62 



The National Geographic Magazine 



$1,117,513,071 of imports, and by $1,- 

 743,864,500 exports in the year 1906 as 

 against $1,226,563,843 of imports. Our 

 first steps in tlie new field indeed are 

 somewhat clumsy and unskilled. In our 

 own vast country, with oceans on either 

 side, we have had too little contact with 

 foreign peoples readily to understand 

 their customs or learn their languages ; 

 yet no one can doubt that we shall learn 

 and shall understand and shall do our 

 business abroad as we have done it at 

 home with force and efficiency. 



A NEWIvY AWAKENED CONTINENT TO THE 

 SOUTH OE US 



Coincident with this change in the 

 United States the progress of political 

 development has been carrying the 

 neighboring continent of South America 

 out of the stage of militarism into the 

 stage of industrialism. Throughout the 

 greater part of that vast continent revolu- 

 tions have ceased to be looked upon with 

 favor or submitted to with indifference; 

 the revolutionary general and the dictator 

 are no longer the objects of admiration 

 and imitation ; civic virtues command the 

 highest respect; the people point with 

 satisfaction and pride to the stability of 

 their governments, to the safety of prop- 

 erty and the certainty of justice; nearly 

 everywhere the people are eager for for- 

 eign capital to develop their natural re- 

 sources and for foreign immigration to 

 occupy their vacant land. Immediately 

 before us, at exactly the right time, just 

 as we are ready for it, great opportu- 

 nities for peaceful commercial and indus- 

 trial expansion to the south are pre- 

 sented. 



Other investing nations are already in 

 the field — England, France, Germany, 

 Italy, Spain ; but the field is so vast, the 

 new demands are so great, the progress 

 so rapid, that what other nations have 

 done up to this time is but a slight ad- 

 vance in the race for the grand total. 

 The opportunities are so large that figures 

 fail to convey them. The area of this 

 newly awakened continent is 7,502,848 

 square miles, more than two and one-half 



times as large as the United States with- 

 out Alaska and more than double the 

 United States including Alaska. A large 

 part of this area lies within the temperate 

 zone, with an equable and invigorating 

 climate, free from extremes of either heal 

 or cold. Farther north in the tropics are 

 enormous expanses of high tablelands 

 stretching from the Atlantic to the foot- 

 hills of the Andes, and lifted far above the 

 tropical heats ; the fertile valleys of the 

 western Cordilleras are cooled by per- 

 petual snows even tinder the Equator; 

 vast forests grow untouched from a soil 

 of incredible richness. The plains of 

 Argentina, the great uplands of Brazil; 

 the mountain valleys of Chile, Peru, 

 Equador, Bolivia, and Colombia are 

 suited to the habitation of any race, how- 

 ever far to the north its origin may have 

 been ; hundreds of millions of men ran 

 find healthful homes and abundant sus- 

 tenance in this great territory. 



The population in 1900 was only 42,- 

 461,381, less than six to the square mile. 

 The density of population was less than 

 one-eighth of that in the State of Mis- 

 souri, less than one-sixtieth of that in the 

 State of Massachusetts, less than one- 

 seventieth of that in England, less than 

 one per cent of that in Belgium. 



With this sparse population the pro- 

 duction of wealth is already enormous. 

 The latest trade statistics show exports 

 from South America to foreign countries 

 of $745,530,000, and imports of $499!,- 

 858,600. Of the five hundred millions of 

 goods that South America buys we sell 

 them but $63,246,525, or 12.6 per cent. 

 Of the seven hundred and forty-five 

 millions that South America sells we buy 

 $152,092,000, or 20.4 per cent, nearly 

 two and a half times as much as we sell. 



Their production is increasing by leaps 

 and bounds. In eleven years the exports 

 of Chile have increased forty-five per 

 cent from $54,030,000, in 1894, to $78,- 

 840,000, in 1905. In eight years the ex- 

 ports of Peru have increased one hun- 

 dred per cent from $13,899,000, in 1897, 

 to $28,758,000, in 1905. In ten j'ears the 

 exports of Brazil have increased sixty-six 



