far interior of that country, from Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, western Brazil, Paraguay, northern Argentina, and Uruguay, through the Orinoco, the Amazon, the La Plata, and their tributaries.

AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTIONS.

The principal agricultural productions are sugar, cotton, tobacco, rice, cacao, maize, coffee, grapes, and all the vegetables and fruits suited to the climate and required for home consumption. Considerable wool is also produced, from sheep, the alpaca, llama, and the vicuña, the three latter being native animals. The forests furnish india-rubber gum, cinchona, medicinal plants, dyewoods, etc. The principal productions for export, however, are products of the mines, silver and copper, niter, and guano, both of which latter, however, are nearly exhausted. What the value of any of these productions is for any one year can not be stated, as it is unascertained or unpublished. The value of the shipments of much the larger part of the surplus is shown under the next following head, particularly in the table of commerce with Great Britain.

The production of sugar in the region about Lambayeque in 1887 was reported by the American consul to be over 176,000,000 pounds, which was about the usual production. There was exported from the port of that locality as follows, the shipments to Chile being principally for transshipment by steamer to England: To England direct, 26,345,622 pounds; to Chile, 29,827,928 pounds; or, in all, to England about 56,173,550 pounds; to the United States of Colombia, France, Germany, and Ecuador, 777,095 pounds; total, 56,950,645 pounds.

The total production of rice is estimated by the minister of agriculture at about 22,000,000 pounds, principally of the department of Lambayeque. Cotton is mostly the product of the department of Piura, and is wholly of long fiber. There is excellent cacao raised in the department of Cuzco, in the province of Convencion, but little is exported. Cultivation and production can be indefinitely extended east of the Andes, and among the mountains also, as can that of coffee, and eastern Peru is yet to be widely known in this respect. The value of the coffee exported, mostly to Chile, in 1876 was only $4,360. Maize is raised in sufficient quantity generally for home use. It is said to be superior to that of Chile, and includes several varieties. The department of Cuzco is the greatest producing region. Potatoes, though a native plant, are not extensively cultivated, yet thrive finely in many parts. A yellow variety has the preference for cultivation. Grape culture is less extensive than in Chile, but the products are of excellent quality. The annual yield of wine is about 2,640,000 gallons, and of brandy 793,000 gallons.

FOREIGN COMMERCE.

It is only by resort to the statistics of other countries that the character and amount of the foreign trade of Peru can be approximately shown. It can not be shown in all cases, as some countries, Germany,

for instance, do not give the value, but the weight, of articles of foreign trade. The most of the trade of Peru is with Great Britain, France, and the United States, which give values; with Germany, which gives weight only, and with Chile, which publishes no detailed statement. The following tables show, from annual statements, the character and value of the trade between Great Britain and Peru for certain recent years, and help to an idea of the value of Peru's surplus production in the showing of exports:

Articles and values of imports of Peru from Great Britain for the calendar years named. [Values in United States money.]

Articles and values of exports from Peru to Great Britain for the calendar years named.

While the foregoing tables show the character of Peruvian interna. tional commerce, they also show that Peru only derived, in 1890, $37,097 worth of goods in the nature of agricultural products from the country

with which its largest trade is; while the exports to that country, of a kind related to agriculture, aggregated $3,333,095, of which $2,006,195 was in raw sugar and the balance in animal products, as hides, furs, and wool. The table of imports shows a falling off from 1888, and that of exports a continual decrease for the two preceding annual periods. It is probable, however, that the exports of guano and nitrate of soda should be credited to Chilean trade account, at least in part, for 1886 and 1888, in which case the value of exports to Great Britain for the several years would appear to have been pretty constant.

The small amount which Peru spends annually upon foreign articles of agricultural derivation is better shown, as to variety and character, by its imports from the United States, as set forth in the following statement of trade for 1890. The agricultural products imported into Peru from this country in 1886 amounted to only $181,387 and in 1888 to $183,954, while in 1890 they rose to $400,393, as is shown in our Treasury reports. So far as can be ascertained there are practically no such imports into Peru from other countries than this and Great Britain, the small sum of their value being included, in other cases, under the designation of "all other countries." France imports only guano and nitrate of soda from Peru, and does not classify her exports to that country; and Germany gives, as in other cases, the weight of articles only.

Value of field products and other articles imported into the United States from Peru during the fiscal year ending June 30, 1890.

Value of farm and field products and other articles exported from the United States to Peru during the fiscal year ending June 30, 1890.

