A REGATTA NEAR BUENOS AIRES.A REGATTA NEAR BUENOS AIRES.
There was another young fellow, somewhat more spry than the example I have given. I met him in the street one morning, and he was furious. He had been in the running for the secretaryship of an English company that had some big contracts in Argentina, and he had been ruled out at last because he did not speak Spanish. That was his grievance. He knew he could mess along somehow, and could always get somebody to explain if he had to talk business with an Argentine who did not speak English; so what was the good of having to swat to learn the lingo?
One of the biggest financiers in Argentina told me one day that whilst plenty of young Englishmen made their way—indeed, if competent, they were preferred to other foreigners—he was astonished at the way others missed their opportunities. My friend, an Englishman himself, but who has lived all his life in the country, and speaks Spanish more fluently than he does English, has his finger in many concerns. Young men who have come out to posts, and are not making the progress they hoped, go to him to see if he can give them a helping hand.
"Delighted," he says; "I want to help my own countrymen as much as possible. How long have you been in 'B.A.'?"
"Eight years."
"Then you speak Spanish like an Argentine, eh?"
"Well—er—no; but I've picked up enough to scrape along on."
"Could you take charge of a hundred Argentines and talk business to them as well as an Argentine?"
"No; I wouldn't like to say that."
"Could you write a technical business letter in Spanish?"
"I'm afraid not."
"Good day, my young friend. I should have been glad to have helped you, but I want a man who would not be sure to make mistakes."
There is a number of that pattern of Englishman in Buenos Aires. There are excuses for them. They go out under a three- or a five-years' contract to some post. A lad is a stranger in a strange land, and has yet to pick up Spanish. He naturally consorts with his own countrymen. They dine together; they meet in the same café; they belong to the same club; they seek their pleasures together. It is very hard for a fellow under such circumstances to become quick with the language, or extend his knowledge to any great extent as to the Argentine way of doing things. He can get all his requirements with a sort of pidgin-Spanish. So at last he does not bother. That is the kind of man who sticks in the same position all his life, and occasionally rails at his luck in not getting a big post.
That is one side of the picture. There is the other. I have in my mind a man who holds a high position in Argentina. When he went out twenty years ago he saw that the first essential was to know the language. At the risk of being thought unsociable, he lived with Spanish Argentines for twoyears, and made friends with young Argentines rather than with Englishmen. He made it a habit to read the Buenos Aires Spanish morning papers. He has gone ahead and done exceedingly well, although I would not describe him as a brilliant business man. Then there was a youth with whom I made acquaintance on the boat. I noticed he was spending a good deal of his time with a Spanish grammar. He told me he was going out under a five-years' contract to be a clerk in one of the banks. "But I am not going to stop a bank clerk," he confided to me, "though that will be all right for five years. By then I hope to have got a good grip of the language and picked up something about Argentina, and if then I'm not able to go to some boss and get one of the good jobs, well, it will be my own fault." With that spirit he would be a success. All over the country I was meeting Englishmen of that standard, and, because they can be relied upon, they are esteemed and trusted.
But I am not going to sing the praises of Argentina from a British immigrant's point of view. First of all, take the case of the unskilled labourer, the artisan, and the agriculturist. There is no man so conservative in this world as the British working man. He has an inherent contempt for all foreigners when he gets close to them, chiefly because their ways are not his ways. So the working man who went out to Argentina would be handicapped by not knowing the language; he would be confused with the money; he would dislike the food; theway in which the working class lives out there would disgust him. At the other end of the string is the great capitalist. Capital knows no language, and owes allegiance to no country. The capitalist with shrewdness, intelligent anticipation, can make money quickly; in no country can a man get so quick a turnover of his capital as in this Republic.
Between these two classes is an army of men who go into the railway service, into the offices of great English firms, into banks. They get better paid in Argentina, but living is three times as heavy as at home. Take the case of a young friend of mine. He had a situation in England at £200, and, with his amusements, he had but little left over. He got a situation in Argentina at £700 a year. Living, more or less in similar style to the way he did at home, cost him £400 a year. But he had £300 a year over, and that was not £300 a year in Argentine value, but £300 a year in English value, because he was investing it for the time when he would return to his native land.
Of course there are promotions and superior posts to be obtained. Occasionally a man will break away and get hold of something which will lead to fortune. These cases, however, are the exceptions. The great fortunes do not grow out of business, as they do in the United States, for up to the present Argentina is not to be reckoned with as a manufacturing country. They come to men who have colossal finance to manipulate. To the great financier Argentina can give untold wealth. There are, of course, cases of men who started with nothing, and can now give their wives a £20,000 necklace. But to the man who lands in Argentina with nothing but his muscle, or a salaried job, although his position will be improved, and he can save more than ever he made in the Old Country, the chances are against his ever joining the ranks of the nabobs.
A FINE ARGENTINE BRIDGE.A FINE ARGENTINE BRIDGE.
The constant wonder to me, as I traversed the fruitful prairies, was why Nature had not supplied the country with indigenous live stock.
One would have thought that the forces of evolution would have provided animals to benefit and multiply. Man, of course, has done much to improve the land. By the laying down of alfalfa he has turned sandy regions into rich pasturage. By irrigation he has converted wastes into prosperous stretches. Still, there were thousands of square miles, capable of maintaining great herds, for ages before the coming of the Europeans. But Nature was niggardly in raising animals which the adventures of man subsequently proved suitable to the soil.
