Railroads were built running from Buenos Ayres in different directions, as each province demanded a railroad, with little regard to its population or business.
A road was commenced to cross the Andes and open communication between the Atlantic and Pacific over mountains which had never been crossed by a carriage of any kind.
The country was not settled so rapidly as the rulers desired. Inducements were therefore offered to immigrants. The passage money from Europe and the expenses of the immigrant to his new home have been paid and land for settlement sold at low rates. It is estimated that over 1,000,000 foreigners have settled in the country during the last twelve years, and the proportionate increase of population in the same period has been twice as great as that of the United States. Grazing lands have been sold at nominal prices to immigrants, or leased for terms of years in lots of 6,000 acres at a rental of $100 a year. Bonds were issued not only by the government but by the provinces, by the municipalities and by the railroads, and all were readily taken in England and Germany. To enable the emigrants to pay for and to cultivate their land, the owner of real estate on depositing his title deeds with the hypothecary banks and having a valuation of his real estate, received cedulas, or bonds of the bank, for one-half its appraised value; these cedulas for large amounts were issued and sold in Europe; and thus, as ever, more money was required, more bonds were issued. In 1889, a year of peace, the public debt was increased 120 per cent., and it is now said to be over one thousand four hundred millions of dollars, and the principal and interest of two-thirds of this amount is payable in gold at a premium of 200 per cent.
In 1890 there was no money to meet the interest and general prostration ensued.
It is difficult to ascertain the debt of the republic; but if the accounts given in the English publications are correct the debt is greater in proportion to its population and wealth than that of any other country in the world. The only hope of the Argentine Republic is to wipe out the debt by insolvency and bankruptcy.
PERU.
A strip of land with 1200 miles of sea coast, without a natural harbor, and 200 to 300 miles wide, consisting of a plain, mountains, a plateau, and still another range of mountains—this is Peru.
In the west, where the rain never falls, are numerous small rivers, to-day mountain torrents, to-morrow dry, rocky beds.
Between the lofty ranges of snow mountains is the highest plateau in the world, after Thibet. The southern part of this plateau is dry and desolate, the northern portion is well watered, with beautiful streams running now through deep cañons and then through rich, fertile valleys steadily descending toward the northeast; the valleys growing ever broader, warmer and more delightful, until the montaña is reached, only a few hundred feet above the Atlantic, where the streams have become rivers, navigable to the ocean.