298 NOTES OF A NATURALIST. 



all the information that I collected, to form a high 

 estimate of the advantages that it offers to European 

 settlers. At the present time the chief source of profit 

 is from the rearing of cattle ; but, though long neg- 

 lected, agriculture promises to become the most 

 important element of national prosperity. Until the 

 middle of this century there were none but wooden 

 ploughs of the type used by the aborigines, and corn 

 was imported from abroad to feed the townspeople. 

 There are now numerous agricultural colonies formed 

 by foreign settlers, especially in the state of Santa 

 Fe, and the results have been eminently successful. 

 Large crops of grain, especially wheat, of excellent 

 quality, are easily raised. The vine prospers, even as 

 far south as Bahia Blanca, and in the northern states 

 cotton, olives, tobacco, and other subtropical products 

 appear to thrive. These agricultural colonies have 

 been chiefly formed by Italian, Swiss, and German 

 immigrants, and one of the most recent, composed of 

 Welshmen, has been established so far south as the 

 river Chubat in Patagonia. It may be feared that, 

 owing to the deficient rainfall of that region, the 

 prospects of the settlement are somewhat uncertain. 



The Argentine Government has shown its wisdom 

 in promoting immigration by the extraordinary 

 liberality of the terms offered to agricultural settlers 

 from Europe. With a territory as large as the whole 

 of continental Europe, exclusive of Russia, and a 

 population of scarcely two millions, immigration is the 

 indispensable requisite for the development of re- 

 sources that must render this one of the most im- 

 portant nations of the earth. The law, which, as I 