Relative to the amount of exportation of principal articles of agricul tural production of 1889, the Peruvian minister of agriculture made a report to Congress in 1890, which, tabulated, gives the following:

But in the same year there were imported similar productions as follows: Rice, 10,176,320 pounds; coffee, 56,430 pounds; potatoes, 440,000 pounds; forage, 114,400 pounds; and tobacco, 107,712 pounds; while the importation of wheat was 687,745 bushels of 60 pounds, and in 1888 it was in amounts and distribution as follows: From Chile, 526,950; United States, 307,243; Australia, 7,446; and Spain, 3,666; in all 845,305 bushels.

The following-named agricultural and related articles were made free of customs charges in March, 1889: Animals for breeding, tan bark, hops, lumber, pitch and tar, and seeds of all kinds. Flour pays a duty or 3 cents and wheat 1 cent per kilogram (about 2.2 pounds), lard 25 per cent ad valorem, canned meat 40 per cent, rice 25 per cent, wines 65 per cent, and animals not for breeding 10 per cent. Goods by way of the Amazon pay a uniform duty of only 7 per cent ad valorem.

The exports from the eastern part of Peru are all forest products, chiefly cinchona, rubber gum, and sarsaparilla. Rubber gum pays an export duty of 4 per cent ad valorem, while the Brazilian product pays 23 per cent.

MEANS OF COMMUNICATION.

Like the most of South America, Peru has few and poor roads, and transportation is mostly upon the backs of animals, except where railroads can be made available. The railway system has been more costly in Peru than elsewhere, because of the difficulties presented by the mountains, and as the system is fragmentary the cost of operation is also enhanced. But railway extension presents the only means of further developing the country from the western side and opening up the vast mineral riches of the mountain region, as well as stimulating agricultural production in the interior valleys.

The report of the Hon. F. C. C. Zegarra, delegate from Peru to the Pan-American Congress, shows that the country had in 1890 thirteen railroads in operation, the length of eleven of which is reported as aggregating 759.93 miles, the shortest of which has an extent of but 3.72 miles and the longest 229.92. There are numerous projected lines, principally for prolongation of those now in use into the interior. None of the roads connect with those of other countries, but it is intended that the one from Arequipa to Puno, the longest, shall be prolonged to

Desaguadero, and connect with the system of Bolivia when that is completed. Telegraphic lines connect the principal cities of the Republic and with other countries.

PUBLIC SCHOOLS.

The statement should not be omitted that Peru has a good school system, including the oldest college in the Americas,* the University of San Marcos, at Lima. Tuition in the common schools is free, and attendance compulsory. Official recommendations have been made that one or more schools of agriculture should be established, but the movement does not appear to gather impetus. In fact, with the railways and commercial revenues given over almost wholly to the bondholder, and the nitrate deposits absorbed by Chile, progress of any kind has little chance of being promoted with government aid.

CONCLUSION.

Such, in brief, is the aspect presented to the world, differing little for several generations, by one of the richest and in many ways most attractive countries of the American group. The natural resources of the Republic are not surpassed by any Spanish American state, and probably not equaled; and yet progress seems to be an exotic there, of uncertain endurance, and for the benefit of aliens. At present, agricul turally, Peru is only self-supporting, and for surplus gain it has much too long depended upon its mineral resources. Were these obliterated, leaving other natural conditions as they are, it is not too much to suppose that the nation would become rejuvenated. The statement of Mr. Theodore Child may be quoted, without full indorsement, as giving at least an honest opinion of a friendly critic:

Peru is not a new country, but an old and decrepit one, presenting many points of resemblance to modern Spain. Its history is more or less a repetition of that of Spain, and its regeneration presents similar difficulties. In Peru we find remnants of the past civilization of the Incas, whose irrigation works, now fallen to ruins, suggest comparison with the works of the Moors, which made fertile vast territories in Spain that are now as barren as the brown quebradas of the valley of the Rimac. The Peruvian nation is sluggish and inclined to linger in the old ruts, looking only to present and personal interests and not to the future collective welfare of the nation.

It should be remembered, however, that Peru has only lately come out of a war which proved unusually disastrous to her in the destruction of railways, plantations, buildings, both public and private, farm implements, machinery, stock, and personal property of all kinds, and which deprived the country of a part of its territory, and with that an inexhaustible source of ready revenue. Still, all that which can make Peru prosperons in civilization, and truly great, remains.

Encyclopædia Britannica. This claim is disputed in favor of the college of Córdoba, in the Argentine Republic, said to have been founded in 1610. San Marcos claims from Charles V in 1551.

19152-No. 2—11