The principal original animals were the alpaca, which provided meat and wool, and the llama, used as a beast of burden by the natives, though the loads it could carry were slight. Spain, when she took possession of the country, saw its disadvantages. Though the Spanish Court was prodigal in giving tracts of the new land to grandees and others, it is significant that in practically all the concessions was the provision that the grant failed unless horses,cattle, sheep, and goats were introduced. They were for purely domestic uses.
A couple of centuries ago a bull and ten cows were abandoned. What became of them troubled no one. Long afterwards their descendants were found grazing, and they had increased to many thousand; now they have increased to many millions. They were sturdy cattle, but too numerous for the then exceedingly sparse population. Their hides, however, were profitable for sending to Europe; and many thousands of beasts were slain, and their carcases left to rot, in order that their skins might be sent across the seas. In 1794 merino sheep were imported from Spain. In 1824 Southdowns were imported from England. They made an excellent cross, and that was the start Argentina got in the growing of wool.
There was no discovery that this part of South America was peculiarly suitable for European stock. There was just a slow but increasing consciousness of the fact that European animals were easily acclimatised, and had a greater breeding capacity than at home. The first European cattle did not come direct, but dribbled in by way of Brazil from Peru—a roundabout route. Indeed, for several centuries Spain, which was mistress of that part of the world, rigorously excluded all other countries from assisting in its development or having any share in its trade. Further, Peru, which was the most important of the Spanish settlements, had sufficient power at the Court of Spain to secure an insistence that allgoods entering South America should do so by the door of Peru. You have only to glance at a map to see how absurd it was that articles intended for Buenos Aires or the east coast had to be shipped to the Isthmus of Panama, taken across to the Pacific side by mule caravan, shipped again down the coast to Peru, and then sent thousands of miles over mountains, through jungle and across uninhabited plains, to their destination. This intolerable condition of things, which Spain refused to change, had much to do with Argentina's casting off the yoke, in the beginning of the nineteenth century, and declaring itself as a republic.
Though one hears much about the way Argentina has gone ahead as a cattle-raising country during the last decade, one must not lose sight of the fact that the Spaniards have been rearing cattle there for over three hundred years. Even when the possibilities began to be realised there were no means of land transport except by driving the beasts, and, except for the hides and tallow and subsequently the wool, there was little that could be sent to Europe.
In the first half of the nineteenth century, however, Argentina was beginning to find herself. The Argentines were not content with the quality of the animals which were bred haphazard. They took to importing better strains from Europe, grasped what pedigree meant, began to demand the best the world could produce, and were willing to pay for it, until the call of Argentina for pedigree stock has almostbecome a mania, and other countries have little chance when Argentina enters the market with her bags of gold.
Not only was there a wonderful increase in cattle and sheep, but horses multiplied. The Spanish contempt for females extends to mares, and no self-respecting Argentine, who was not seeking the sneers of his countrymen, would think of riding a mare. A hundred years ago European nations had not thought of purchasing South American mares; and it has been computed that in the first quarter of the last century over 500,000 mares were mercilessly slaughtered in Argentina. It has been said that an enormous number of wild horses were at large, and their continued incursions amongst the general stock caused great loss to the breeders.
But that Argentina is one of the most productive lands in the world for horses is undoubted. They seem to have something approaching the fertility of the Australian rabbit. Historians disagree as to whether the first importation of horses to Argentina in the sixteenth century were seventy-two horses and mares, or forty-four horses and mares, or seven horses and five mares. Anyway, whilst Ruy Diaz de Guzman, who vouched for the latter figures, wrote they had "attained such a multiplication in less than sixty years that they cannot be counted, because the horses and mares are so many that they appear like great woods and occupy (the country) from Cape Blanco to the fort of Gabato, rather more than eighty leagues, and reach inland to theCordillera," the monk Fray Juan de Rivadancira, who declared for forty-four horses and mares, states that "the coast is inhabited by a great many people, and there is an immense number of horses that remained there from the time of Don Pedro de Mendoza, that is forty-five years ago, forty-four horses and mares that have multiplied themselves, but, strange to say, in all this time they have not been seen by the Spaniards, who only know of them from the reports of the Indians, who say that they cover the plains to an astonishing extent." Allowing for these tales being exaggerated, the very fact they should be recorded some fifty years or so after the first importation of horses shows there must have been an astonishing increase.
Argentine breeders of cattle, knowing of the care taken in Europe to improve quality, realised that quantity was not sufficient. There would be little merit in having millions of animals on the rich grassed plains if commercially they were unable to compete with other countries with their produce. So between fifty and sixty years ago they began methodically and scientifically to improve their herds. The result was so satisfactory that owners of herds conceived it to be their patriotic duty—and Argentina is noisily patriotic—to raise the standard of quality. The Argentine Agricultural Society was established. It has increased in size and importance. Its offices at Buenos Aires have the marks of energetic distinction, whilst its permanent show grounds in the suburbs of the city are the finest buildings for such a purpose in the world. I will not say, as is often said, that the display is the finest in the world. Now and then it tops any other show in a particular class. But it is a great show, provided by a country with only seven million inhabitants; and, speaking generally, it is not a bad second to any other, no matter where it is held.
