AMERICAN LUMBER IN FOREIGN MARKETS. 39 



enacted a law prohibiting the cutting of timber on the public lands 

 except by special permission which had to be paid for, and then the 

 work was required to be done under special conditions. Though the 

 timber thieves still get in their work in the remote places, there is now 

 more system and somewhat more care displayed in getting out lumber. 



NATIVE ESTIMATE OF ARGENTINE WOODS. 



As showing the estimate which the more intelligent portion of the 

 Argentine people place upon their forest riches, I translate the follow- 

 ing from a recent issue of the Buenos Ayres Nacion : 



Our national forests present a superabundant element of riches; and, if wise laws 

 are made to protect their production, in a few years the Republic will be able to get 

 along without importing foreign lumber and be prepared even to export all kinds 

 which are suitable for city or rural constructions or as auxiliary to other important 

 industries. Among the five hundred varieties which have been catalogued there are 

 many woods of great value; and there is no object or use or necessity or industrial 

 purpose which can not be supplied by some of the classes of these woods. At pres- 

 ent, however, it must be confessed that these great forest riches are but slightly 

 appreciated by the majority of our people. What a wonderful source of wealth 

 they would be if they were the possession of some more enterprising nation ! The 

 greater part is of spontaneous growth and owes nothing to the hand of man, which 

 from time immemorial has, on the contrary, done all it could to destroy what nature 

 has provided for the country. 



Science, reason, and common intelligence condemn the manner in which the for- 

 ests of the nation have been exploited. Without entering into details, it is suffi- 

 cient to say that the damage and destruction under the present system are greater 

 to' the country than the profits. Everybody sees the manner in which, despite the 

 law on the subject, the natural forests are being ruined, but how few apply the rem- 

 edy against the devastation which is going on. 



THE SAWMILLS AND SAWYERS OF THE COUNTRY. 



The number of sawmills in the country are now numbered by thou- 

 sands, and they are quite generally distributed, not only along the 

 shores of the upper rivers, but in the interior provinces. On this sub- 

 ject I translate from a recent number of the Buenos Ayres Prensa the 

 following : 



There is one industry in the Republic which at least can count on an extraordi- 

 nary number of establishments of every magnitude, from the least with a single mule 

 power (movido porla perezosa mula) to those of the largest dimensions, stocked with 

 the very best machinery which the world affords. We refer to the sawmills of the 

 country. There is no province or territory, whether in the north or the south, which 

 does not count on a large number. It may be stated as a fact that the woods of the 

 country furnish labor for a larger number of artizans and laborers than that of any 

 other industry. In the Province of Santiago del Estero, no less than 5,000 workmen 

 are employed in no less than 200 different establishments, most of them in the Sierras, 

 getting out quebracho sleepers for railways, white quebracho beams for constructions, 

 woods of other descriptions for cabinet work, and joists and scantlings and boards 

 of other timbers, besides the large amount of fuel for the numerous railways of that 

 vicinity. In the Province of Tucuman there is even a larger number of lumbermen 

 and a larger number of establishments. In the Province of Cordova the working up 

 of the algorroba forests sustains a still greater number of sawmills and employes, 



