Why A Boom Burst

Laredo, Tex., has been on a great "boom" within a year past, but the improvement company of the town has been put into the hands of a receiver, and the outlook is described as "decidedly gloomy." One of the causes f or the flattening out of Laredo's boom is worthy of attention from those simple minded people who fancy that a tariff does not restrict trade and interfere with business. A correspondent of The American Wool Reporter writes from Laredo as follows: "One of the severest blows Laredo has experienced, and which has added much to the depression in real estáte there, is the result of the decisión of the late Secretary Windom, shuttihg out of this country Mexican lead ores. At this point had just been erected the buildings of the Omaha and Kansas City Ore Sampling works and a large concentrator for the reduction of ores by the Yguana Mining company, of Philadelphia, at 'a cost of $300,000. These industries are now closed down, and the machinery has all heen removed to Monterey, Mexico." The Windom decisión has now given place to the McKinley law, and as this law imposes a duty of IJ cents per pound on lead ores, Laredo cannot smelt those ores with profit, aJthough lying right on the Mexácan border. i