238 



THE RIVER-ROUTES 



In 1841 Rosas forbade navigation on the river. 

 There was then a double blockade checking the trade 

 of Argentina. The Franco-British fleet closed the 

 Rio de la Plata and blockaded Buenos Aires, where 

 the Government of Rosas was established. In addi- 

 tion, Rosas's troops on the barranca of the right bank 

 prevented any from going up the Parana, and cut off 

 the interior provinces from the rest of the world. The 

 injury then done to interests which were already 

 fully self-conscious may be gathered from the agita- 

 tion provoked by the decision of France and England in 

 1845 to break ttie blockade of the river. A convoy was 

 at once organized at Montevideo, consisting of no less 

 than ninety-eight ships, of 6,900 tons in all (MacKann). 

 It went up the Parana under the protection of war- 

 ships, which removed the chains shmg across it by 

 Rosas. The convoy dispersed up river as soon as 

 it was out of range of Rosas. But it had needed so 

 great an effort that the attempt could not be made 

 again before the fall of Rosas. 



The closing of the Parana compelled a diversion of 

 the trade of Paraguay toward the south-east. It 

 crossed the isthmus of Misiones, between the Parana 

 and the Uruguay, and passed down the Uruguay. At 

 this time the whole commercial activity of Paraguay 

 was concentrated at Itapua, on the upper Parana. 

 The prosperity of the Uruguay was some compensa- 

 tion for the misery that reigned on the Parana. The 

 populations of Paysandu and Montevideo greatly 

 increased. 



In 1852, at the fall of Rosas, the modern period 

 began for the Parana. The river-population changed 

 rapidly. It ceased to be exclusively creole. Basques, 

 and later Italians, had settled upon the Uruguay ten 

 years before, and they now spread along the Parana. 

 In 1850 MacKann found fifty vessels, of 20 to 100 

 tons, belonging to Italians at Santa Fe. This wave 

 of immigration coincided with the development of 



