. 15. The Board shall transmit to the Supreme Government monthly statements of its cash account, and each year it shall transmit another of its general receipts and expenditures. The first are to be published every four months by the board, and the second annually at the proper period by the same board.

ART. 16. The Board shall have power to settle with the parties interested the business left pending by the late tribunal of mines, and which the estab lishment may at present hold; these transactions are to be submitted for the approval of the Supreme Government.

ART. 17. The privilege is granted to the same board that the mines of the establishment may put in operation in Tasco, may not be denounced during two years, and for that purpose the articles relative to the ordinance of mining are suspended in this case.

TITLE II.

Of the Quicksilver fund.

ART. 18. A fund shall be created destined to the acquisition of quicksil ver which the board shall manage, distributing it exclusively among the workers of metals at cost and expences. The said fund shall be formed with two thirds of the amount of the import duties, imposed upon linens and textures of foreign cotton, according to the decree of this date.

ART. 19. The Board may transfer the quicksilver with the corresponding guaranty, and on the terms established, by the regulation, being authorized, in order to render effectual the collecting of the duty, to have recourse either by themselves or by their agents, to the judges" de hacienda," in order that they may enforce upon the contractors a fulfilment of their obligations, and coerce payment from those who refuse to make it.

ART. 20. Every four months the board shall publish a statement of the issues of quicksilver, expressing the quantities sent to each mine, and the

names of the beneficiaries who shall receive it; and in case of complaint of partiality or injustice in the distribution, the supreme government shall decide; the said statement shall also comprehend a report of the quantities purchased by the board, and the cost thereof.

ART. 21. When the board may have succeeded in collecting a fund equivalent to twenty four thousand quintals of quicksilver, the portion assigned out of the proceeds of the increase of duties upon foreign linens and textures of cotton shall cease to be applied to this object, conformably with the appropriate decree of this date.

TITLE III.

Of the foundation fund and redemption.

ART. 22. The proceeds of the so called Real de Mineria, the active credits of the old tribunal, and those of the establishment which by this law is reformed, continue to be liable to the charges and obligations designated in the decree of May 20, 1826 in Art. 7, and shall continue to be scrupulously complied with.

ART. 23. Every four months there shall be made by the Board a partial redemption of debts from the amounts which have been realised, taking care as far as possible to concede the preference to which they are justly entitled, who as creditors to said fund, offer the most favorable terms.

TITLE IV.

Of the administration of justice in the affairs of mining. Of the primary

courts.

ART. 24. The Governors of the departments, in concert with the Departmental Juntas, and having the previous approval of the Supreme Government, shall establish in each the number of tribunals of the first instance, which are necessary within their limits.

ART. 25. Each tribunal shall be composed of three territorial deputies, elected in the same manner as is prescribed in the ancient ordinance of mining; and of these three individuals, the first shall be the president of the court and the other two the associates.

ART. 26. Each of these three tribunals shall exercise in their territory the governing and economical powers committed to them by the ancient ordinance of the branch, and in judicial matters they shall also conform to the same ordinance, as respects simplicity and brevity in their proceedings.

ART. 27. In suits in which the tribunal may have occasion to consult with a counsellor, it shall be with the Judge of the first instance of the respective district.

ART. 28. Each tribunal of the first instance shall choose a secretary, and the clerks it may deem necessary for the despatch of the business of its secretaryship and of the court, specifying the salaries they are to receive, which it will report to the respective governors of the departments, in order that with their assent the determination to which the Supreme Government may consent, may be heard.

ART. 29. From the definite decisions pronounced by these courts, in which the amount in dispute does not exceed five hundred dollars, there shall be no room for appeal when the sentence of the court of the second instance is in conformity with that of the first, and the amount in litigation does not exceed two thousand dollars.

ART. 30. Besides the three persons who are to compose the court of the first instance, three others shall be appointed who shall act as consulters in all the governing matters in which the same tribunal may desire to hear their opinion, and they shall supply the place of the judges, in case of inability or resignation of the same.

Of the second and third instances and extraordinary appeals.

ART. 31. The second and third instances which may occur in the business of mining, and the extraordinary appeals which may arise, shall be proven and decided in the superior courts of justice of each respective department, and in the courts designated by the laws, or which shall be hereafter designated.

Wherefore I order, that the same be printed, published, circulated, and carried into full effect.

Palace of the National Government, Mexico, 2d December, 1842.
JOSE MARIA TORNEL,
NICOLAS BRAVO,

Minister of War and Navy.

And I communicate the same to your Excellency, for your information and consequent action.

God and liberty.-Mexico, December 2d, 1842.

To His Excellency, the Governor of this department:

TORNEL.

And in order that it may come to the notice of every one, I order that it be published by Edict in this Capital, and in all the other cities, towns and places comprehended in this department, exposing it in the usual places, and circulating it among whom it may concern.

LUIS G. VIEYRA.

MIGUEL ZERES,

Secretary.