BREAKING-IN HORSES IN THE ARGENTINE.Photograph by Moody, Buenos Aires.BREAKING-IN HORSES IN THE ARGENTINE.
There is tremendous rivalry amongst breeders, and the ambition to secure the blue ribbons is so great that the Argentines, as I have mentioned in a previous chapter, will not trust people of their own race to act as judges. The judges all come from Britain, and are men of recognised competence and integrity. They are the guests of the Society. They are provided with first class return tickets, are entertained at the best hotel for three weeks, have many courtesies piled on them, and each receives £30 as out-of-pocket expenses. So keen are some Argentine breeders to gain the coveted ribbon that I have heard of their sending special representatives to travel on the boat from Southampton to Buenos Aires so that an amiable judge may be "nobbled." Fortunately, British judges are not made that way; and although stories of attempts are common, there is no recorded instance of success.
I was present at the official opening of the show in 1913 by the Minister of Agriculture. It was not an enthusiastic occasion. The weather was bad and cold, and there was the reading of two interminable speeches from manuscript—read to about a score of top-hatted and frock-coated gentlemen standinground, looking insufferably bored and never raising the equivalent of a single "hear, hear," whilst the crowds in the stands heard not a word but waited patiently for the parade of prize winners to begin.
But it was a show of cattle of which Argentina had a right to be proud. It was another post along the road of evolution. The time is yet far off when Argentina can rightly claim first position amongst the live-stock nations; but it is a goal which the Argentines steadily keep in sight. Stud farms are to be found all over the country. Prices which formerly would have been thought reckless are now willingly paid for stallions, bulls, and rams. Yet, though the Argentine is pleased with himself, he does not so much boast of what he has accomplished as rhapsodise about the future. To-day (1914) there are 8,000,000 horses in the country, 30,000,000 cattle, and over 80,000,000 sheep. Yet only a portion of the country suitable for stock is utilised. Everything indicates that within the next ten years 200,000,000 animals of all classes will be grazing on the pastures of Argentina.
The love of horse-racing is bred in the bone of every man in the country. All the big towns have their race-courses. Out on the prairies, if there is no race-course, the men at theestanciasmark out a track and race against each other's horses on Sunday afternoons. An eye is kept on the famous European race-horses, and as much as £40,000 has been paid for a great winner, so that he may beused for stud purposes. The breeding of thoroughbreds has become part of the national life of the Republic. The Jockey Club at Buenos Aires, possessed of an enormous income, has by the offering of handsome prizes encouraged the breeding of race-horses. The Argentine stud farms are, in excellence of stabling and general surroundings, lavish in luxury. So successful has been the breeding from expensive European sires that European breeders are now looking to Argentina to purchase some of the sons.
But always, one must remember, the prosperity of Argentina rests with her commercial cattle. As England prohibits the landing of live cattle for fear of foot-and-mouth disease, increasing attention has been given to the business of exporting chilled and frozen meat. The closing of British ports and consequent slump in Argentine cattle gave a colossal impetus to the frozen meat industry, so that at the present time the Republic is the greatest exporter of frozen meat in the world. That, perhaps, is the reward for Argentina's being the first country to export chilled and frozen meat to Europe. This was as far back as 1877, though it was not until 1885 that the first freezing works were established. To-day something like £11,000,000, mostly English and United States capital, is sunk in Argentine freezing houses. England is the largest consumer. But though the quantity imported is enormous, it is a mistake to suppose that frozen meat is yet ahead of English home-killed meat. As a nationwe are increasing meat eaters. We are now consuming something approaching two million quarters a year. Only about a third of this is chilled and frozen meat, and the consumption of home meat is increasing, not decreasing.
That there is foot-and-mouth disease in Argentina is undoubted. Though the Argentines protest we continue the cry as an excuse for keeping out their stock from our meadows and from competing with our own fresh meat, I was quite convinced that the disease does seriously exist in Argentina, and that, whilst not so prevalent as occasionally alleged, it is sufficiently bad to justify the British Board of Agriculture in maintaining the prohibition. With care, however, I am sure the Argentines could stamp out the evil. Its persistence is due to carelessness. The natural conditions of the cattle, being out on the pastures all the year round, count for healthiness. I have visited the great canned meat establishments in Chicago, and when in Buenos Aires and La Plata I inspected some of the biggest of the Argentine freezing places. Though the latter lacked the magnitude of the Chicago houses, I admit my complete satisfaction with the sanitary conditions surrounding what, to me, is always a sickening business.
When a mob of cattle has been purchased the seller gives a guarantee of the soundness of the animals. When they reach the stock-yard the veterinary surgeon of the company makes inspection of each beast before it goes to the slaughter-house.The operation is the usual one: the animal is pole-axed, then the carcase is conveyed on a truck to a shed, where it is hung up, bled, disembowelled, and skinned. The veterinary surgeon makes an examination to see if he can detect disease. But this is not enough; a piece of the meat, a few ounces, is cut off, labelled, and sent to a laboratory, where further experiments are made. There is much greater care taken in these slaughter-houses of Argentina in the case of chilled and frozen meat than is usually taken at home in providing the "roast beef of old England." The carcases are placed in a chilling chamber, 34° Fahr., for twenty-four hours. Then they are cut in two, each side wrapped in a cloth, and taken into the refrigerator compartments on board a steamer. Should the investigation in the laboratory reveal disease the carcase is burnt.
