SUMMARY. 289 



seriously threatened the peaceful relations of these two South American 

 republics, but is now happily approaching a peaceful settlement through 

 friendly arbitration, arose from an attempt by joint commissions represent- 

 ing the two governments to establish and properly mark an international 

 boundary line, extending northward from the fifty-second parallel of south 

 latitude. In their work of delimitation these joint commissions were 

 to be guided by the text of a treaty entered into by the two govern- 

 ments in 1 88 1, which stipulated that a line connecting the highest peaks 

 of the Andes and dividing the waters of the Atlantic from the waters of 

 the Pacific should constitute the international boundary line. 



An attempt at a practical application of the conditions of this treaty 

 soon demonstrated its impossibility and developed the fact, previously 

 unsuspected, that the continental watershed throughout the entire extent 

 of Patagonia, excepting only a small area about the source of the Santa 

 Cruz River, was not formed by the main range of the Cordilleras, but lay 

 far to the eastward and, in many instances, extended even beyond the 

 lowest foothills of the mountains. It was clearly impossible, however 

 good the intentions of the respective commissions might be, to comply 

 with the conditions imposed upon them by a treaty founded on geo- 

 graphical conditions which in reality do not exist, for no line can be 

 drawn complying with the evident intentions and literal wording of the 

 treaty. But while the joint commissions did little toward tracing the 

 boundary line between their respective domains, they have done much 

 to increase our knowledge of the geography of the interior of central 

 Patagonia, which, prior to 1898, remained almost entirely unknown. 



The least frequented, and therefore least known, portion of Patagonia is 

 that between the Santa Cruz River on the south and the forty-sixth parallel 

 on the north, or approximately between the forty-sixth and fiftieth parallels 

 of south latitude. I visited this region in the summer of 1896 and 1897, 

 accompanied by Mr. O. A. Peterson. At that time, as already stated, neither 

 the Argentine nor the Chilian commission had entered it, the labors of both 

 having been confined to the more easily accessible districts to the north and 

 south. A glance at any of the current maps will demonstrate how little 

 indeed was then known of its interior. The few travellers who had pre- 

 viously visited it contented themselves with a journey up the Santa Cruz 

 River to the lakes about its source, or at most with a trip over the old 

 Indian trail leading from the mouth of the Santa Cruz River up the River 



