138 To the River Plate and Back 



in 1565, and at Cordoba in 1573. An expedition from 

 Chili in 1559 established a settlement at Mendoza, the 

 name being given in honor of the leader, who must not 

 be confounded with Pedro de Mendoza who had so 

 signally failed in colonizing the region about Buenos 

 Aires. 



The occupation of South America by the Spanish 

 was effected by expeditions which in going out from 

 Spain very naturally followed the routes originally 

 pursued by Columbus and his successors. Nombre-de- 

 Dios on the northern shore of the Isthmus of Panama 

 became the rendezvous of the Spanish fleets, and all 

 commerce between Spain and Peru took place through 

 that port. The region now known as Argentina was in 

 the early days subject to the control of the Governor- 

 General of Peru. Spanish commerce with South 

 America was in the hands of a clique of wealthy mer- 

 chants in the city of Cadiz, who by reason of their ability 

 to influence the court had secured for themselves a 

 monopoly of the carrying trade. They succeeded in 

 effecting the passage of laws prohibiting all importation 

 and exportation of goods directly by sea from the region 

 of the River Plate and compelled all intercourse with 

 the valley of the Plate to follow the route by Panama 

 along the west coast and across the Andes. They even 

 went so far as to cause regulations to be passed making 

 it an offense punishable by death to ship in or out of the 

 River Plate by direct ocean routes any goods whatever. 

 Human governments have often been induced for self- 

 ish ends to violate the laws of nature. It may well, 

 however, be called into question whether any more 

 atrocious perversion of fundamental economical prin- 

 ciples was ever enacted than in this case, where a com- 

 munity, with nothing between it and the mother 