To the layman inclined to be confused between the terms "chilled" and "frozen," it is well to explain the difference. Frozen meat is that which has been kept well below freezing point, and can be kept for an indefinite time. Chilled meat is not frozen, but it can be kept wholesome for some weeks when in a low temperature. Chilled meat is of better quality than frozen meat, and, as the Argentine ports are within three weeks of Smithfield, her produce has a distinct advantage over that of countries farther away, where the journey takes six weeks, and the meat cannot be kept chilled, but must be frozen.
I am aware of the prejudice against chilled meat. Yet I suspect that occasionally some of us, when paying for the home article, are really receiving the foreign meat, but we do not know the difference. The chilled meat trade—a later development than the frozen trade—has sprung into existence in Argentina mainly during the last dozen years. That which we get in London, whether from La Plata, Buenos Aires, or Chicago, is of better quality than the meat the Argentine or the American gets. The explanation is that the best meat is exported because it has to come into competition with British beef, which admittedly is the best in the world. The question, however, arises, what real detriment is there to meat as the result of freezing? Professor Rideal, of London University, who has made various experiments, has gone so far as to declare that the nutritive and digestive qualities of Argentine frozen meat are superior to those of the best freshly killed English meats, and that Argentine chilled meats possess the same qualities as English meat.
It was in 1880 that we began to receive frozen meat in any quantity from the Argentine, and year by year the quantity has increased. Other European countries are in need of cheap meat, and yet it is a singular fact that nine-tenths of the cold storage meat of the world comes to England. Just upon two hundred and fifty steamers are now engaged in bringing chilled or frozen meat to England from Argentina, Australia, and New Zealand. Londonalone has thirty cold stores with a capacity for storing 3,000,000 carcases of mutton. South America, Australia, and New Zealand have seventy freezing establishments, chiefly for the purpose of supplying the British market. Satisfactory though that market is, Argentina is not content. She is beginning to import her chilled meat into the United States. She is making a bid for the French market. Professor Armand Gautier, of the Academy of Science, of Paris, has stated that the French people ought to eat a third more meat than they do. As the French production is insufficient, he has urged the importation of meat preserved by cold, because it can be kept almost indefinitely, and because in times of epidemic disease in live stock, or lack of forage, and above all in time of war, it would lend most important service.
For a long time, however, Continental countries have been shy about foreign meat, chiefly, I believe, because they were thinking of the interests of the breeders at home. Frozen meat has, however, been received in limited quantities in Italy, Switzerland, and Portugal. The Austrian Government at first restricted the importation to 10,000 tons, but as the meat was popular the restriction was removed. So, gradually, frozen meat of good quality, and cheaper than native meat, is finding a way into other European markets besides our own. The German-Argentine Society, recently formed, has been petitioning the German Parliament for the admission of Argentine frozen meat. The considerableconsumption of frozen meat in England is encouraging Argentina in her ambition to contribute to the feeding of the immense artisan populations in the industrial centres of the continent.
Now anyone who has been much at sea knows about jerked beef. The preparation of salt beef in the old sailing days was a great business, and Argentina's first endeavour in the meat business was the preparation of jerked beef, as it is called. It is not going too far to say that it was this business which opened the eyes of South Americans to the potentialities of their country. But gradually the trade got shifted to the neighbouring little Republic of Uruguay, with Monte Video as the chief place of export. A great many of the cattle killed in Uruguay are bred in Argentina. The trade has extended to Brazil. Brazil, however, still calls for Argentine cattle. So although this dry-salting was first practised in Argentina in South America, and the trade has to a great extent been removed, Argentina is getting benefit because she sells hundreds of thousands of steers to the neighbouring republics. During the last year or two there has been a distinct movement in Argentina to recapture the trade. There is a huge demand for jerked meat in Cuba—and Argentina is after the business. Argentina has both eyes on the whole of the West Indies, where there are great negro populations who, it is supposed, would welcome this cheap kind of meat. It can be used in tropical regions where expensive cold storage would be an impossibility. Besides, an inferiorstandard of animal, scarcely suitable for freezing, can be jerked.
The gigantic business in meat extracts carried on by such firms as Bovril and Liebig has given a cue to the wide-awake Argentine for another outlet to his enterprise. Indeed, the preparation of meat extract in Argentina to-day needs the killing of 200,000 head of cattle a year, whilst those killed for jerked beef are about three-quarters of that number. Anyway, Argentines, whilst glad enough to have foreign capital brought to develop their resources, are now constantly asking themselves, "Why do not we do all this?"
The fact is not to be overlooked that Argentina has a population of 7,000,000 to feed as well as to contribute to the feeding of the outer world. The population of the city of Buenos Aires is a million and a half. So, whilst it needs the killing of 4,000 head of cattle every day to keep the Republic supplied with meat, 1,800 of these are needed in the capital.
