MATERIAL CONDITION OF ARGENTINA. 463 



While increasing the population as a whale, the new arrivals cause an 

 apparent relative lowering of the birth-rate, owing to the excess of male over 

 female immigrants. In Buenos Ayres, Santa Fé, and Entre-E,ios the disparity- 

 is as much as 20 per cent. But the Italian element, at present by far the largest 

 in the general movement, is also the most prolific. In the Argentine regions the 

 birth-rate is stated to rise to 60 per 1,000 in Italian families, compared with 40 

 per 1,000 in French, and still less in native households. In some years the 

 mortality would even appear to exceed the births in Argentine families residing 

 in Buenos Ayres. The native element would thus seem to have already lost some- 

 what of its vital force, so that the growth of the nation would be arrested were 

 the race not constantly renewed by a strain of foreign blood. The phenomenon is 

 somewhat analogous to that which has been observed in New England and the other 

 parts of the United States that were the first to be colonised. In the Argentine 

 Republic, as well as in Paraguay, more females than males are said to be born in 

 the Creole families. 



Next to the Italians, who form one-third of the new arrivals, follow the 

 Spaniards, French, English, Swiss, and Germans (amongst whom many Slavs from 

 the eastern provinces) in the order named, and since 1891 over 6,000 Jews from 

 Russia, Austria, and Palestine. Most of the immigrants being of Romance (Neo- 

 Latin) speech, the adoption of the Spanish language presents no difficulty. It 

 also appears that over nine-tenths are Catholics by birth, and that about one-third 

 can neither read nor write. 



Naturally the great majority remain at or near the ports of arrival, such as 

 Buenos Ayres, Rosario, Santa Fé. But throughout nearly the whole of the Republic 

 Europeans find a suitable climate, and need to avoid only the marshy, malarious, 

 or goitrous districts. Tetanus causes many deaths, and ring- worm is also common, 

 owing to the habit of eating raw or half-cooked meat. Leprosy carries off a few 

 victims, and Buenos Ayres has been visited by yellow fever, introduced from 

 Brazil ; but this scourge has not made its appearance in recent years, thanks to 

 the improved quarantine and sanitary regulations. Small-pox and consumption 

 also carry off many victims ; but some of the remote, thinly-settled regions are 

 remarkably free from maladies of any kind, and there is a local saying, probably 

 not to be matched in the whole world, that, " Once in a hundred years a man 

 dies in Patagonia." It has, however, been suggested that the proverb may owe 

 its origin to the fact most people in Patagonia meet with some violent end.* 



Stock-Breeding. 



Agriculture, properly so called, is of recent origin in Argentina. Where 

 cattle roamed the pampas in thousands and millions, the scanty groups of popula- 

 tion had little need to dig and delve, the less so that they lived almost exclusively 

 , on a flesh diet. An ox was slaughtered for the sake of the tongue, and no trouble 

 was taken even to save the hide ; the carcass was at most used as fuel in the 



* W. H. Hudson, op. cit., p. 126. 



