THE PORTUGUESE FORTS 235 



Spanish colonization, however, did not succeed in 

 making permanent settlements on the Chaco. The 

 Indians, who were masters of it, disputed their 

 passage, and the only practicable route was the 

 southernmost of the roads to the tableland, south of 

 the Rio Salado, which ends at the estuary. From 

 this time onward the prosperity of Buenos Aires 

 eclipsed that of Asuncion. The river ceased to be a 

 great continental route. 



The division of the Parana between the Spanish 

 and the Portuguese was a check upon the full develop- 

 ment of the river-route. The Portuguese held the 

 upper part of its basin, which now belongs to Brazil. 

 They expelled the Spanish missionaries from the upper 

 Parana about the middle of the seventeenth century, 

 and made themselves masters of the Paraguay north 

 of 20 S. lat. Their forts at Coimbre and Albuquerque 

 prevented any from ascending. D'Azara insists that 

 it would have been Spain's interest to disarm these 

 forts ; it would have enabled them to go up the river 

 as far as the Spanish missions to the Mojos and the 

 Chiquitos. On their side, the Portuguese only used 

 the upper section of the river, where it is joined by 

 the Paulist road north of the Coimbre, as a means of 

 access to the gold mines of the Matto Grosso. Even 

 now, although the Parana is open to every flag, the 

 development of the river-route is not independent of 

 political conditions. In making the railway from 

 Saint Paul to Corumba, and so creating on its own 

 territory a means of direct communication with the 

 upper Paraguay, Brazil diverts from the lower dis- 

 tricts part of the traffic which ought normally to go 

 there. Again, the ports of southern Brazil and the 

 lines which go to them try to attract to the Atlantic 

 the produce of the basins of the Uruguay and the 

 upper Parana, which would have followed the thread 

 of the river to foster the trade of Buenos Aires if the 

 frontiers had been fixed otherwise. 