England clings to old and sometimes unsatisfactory ways. When I visited the abattoirs at Liniers I thought it would be no bad thing if a number of British municipalities sent a shipload of representatives to Argentina to study up-to-date slaughter-houses. One of the most important features of Liniers is the veterinary pavilion, with rooms for bacteriological and microscopical observations. There are twenty veterinary surgeons who make it their business to examine every carcase and stamp itbefore it is permitted to be sold as food. The annual entry at the abattoir is, in round numbers, 750,000 sheep, 100,000 pigs, and 1,250,000 cattle. Yet the animals slaughtered for local consumption represent only three-fifths of the beasts sold in Buenos Aires, the rest going to the slaughter-yards attached to the freezing houses. These animals are not reared only in the province of Buenos Aires. Other provinces supply cattle, Cordoba, Santa Fé, Entre Rios, Corrientes, and further afield.
One of the most instructive places is the sheep market, covering 500 acres. Not only are there pens innumerable, but there are two galleries set apart for sales so that buyers may obtain a quick bird's-eye view of the stock offered. A police representative is constantly on duty, keeping a lookout that the marks are all right and preventing sheep stealing. Ten sanitary inspectors make inspection of sheep as they go along the gangway or race. Any sheep showing signs of disease is sent to the necropolis—supervised by the cattle division of the Ministry of Agriculture—is killed and examined. Over 4,000,000 sheep are inspected every year. Of these nearly 3,000,000 go to the freezing establishments and the others are either for local consumption or are bought to be fattened. On an average 4,000 railway wagons a month come in to Buenos Aires filled with sheep.
More than once I was made conscious of the deep disappointment amongst Argentine breeders that there is an embargo in Britain against theimportation of live stock. They insisted that if there were disease it would show itself during the three weeks' sea journey, so that British herd owners should have no fear of their own cattle being contaminated. The Argentines cannot get it out of their minds that it is not fear of disease, but protection for the British farmer which really actuates the British Board of Agriculture. Notwithstanding the increase in the sale of chilled and frozen meat, the Argentines, of course, recognise that the Englishman would prefer fresh killed meat if he could get it at a sufficiently cheap price. The steady increase in the price of home-grown meat in English shops is noted, and all the strings possible are being tugged in order to induce the British Government to relax. Besides, there is a considerable body of opinion in Great Britain itself, occasionally voiced in Parliament by the representatives of industrial constituencies, favourable to the importation of foreign animals, of course under proper inspection. Were admission granted, there would undoubtedly be a fall in the price of meat. But, even eliminating the natural antagonism of the British farmer, there is the consumer to be considered. Without joining in the combat whether Argentine meat is as good as British meat, there can be no doubt that the home buyer prefers the home article, and in innumerable cases he is prepared to pay more for it. There is the possibility, the danger if you like, if live stock from Argentina were admitted, for certain graziers to buy them, give them a week or two onEnglish meadows, and for the retail butchers, either in ignorance or with the intention to mislead the purchaser, to ticket the sides as "English fed."
Though Argentines grumble at the British ports being closed to them, causing a slump in their export of live stock, they acknowledge that the effect has been counterbalanced by the increase in the export of frozen meat. "Therefore why should they make such a fuss?" may be asked. Simply because the Argentines are eager to find an outlet for the productive capacity of their country. They do not rest on their oars. They are looking to the future. There is no question in their minds what Argentina can do. They do not want to be baulked by restrictions. It may be argued that, whilst they are zealous to secure freedom for their goods in oversea markets, they do not show any inclination to give an equally wide freedom to the goods of other countries in their own markets. That, however, just shows that considerations which often influence individual traders do not disappear when the nation acts collectively.
The point to be marked—and it is the significance of much in this chapter—is, that although other new nations provide increasing amounts of meat, Argentina is as alive as any of them to the growing necessity for the industrial communities of Europe—constantly increasing whilst agriculture stands still or slides back—to look across the oceans for their meat supply. The meat will be wanted. Competition to supply it will be keen. In some European countries the live stock is diminishing. Countrieswhich formerly did much business in supplying neighbours have now enough to do to supply themselves. Even Switzerland, unable to provide for her own needs, and no longer able to get what she requires from France and Italy, has turned to Argentina. The doors are closed by some European Powers, including Spain. But Argentina is keeping a watch on the artisan classes in commercial Europe. She expects the day will soon come when they will clamour for cheaper meat, and break down the doors. When that time does come, Argentina is determined to be ready with a full basket.
I think I have made it clear that, accepting Argentina as an amazingly fertile country, it is the railways that have chiefly been instrumental in making it one of the most prosperous lands, with a big part to play in providing food for the world. To-day 95 per cent. of its stock and produce is carried over some part of the 20,000 miles of line representing nearly £200,000,000 of British capital.
I remember riding in a coach attached to a freight train across some hundreds of miles of sand and sage bush, an impossible region from an agriculturist's point of view.
"This is an unprofitable stretch," I remarked to the railway official who was my companion.
"Not at all," was the reply; "you see, we have a full load, and we get paid mileage, whether we run through good or bad land."
That is one of the causes of railway profits in Argentina: the enormous distances freight often has to be carried.
It was not my lot to travel over all the railway systems in the Argentine, but I travelled over the most important of them, and from first to last I was enthusiastic. The rolling stock is excellent; the permanent way is better than over similar country elsewhere, and as for the comfort of the passengers it is certainly unsurpassed. Frankly, I often felt like rubbing my eyes in order to make sure I was "roughing it" in Southern America.
