TOPOGEAPHY OF AEGENTINA. 425 



some Germans from the banks of the Volga. The woods and pastures remain 

 undivided, and each family draws lots for its share of the land to be tilled in 

 common. The first Russo-German colony founded near Diamante, south of 

 Parana, has sent forth numerous branches numbering altogether about 10,000 

 settlers along the banks of the river. Excellent growers of wheat and horse- 

 breeders, these emigrants from the Volga continue to prosper, and every year 

 purchase new lands for the development of their commercial system, which is 

 administered by a general assembly of all the heads of families, the women 

 included. The Argentine Government having attempted to introduce the same 

 organisation as in the other colonies, the sturdy peasants revolted, and since 

 then they have been left to administer themselves after their own fashion. In 

 the same region of Entre-liios some positivists and disciples of Count Tolstoi have 

 also established themselves in " harmonic societies." 



TowjNs of the Province of Saxta Fe — Esperanza. 



In clear weather the towers and domes of Saida Fé may be seen from the 

 heights of Parana glittering in the setting sun some 12 miles away. This city, 

 founded by Juan de Garay in 1573, and chosen by the Jesuits as tLe centre of 

 the Missions amongst the Mocovi and other Chaco Indians, stands not on the Parana 

 itself, but on a side branch, the Riacho de Santa Fé or Coronda, which broadens 

 out into a lagoon, and is here joined by the Rio Salado. The port, approached 

 through a labyrinth of channels, is accessible to craft drawing 6 or 7 feet ; but 

 most of the truffic is done on a railway 7 miles long, which connects Santa Fé 

 with the riverside port of Coladiné, with a depth of from 24 to 26 feet even at 

 low water. 



A city of churches and convents, a venerable metropolis where Congress met 

 occasionally to deliberate on the common interests of the Republic, Santa Fé was 

 long abandoned by commerce, and even declined in population, until its prosperity 

 was revived by the opening of the railways and the arrival of foreign settlers, 

 who have brought the surrounding lands under cultivation. 



These settlers, who have enriched Santa Fé, are grouped round Fsperanza, 

 " Hopetown," founded in 1856 on the plains 18 miles north-west of Santa-Fé. 

 The " hopes " of the founders have been realised. The two hundred Swiss fami- 

 lies who arrived before a single cabin had been erected for their reception, have 

 been followed by thousands and thousands of other families, French, Germans, but 

 especially Italians. Towns, villages, steam factories, workshops of all kinds have 

 sprung up in the pampa, where the railways have ramified in every direction. 

 The pleasant little town of Esperanza, with its rows of paraisos, "paradise trees" 

 {melia azedaracli) lining all the thoroughfares, bears on its town hall the inscrip- 

 tion in Spanish, " Subdivision of Property." To this subdivision of the land into 

 small and average holdings the district assuredly owes its prosperity, yielding 

 crops a hundredfold more abundant than those obtained from far more fertile 



