The national census of 1869 gave the population of the country as 1,830,214, whereof the city of Buenos Aires had 187,346 inhabitants. According to the census of 1895, the total population amounted to 3,954,911, with that of the capital at 663,854. A new census, taken May, 1913, is now being compiled, but from figures supplied we know the population of the city was at that time 1,560,000 inhabitants. According to the Division of Statistical and Rural Economy, the entire population of the Republic in 1911 was estimated to be 7,467,878. The latter figures are necessarily based upon incomplete returns and have probably been estimated upon a ratio of increase established by earlier calculations; but all indications point to the probability that on the completion of the new census, during the present year, the total population of the Republic will approach 10,000,000.

INVESTMENT OF FOREIGN CAPITAL

The investment of foreign capital in the Argentine Republic has assumed far greater proportions during the past twenty years than in any other corresponding period since its formation. As one example of importance, it may be stated that the total capital invested in private and government-owned railways in the year 1895 amounted to $485,360,121, whilst in 1913 the capital employed in railways operating in the Argentine Republic reached $1,210,475,331, of which over ninety per cent is British. In 1895 the foreign capital invested in the Republic, including, at that time, about $400,000,000 of External National Debt, barely exceeded $1,000,000,000. An official estimate of foreign capital invested in the country at the end of 1910 gave the following figures:

$Gold
1. Loans and various Argentine Bonds691,831,000
2. Railways804,413,000
3. Banks37,541,000
4. Ports22,164,000
5. Street car lines91,576,000
6. Freezing plants8,392,000
7. Gas and electric companies,water works and sanitary works58,035,000
8. Land and loan companies160,800,000
9. Other companies41,650,000
10. Mortgages and properties150,000,000
11. Commerce and credit200,000,000
Grand total$2,266,402,000

GOLD RESERVES

The vast increase in exports during latter years has naturally attracted considerable imports of gold; and, as showing the wealth and stability of the Republic, it may be mentioned that the Conversion Fund created by law in 1901 to secure the national issues of paper and nickel currency (which was then to consist of appropriations from certain sources of revenue until a total of $30,000,000 had been obtained) showed at December 31st, 1913, gold reserves in the Caja de Conversion to be $233,197,727, or considerably more than 60 per cent. of the entire issues of paper and nickel currency.

CUSTOM HOUSE REVENUE

The Custom House Revenue on import duties for 1903 amounted to $37,191,857, and in 1913 to $98,978,745.

When it is remembered that the Argentine Republic covers an area of about one-third of the United States and that up to the present time not nearly one-fifth of its productive soil has been placed under cultivation, the figures relating to its production will leave little doubt that the world, in the not distant future, will find in that favored land one of the main sources of its food supply. But it is not alone in the development of the agricultural and pastoral industries that the great advance of the Republic is to be noted. In every form of national activity the forward march of the Argentine Republic has made itself felt far beyond its own borders; while from a purely commercial point of view it has become a centre of universal interest and has added materially to the enrichment of the commerce of many of the countries of Europe.