INTERIOR OF DINING CAR, CENTRAL ARGENTINE RAILWAY.INTERIOR OF DINING CAR, CENTRAL ARGENTINE RAILWAY.
Nowhere, out of Russia, have I seen the coaches so admirably adapted for small or large parties. You can have a section of a coach self-contained, dining-room, bedrooms and bathroom, suitable for families; and meals can be supplied from the buffet. If you travel over a certain distance you cannot miss having a buffet car; the law insists. Also the law insists on dormitory coaches on the all-night journeys. They are more commodious, because on most of the lines the gauge is wider than in England. There is none of the uncomfortable sleeping behind curtains, with, maybe, a stranger in the bunk overhead, and then having to wash in the smoking-room, which the long-suffering men of the United States put up with under the notion they possess the most luxurious travelling in the world. When you come to "special cars," a thing we know nothing about in England except for royalty, the United States comes first, but I would say Argentina is a close second.
Nothing could be jollier—when a sand storm is not on the wing—than travelling with pleasant friends in a reserved coach. It is like a flat. There is a sitting-room, and on a chill evening the fire burns brightly in an open grate. On a hot afternoon you have your easy chairs out on the platform at the rear and, with legs cocked up on the rail,you can smoke your cigar. You press a button, and when the attendant has brought you an iced cocktail you agree that "roughing it" in Argentina is a delightful experience. If your car is properly equipped with a good kitchen and a good cook, and there is a decent "cellar"—hospitality is one of the legitimate boasts of the people—you fare as well as you would do in a first-class hotel. Were it not that I might be thought a sybarite, I could write like a chef about the menus I experienced and enjoyed in my long excursions throughout the land.
"This is a nice chicken," I said to my host one night. "Yes, we have a chicken run under the car," he answered. I laughed, for I imagined the innocent stranger was having his leg pulled; but the next morning personal inspection assured me there was a "run," in the shape of a long galvanised screened box beneath the car.
It was pleasant to have a bedroom four times the size of a crib on an English "sleeper," to have a writing-table with electric light, and a bathroom adjoining. But the chief joy of a special car was that there was no changing to catch trains. Instructions were given that we would stop at a certain place at nine o'clock in the morning. The car was detached and shunted into a siding. We lived on the car and slept on it. Orders were given that we were to be picked up by the 3.15 local train in the morning, taken down a branch line forty miles, attached to the express which would be coming along at seven o'clock, and were to be releasedsomewhere else at 10.15 and put into a siding. I lived this sort of life for nearly a month. It was the best possible way of seeing the country.
Sometimes we travelled from point to point during the night; sometimes we camped, as it were, at a little wayside station, with the silence of the plains around us except when a great goods train went roaring by. We kept up the joke about "roughing it." After a dinner party, when the coffee and liqueurs were on the table, and the sitting-room was pouring billows of cigar smoke from the wide-open windows, we leaned back in our big chairs and hoped that other poor devils who were "roughing it" in the wilds were having no worse a time than we were.
Of course, the passenger traffic—except around Buenos Aires—is a secondary consideration compared with agricultural produce. It is estimated that the area of land suitable for agriculture but not yet cultivated is 290,000,000 acres, really all beyond the zone of railway influence. At a greater distance than fifteen miles from a railway station the cartage of the produce becomes so expensive and difficult that the profit disappears. Information supplied me by the Argentine Agricultural Society shows that the average cost of cartage is 0.70d. per mile per cwt. Therefore, whoever has his farm farther than fifteen miles from a station has to pay 10d. per cwt. for cartage. Lands lying within the agricultural zone, but distant more than fifteen miles from a railway station, lose enormously in value, as they cannot be utilised except for live stock. To find a meansof facilitating and cheapening the transport of cereals would be to double the production and value of the lands. The Agricultural Society thinks the solution may lie in the construction of cheap auxiliary lines of the simplest kind, which, laid down parallel to the principal lines at a distance of nineteen to twenty-two miles, or at right angles to them, would hand over to cultivation considerable zones of valuable fertile lands, and concentrate the produce in the loading stations at a fair cost to the farmers.
The question is well asked, if the 20,000 miles of rails are only sufficient to permit the cultivation of 70,000,000 acres, how many will be necessary when nearly 300,000,000 more acres are being worked? At present about 1,000 miles of fresh railroad are being laid down each year. £20,000,000 a year is being put into new railroad construction. Yet thirty years ago (1884) the total amount invested in Argentine railways—now running into hundreds of millions—was only £18,600,000. In 1885 all the railways in the Republic transported cargo amounting to a little over 3,000,000 tons. In 1905 it was over 12,500,000 tons. In 1913 it was moving toward 40,000,000 tons.
One harks back to the time of William Wheelwright, who may be called the father of railways in Argentina. It is three-quarters of a century since he was shipwrecked at the mouth of the River Plate. It was as a starveling that he got his first knowledge of Argentina. He had come from the United States, knew what railways were beginningto do for the North, and dreamed what they ought to do for the South. When he got back to the United States he tried to interest his countrymen. But the North Americans turned a deaf ear. There they missed one of the greatest chances in their commercial history. Had they seized their opportunities, and come to South America with their adaptive enterprise, the story of the relationship between the United States and the Latin republics below them would have been very different from what it is to-day. Finding he could raise no capital in his own country for railway enterprise in Argentina, William Wheelwright came to England and interested Thomas Brassey, one of our railway pioneers. Brassey, Wheelwright, and others got capital, and a little line out of "B.A." was built. Other little lines were built. Bigger lines were built. There were set-backs; occasionally the investing public was shy. But, all told, for forty years a mile a day of railroad was laid down in Argentina, and during the last few years the rate has been three miles a day. And it is all done by British capital.
