454 



The National Geographic Magazine 



falls naturally into three great latitu- 

 dinal divisions, each possessing marked 

 characteristics of conformation and in- 

 dividuality of vegetation. The division 

 of greatest importance and area is that 

 bearing the name of the "Pampas" and 

 occupying the central section of the 

 Republic. From an elevation of about 

 2,000 feet in the foot-hills of the Andes 

 the pampas sweep eastward to sea-level 

 at the Atlantic. For the greater part 

 they are treeless and covered with a 

 growth of coarse grass which improves 

 rapidly under grazing. The soil in 

 most sections is rich alluvium, often 

 from three to six feet in thickness, 

 formed by decaying vegetation. This 

 soil rests upon sedimentary deposits of 

 earth scoured from the Andes and ad- 

 jacent highlands. On these great pam- 

 pas, or prairies, are pastured the ma- 

 jority of the cattle and sheep for which 

 the Argentine Republic is famous, 

 while districts under cultivation now 

 produce more than half of the corn 

 raised in the Republic. 



The second division, which occupies 

 the northern third of the Republic, 

 passes under the general title of the 

 river basin of the Parana. Here im- 

 mense tracts of country, similar to the 

 southern pampas, are devoted to the 

 raising of wheat and the pasturage of 

 cattle, while the fertile banks of the 

 Parana and the Paraguay rivers are the 

 scene of extensive agricultural coloni- 

 zation. Still farther north lie the sugar 

 lands and the sections rich in timber. 

 The soil of the river-basin country is 

 sedimentary deposit of unusual breadth 

 and depth, for the rivers have so fre- 

 quently shifted their course that the 

 deposit covers an area of 750 miles 

 long and 400 miles wide, ranging from 

 30 to 100 feet in depth. 



The third natural division of the 

 country comprises the Patagonian 

 plains, which form the southern portion 

 of the Republic. These great plains of 

 gravel and sand once formed a bed of 

 an ocean which rolled against the An- 

 des ; they require irrigation to become 



productive. A number of small valleys 

 of extreme fertility exist, however, in 

 this division. Four salt lakes situated 

 in this section are of commercial value. 

 While the country justifies the general 

 description of a country of great plains, 

 within its limits are to be found the high- 

 est mountains in the Southern Hemi- 

 sphere, conspicuous among them being 

 the giant uplifts of Aconcagua, 22,860 

 feet, the highest point in America. 



IvA PLATA — THE SECOND RIVER SYSTEM OE 

 THE WORLD 



The second largest river system in 

 the world finds its way to the sea near 

 Buenos Aires, capital of the Argentine 

 Republic, bringing to that port com- 

 mercial tribute from 10,000 miles of 

 inland waterways — rivers which, ulti- 

 mately consolidating in La Plata, dis- 

 charge into the Atlantic a volume of 

 water 84 per cent greater than that dis- 

 charged into the Gulf of Mexico by the 

 Mississippi River. This vast river sys- 

 tem is almost wholly the gift of neigh- 

 boring states, the volume of water in 

 the greatest river of the system being 

 as large where it enters Argentine ter- 

 ritory, 825 miles inland, as at the river 

 mouth, loss by evaporation equaling 

 gain from intervening streams. The 

 circumstance that these rivers are full- 

 grown when they first cross the bound- 

 ary line of the Republic — due to the 

 equatorial drainage area having an 

 annual rainfall of 60 inches — renders 

 them of large commercial value. On 

 the Parana, for example, vessels draw- 

 ing 21 feet can reach the port of Ro- 

 sario, 230 miles from Buenos Aires ; ves- 

 sels drawing 19 feet, Santa Fe, 350 

 miles; those drawing 15 feet, Corrien- 

 tes, 850 miles, while craft drawing 8 

 feet navigate affluents of the Parana to 

 points in Brazil distant over 2,000 

 miles from Buenos Aires. 



BUENOS aires 



Buenos Aires, capital of the Argen- 

 tine Republic, with a population on 

 September 30, 1902, of 861,513 and an 



