The value of Mexico is thus portrayed by the British historian Alison
(vol. iv., p. 423):
'Humboldt has told us that he was never wearied with astonishment
at the smallness of the portion of soil which, in Mexico and the
adjoining provinces, would yield sustenance to a family for a year:
and that the same extent of ground which in wheat would maintain
only two persons, would yield sustenance under the banana to fifty;
though in that favored region the return of wheat is never under
seventy, sometimes as much as a hundred fold. The return on an
average of Great Britain is not more than nine to one. If due
weight be given to these extraordinary facts, it will not appear
extravagant to assert that Mexico, with a territory embracing seven
times the whole area of France, may at some future and possibly not
remote period contain two hundred millions of inhabitants.'
This is the magnificent empire which France now seeks to conquer,
without a murmur of remonstrance from Great Britain, who so often
combined Europe to resist the petty acquisition by France of territory
less than one of the Mexican States.
It is needless to say that England relies on the United States to
prevent Mexico becoming a French province. Her statesmen have for the
past two years professed the belief that the dismemberment of the United
States is inevitable.
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