Before I went out to this country I was conscious of a certain apprehension in England that we had rather too much money in Argentina, and that it was about time we called a halt. The general average of dividend during recent years has been a fraction over 5 per cent., not much return for adventure in a new country; but the fact is not to be lost sight of that enormous extensions have been provided out of revenue, as well as out of freshcapital. That there is jealousy amongst considerable sections of the young Argentines at the financial interests which a foreign country like England has in the Republic is undoubted. But it may be said that the mass of the people recognise what they owe to foreign capital, and although the Government is inclined to increase the tightness of its grip on railway administration, making bargains for lines through uneconomic country in return for a concession through fertile land—so that occasionally a company will throw up a scheme rather than pay the price by building in a region the Government wants to be developed—I do not think it can fairly be said that the Government is antagonistic to foreign capital. The danger of foreign capital getting a hold on Argentina in the way of extensive concessions is sometimes preached; but the pouring of foreign gold into the country brings too precious a return to the Argentines themselves for any check to be put upon it.
Besides, in strict fact, very little money is taken out of the country in the way of dividend; the profits are mostly thrown back to provide new works. I have lying before me the returns of the four principal railways for the year ending June 13th, 1913 (the Central Argentine, the Great Southern, the Buenos Aires and Pacific, and the Western of Buenos Aires). During the year the four companies expended in additional capital £8,870,639, and the earnings were £9,017,944, so that the investing public extracted only £147,305, which is not a large draftin return for the hundreds of millions invested. The manner in which the earnings are thrown back into the country for further development shows that, despite the vague apprehensions in certain quarters, the public confidence is still firm.
The Central Argentine Railway may first be described, because not only does it date its origin from the earliest times of railway enterprise in the Republic, but it is one of the most up-to-date lines in the world. At the head of it as general manager is Mr. C. H. Pearson, young, shrewd, and, like most strong men, a quiet man. When in England I hear of lack of capability in railway management I think of such a man as Mr. Pearson, who has won his spurs at home, and by clear vision and steady, determined action is successfully directing a company which has 3,000 miles of railroad, most of it through rich country. The line to-day is the offspring of amalgamations. In the early 'seventies the Central Argentine opened a line from the river port of Rosario to Cordoba, two hundred and forty-six miles. Later on Buenos Aires and Rosario were joined by another railway company. Subsequently the two lines were linked. Always, without halt, the line has pushed its head into fresh country, until now its arms stretch like a fan with Buenos Aires as the base.
I have heard Buenos Aires and Rosario described as the London and Liverpool of Argentina—and the illustration is apt. Rosario, to be pictured in a later chapter, is a business and shipping centre, and between the two towns there is a constant rush bycommercial men. It is inspiriting to see the rush at the Retiro station in the early morning, when men are busy getting their newspapers at the stalls and hastening to the breakfast car and the roomy coaches. To the eye of the newly arrived stranger there are innumerable little differences from things he is accustomed to at home. But they are matters of detail to which you speedily get used, so that after a week or two, or even a few days, you have a little start in the realisation that you are not travelling in a London and North-Western express, but amongst a similar crowd of business men, in a far part of the world, who are intent on their own affairs.
Twelve passenger trains journey daily between Buenos Aires and Rosario. Until Mr. Pearson came along with fresh ideas most of the passenger traffic was by night. Trains left both places at ten o'clock; the passengers went to bed, and early next morning the destination was reached. Now there are two day express trains completing the journey in just under five hours. Only first-class passengers travel by these trains, as excellent as the expresses between New York and Philadelphia. There is nothing in the way of scenery to move one to rapture; but there is good agricultural progress on either side. The line is being double tracked and stone ballasted, and the running is comfortable. And sitting in this train, thronged with business men, whilst the great engine tears along to keep to scheduled time, you understand something of the spirit of modern Argentina.
Amongst the cities of the world Buenos Aires takes thirteenth place in size. With its population of a million and a half, long-distance electric tramcars and the institution of an "underground" system are not enough. High rents are driving many thousands to the suburbs, and when, in the morning, the rush of trains begins to deliver throngs of men and women into the heart of "B.A.," the scene is animated. All the big companies running out of "B.A." are nursing their valuable suburban traffic. The Central Argentine is electrifying over forty-four miles of double track in the neighbourhood of the city. This company, in the suburban section of its system, now carries 15,000,000 passengers a year. All the trains of the company run 889,000 miles a month. A handsome new station is being erected on the site of the old Retiro. I was able to inspect the latest pneumatic system of signalling. When at Rosario I went over the extensive workshops, and although it would be idle even to suggest they compared with Crewe, Swindon, or Doncaster, considering most of the parts are imported, they are comprehensive works, and the machinery of the best.
Since Mr. Pearson has been in charge the Central Argentine has taken to running excursions, and encouraging the holiday makers in the flat lands to go and seek bracing air in the Cordoba mountains. Alta Gracia—of which more anon—an old Spanish town which has been drowsing in the sun for several centuries, is now one of the most popular of holiday haunts.
