A waggon road connects
the capital with Tonala, a port on the Pacific coast, from which a
short railway connects with the Tehuantepec line, and so with the
general railway system. But apart from this, the principal means of
communication are the navigable streams and the waggon roads.

Agriculture is the principal industry of this state, with
timber-cutting, cattle-raising, and the production of salt from the
deposits on the coast. In their relative order of importance are
sugar-cane, coffee, chocolate, tobacco, indigo, whilst fibre, rubber,
cereals, alcohol, cattle, and other products, as cedar, mahogany, &c.,
are also exported in increasing value. There is, however, much room for
the improvement and development of agriculture in this prolific region.
The famous ruins of Palenque render this state of great interest
archaeologically.

CHAPTER XV
NATURAL RESOURCES, AGRICULTURE, GENERAL CONDITIONS (continued)

Central and Atlantic States--Chihuahua and the Rio Grande--Mining,
forests, railways--Coahuila and its resources--Nuevo Leon and its
conditions--Iron, coal, railways, textile industries--Durango and its
great plains and mountain peaks--Aguascalientes--Zacatecas and its
mineral wealth--San Luis Potosi and its industries--Guanajuato,
Queretaro and Hidalgo, and their diversified resources--Mexico and its
mountains and plains--Tlaxcala--Morelos and its sugar-cane industry--
The rich State of Puebla--Tamaulipas, a littoral state--The historic
State of Vera Cruz, its resources, towns, and harbour--Campeche and the
peninsula of Yucatan.

The states described in this chapter are those which mainly occupy: (a)
The _mesa central_, or great plateau, and (b) the states which border
upon the coast of the Gulf of Mexico, and the Caribbean Sea, forming
the eastern littoral of Mexico, and consequently those nearest to
European influence. Taking first the plateau states, and beginning at
the north, the frontier with the United States, we have the State of
Chihuahua. The area of territory embodied in this state, the largest in
the Republic, is greater than that of Great Britain, having an area of
some 90,000 square miles, with a population of about 330,000. The
northern boundary of this state is the Rio Grande del Norte, the
dividing line between it and Texas, and it occupies much of the
northern portion of the great plateau, and part of the Western Sierra
Madre, whose summits form its boundary. The elevation above sea-l