Irrigation of the region between the Sierra and the coast is assured, and this is going to furnish the basis for the largest and earliest increase in population. A portion of this increase should also come from Italy and Spain and perhaps also from Germany, for the Germans are highly successful in semi-tropical agriculture. The Italians have been very successful in Peru in retail trade and in some of the mechanical employments, but the conditions also are favorable for them in the agricultural pursuits. The vineyards in the region around Pisco and Ica seem to afford an especially inviting field for them. By the time the Panama Canal is open the big transatlantic liners from Genoa and Naples which now come to Colon should be bringing a full quota of Italian immigrants through the waterway to the Peruvian ports.

The government has enacted liberal legislation providing for immigration and colonization, but it does not follow the theory of government-aided colonies. Its course is sound. It grants lands to private enterprises for colonization, and in the industrial plans which are now a part of its political policy there is a certainty of an increased population to be drawn from abroad. An old law authorizes an annual appropriation of $50,000 for encouraging immigration, and the passage of immigrants may be paid, but this is the limit of state aid.

Colonization plans by private enterprise received a check a few years ago, when the Peruvian Corporation abandoned its efforts. Of the total grant of 2,750,000 acres in the region of the rivers Perene and Ene and the Chanchamayo valley, more than a million acres were set aside for immediate peopling. The corporation began to attract settlers to the lands, but the movement was feeble and was not sustained. The complaint made was that instead of inviting fresh and virile European immigration it drew the dregs from neighboring countries, taking colonists who had proven their own worthlessness in the places where they first settled. The experiment was still another instance of ignorant London directors and incompetent management.

Many of the earlier colonists in this district went into coffee-growing with fair success. The climate, the soil, the slopes of the Cordilleras, all were favorable. Good crops were raised and found a profitable market. But this market was obtained at the period when Brazil was changing from the Empire to the Republic, and when through that and subsequent disturbances the supply to meet the world’s demand was interrupted. When the Brazilian crop became abnormal in its productiveness, weighting the price down below the level of profitable production, coffee-raising no longer was business for the colonists in Peru. They themselves did not clearly perceive the cause of their distress. Many of them, instead of turning to other products, got discouraged and went away. But merely because of this failure there is no ground to believe that in the future colonizing movements in this region, intelligently directed by the Peruvian Corporation or by any private company, will not succeed. The climatic and soil conditions are inviting, and the only question is the means of utilizing these gifts of Nature. The entire Pichis zone is favorable to European colonization. When it is connected with the Pacific by the extension of the present railroad to Port Bermudez or some other river point, its colonization capabilities will be appreciated; for the lack of access has been the drawback. This rich region lies within 300 miles of the coast.

A similar observation may be made concerning the northern districts. From any one of half a dozen little seaports the valleys of the Marañon and its tributaries are less than 200 miles distant. But the Continental Divide lies between, and this mass of mountain wall must be pierced by the railroad. Once this is done, the immigration possibilities of northern Peru will develop rapidly.

For all this there must be faith, and resolution, and definite measures. It is not a question of settling a new land, for Peru is an old, old country. Nor is it the problem of reconstructing the ancient civilization of the Incas, or the civilization which twentieth-century iconoclastic antiquarians charge the Incas with stealing from other races. In its economic aspect the matter is simply one of getting more people into a country which has plenty of room for them.

During a stay in Lima I spent an afternoon with the Rev. Dr. Wood, a Methodist Episcopal missionary, who had been in South America for thirty years, and who had made the most discriminating study of social conditions of any Yankee living in the Andes. I came away permeated with some of Dr. Wood’s enthusiasm and, I hope, with some of his devout faith. The South American continent, he declared, had been held in reserve by Providence for a time when the population of other countries would press for room and for means of subsistence. The present Peru, he thought, was easily capable of supporting 20,000,000 inhabitants in conditions of life and comfort similar to those enjoyed by dwellers in the Alps and the Apennines.

But if, in the years pending the completion of the Panama Canal, Peru by natural increase and by immigration can add 1,000,000 to her population, that modest addition will determine her industrial future. A million more people during the next ten years will mean an extra 2,000,000 in the decade that follows. The horizon does not need to be extended farther.

CHAPTER XI

PERU’S GROWING STABILITY