302 AMAZONIA AND LA PLATA. 



general aspect, temperature and slight degree of salinity, and the term Araguay 

 (Araaquay) has been applied by the natives to the Pilcomayo properly so called. 



It is now generally admitted that thePilcomayoisuotinitspresent condition navi- 

 gable, and that it is consequently useless as a commercial highway between Bolivia 

 and Paraguay. But some engineers have suggested that it might be made avail- 

 able by canalisation. Such an idea is pronounced visionary by Bourgade, who 

 points out that it would involve an outlay only to be incurred in densely peopled 

 reo-ions, or on great international highways such as the Suez Canal. The cost 

 would be enormous, without any prospect; of adequate returns on the outlay. The 

 population is too scanty in both regions to hope for any great development of 

 traffic ; nor are the surrounding districts suitable for settlement, as they consist 

 for the most part of saline sandy wastes and marshy clays, unfit either for tillage, 

 stockbreeding, or the permanent residence of the white race. 



In its lower course below the Tibicuary, the Paraguay is joined on its right 

 bank by the Argentine Rio Bermejo, whose red current flows a long way side by 

 side without mingling with the whitish waters of the main stream. Beyond 

 the confluence the Paraguay develops two great bends, one of which washes cliffa 

 20 feet high, where till recently stood the formidable Paraguayan stronghold 

 of Humaita. A little farther on it joins the Parana through the Très Bocas, 

 three shifting channels of unequal volume. The tract, over 125 miles wide, 

 which stretched along both sides of the Parana about the confluence, and which 

 is still studded with shallow marsh waters, was certainly at one time the bed of 

 an inland sea, where the two great rivers converged. 



This basin had a double discharge through the Lower Parana and the 

 Uruguay southwards to the Plate estuary. After the disappearance of the in- 

 land sea, the rivers long continued to wander over the plains in search of a decided 

 channel. Even still certain marshy tracts in the lower part of the Paraguayan 

 Mesopotamia have the meindering aspect of rivers that have overflowed their 

 banks. 



Climate. 



The almost uninhabited northern part of Paraguay is traversed by the tropic 

 of Capricorn, so that the more settled southern districts lie entirely in the tem- 

 perate zone with its alternating seasons, as in West Europe. Nevertheless, the 

 natives scarcely recognise any contrasts except those of winter and summer. The 

 transition is sudden, and the spring season is all the less noticed that most of the 

 trees preserve their foliage throughout the winter. Drought far more than cold 

 causes them to shed tbeir leaves, and oranges, the characteristic fruit of the Para- 

 guay gardens, ripen in winter. 



The temperature ranges from torrid heats to the freezing point, and the grass 

 sparkles with hoar frost, esj^ecially in the southern savannas exposed to intense 

 nocturnal radiation. But these frosts do little harm except to the sugar-canes, 

 whose tissues are disturbed by the sudden thaw at sunrise. 



