58 AMERICAN LUMBER IN FOREIGN MARKETS. 



magnificent variety of the family of Legiiminosce, having no thorns and producing 

 an excellent wood for various purposes. Specific gravity, 0.766. 



The mora, a very large tree, with heavy yellow wood, which grains beautifully, 

 and on being worked takes the color of the richest mahogany, and is greatly used 

 for the manufacture of the best furniture. The tree produces an edible fruit. 

 Specific gravity, 0.935 to 1.090. 



The quebracho Colorado (Loxopterygium lorentzii). Quite a different tree from the 

 Q. bianco found elsewhere. It is very abundant throughout the northern portions 

 of the Argentine Republic. The wood is a deep red, and remarkable for its extreme 

 hardness and weight. It is almost indestructible. Since the discovery of the 

 country it has never been found rotten or decayed, no matter in what position, in 

 air, earth, or water, it might be placed. It forms a most important article of com- 

 merce, and, owing to the immense size to which it grows, upwards of 200 feet with 

 10 feet of diameter, is used for ship-timber, beams, spiles, joists, bridges, etc., and 

 makes most enduring railway sleepers and ties. It also takes an exceedingly fine 

 finish, and is greatly iu demand in carpentry work for doors, window-frames, cabi- 

 nets, etc., the luster being equal to that of rosewood. In wood engraving it takes 

 the place of boxwood. Specific gravity, 1.234 to 1.392. 



There are nvmy other valuable trees of the largest size found in this part of the 

 country, among them the qnina-quina, which produces an aromatic resin, and whose 

 bark is used as a fever antidote and tonic; the cascaion, with a red and lustrous 

 bark; the palo mortero, very similar to the tipa already described; the pacay, the 

 sinquillo, the may ana itara, and others not yet classified, all of which furnish most 

 valuable timber, each one with some certain quality for certain uses, such as 

 building, turning, furniture, cabinet-work, etc., but I have no descriptions of them. 

 In the subtropical forests, which we are considering, there are also numerous smaller 

 trees, nearly all of them hard wood, bearing a rich 'foliage and exceedingly 

 ornamental; also a great variety of arborets, bushes, climbing plants, etc., many of 

 them exquisite coloring in their leaves and flowers, but it hardly comes within the 

 object of this sketch to mention them. 



In the mountains of the Andes, beyond the chain of the Aconquija, and on the 

 plopes of the Cordilleras proper, is found in extensive forests the pine tree (Podicar- 

 sus auguftifolia). It is of medium height and of compact crown, but it is not simi- 

 lar to the European pine. The inhabitants utilize the timber, but there is no demand 

 for it, on account of its inaccessibility to the market, and it is at present of but 

 little importance in the economy of the country. 



TIMBER RESOURCES OF THE GRAN CHACO. 



Along the eastern borders of the subtropical regions whose forests I have been 

 describing, lies an immense territory, in some parts reported to be arid and waste 

 for want of water, but in others filled with a succession of rivers, and in time des- 

 tined to be one of the most valuable portions of the Argentine Republic. It is 

 called the "Gran Chaco." It extends from the Parana" to Bolivia, and is separated 

 on the east from Paraguay by the river of the same name. The last Argentine cen- 

 sus gave it a superficial area of 621,000 square kilometers, but as its limits have not 

 yet been fixed with the neighboring provinces, its real area can not yet be determined. 

 It is divided by the river Vermejo into two almost equal parts, one called the "Cham 

 Austral" and the other " Chaco Boreal," the last extending to latitude 20 south, 

 and hounded on the north by the Bolivian province of Chiquitos. The "Chaco 

 Horeal " is composed of an uninterrupted plain elevated about 400 feet above the 

 level of the sea, with a heavy soil of humus, and is divided into the most beautiful 

 forests with intervening meadows as if made on purpose for the raising of cattle. 

 The Austral or Southern Chaco lies between the Vermejo on the north, the Parana on 

 the east, and the province of Santa Fe" on the south. It is also completely level and 

 U richly endowed by nature, not only with a deep soil but with most magnificent 