But, though naturally enough the average passenger considers a railway line from the way it ministers to his needs, it is the goods traffic which is of first importance to railways in a country like Argentina. I went on the Central Argentine line as far north as Tucuman, and as far west as Cordoba and Rio Cuarto, and beheld the richness of the plains. There were endless miles of wheat and maize and linseed; there were the great herds of cattle and sheep. I witnessed the sugar cane harvest in the north in full swing.
All the goods are not brought into "B.A." The line runs to three up-river ports, Rosario, Villa Constitucion and Campana, where there are wide wharves and grain elevators. A goods tonnage of nearly 7,000,000 a year and receipts of nearly £3,500,000 a year spell big business. Yet one found this was only the beginning of things. Already there are gigantic schemes in project for irrigation works in those stretches which are incapable of use because of the insufficient rainfall. The Argentine Government is giving serious attention to this matter. But the railway companies in the Republic are not content to twiddle their thumbs and keep asking, "Why does not the Government do something?" All of them are attending to irrigation themselves, or are doing the work for the Government. The Central Argentine, on behalf of the Government, have an irrigation scheme on hand which will cost close upon £600,000. New lines and extensions up to a further 1,600 miles are projected to cost£8,000,000. Over 35,000 employees are on this line. The length of rolling stock is 143 miles, including 600 passenger coaches and 2,200 beds. Twenty million passengers are carried a year, and the total receipts work out at £40 a week per mile.
The second big railway which attracted my admiration was the Buenos Aires and Pacific, which strikes westward across the continent. The company was formed as recently as 1882, but it has a present capital of over £50,500,000. It owns 1,406 miles, it leases 2,011 miles, and so operates 3,417 miles. Some 150 miles are under construction. It has over 16,000,000 passengers annually, and over 6,000,000 tons of freight; and its gross earnings in the last financial year (July 1912 to June 1913) were £5,590,613. During the last ten years it has absorbed a number of lesser lines—the Villa Maria Rufino, the Bahia Blanca and North-Western, the Great Western, and, lastly, the Argentine Transandine. It has also bought a length of over 200 miles of Government line out in the west. The "B.A. and Pacific" has several subsidiary undertakings. In conjunction with the Great Southern Railway it has a well-equipped light and power company. In my chapter on Bahia Blanca I shall deal with the port accommodation provided by the Pacific Company to dispatch the grain produced within its area to Europe. Perhaps the most important improvement made by the company has been the high level independent access to the city of Buenos Aires. This line, which is five miles in length, consists oftwo viaducts of brickwork, containing 116 arches of 42.3 feet span each, and 19 steel bridges, the largest being 178.8 feet. From the River Plate an area of 366 acres is being reclaimed to be used for goods sidings and access to the docks. For the conveyance of coal, and materials for use on the line, the company owns its own fleet of steamers. It would be easy enough to give a bunch of figures to show how the passenger traffic has grown; anyway, its suburban service bears comparison with that of any other line entering the capital.
The Buenos Aires and Pacific Railway is becoming increasingly popular, for people desiring to see the world now travel from "B.A." across the pampas, over the Andes, and so down to Valparaiso in Chili, where steamers can be obtained to take them up to Peru, Panama, and San Francisco. Leaving "B.A.," the train runs for some twelve hours across an extensive plain which is far from indicating to the traveller the great mountain ranges which will surprise him later on. Across this plain the lines of the railway extend in an absolutely straight line from Vedia to Makenna, a distance of 175 miles, which is the world's record. Near the first-mentioned station the railway curves in the form of an S; without this, the stretch on the straight would have been 206 miles long.
Although the pampas are occasionally marked by undulations and small green-covered slopes, the first notable elevations are not encountered until Mercedes is reached. These are the San Luis hills,the outposts of the Cordillera. Passing on the western side of this chain the picturesque city of San Luis is reached. As the traveller approaches the Cordillera of the Andes he finds himself in a district topographically distinct but always fertile, and watered by canals fed by the Tunuyan and Mendoza rivers. The view of the Cordillera in the early morning is a spectacle worthy of admiration. At a distance of one hundred miles before arrival at Mendoza the interminable chain of the Andes, with its snow-capped peaks mingling with the clouds, is distinguishable. As the train approaches their imposing grandeur becomes more and more evident. Another of the views which delights the tourist, and makes the business man think, is that of the smiling vineyards extending on both sides of the line in a delightful prospect until lost on the horizon.[B]
From Mendoza the line runs across the Andes by the Uspallata Valley route, the only transcontinental line in South America. What the Suez Canal and the Trans-Siberian Railway have done for the Far Eastern trade, the Transandine Railway is achieving for transcontinental traffic in South America by giving rapid communication between the two South American Republics—reducing the journey between Buenos Aires and Valparaiso from thirteen and a half days to thirty-eight hours—and thereby cementing closer commercial relations and developing trade with the Far East.
This has only been made possible by the summit tunnel of the Transandine Railway, which was opened for public traffic in May, 1910, so that the distance between Buenos Aires and Valparaiso has been reduced to 888 miles. It is probably of interest to state that this tunnel is one of the longest of its kind in the world, being 10,384 feet long, including two artificial ends 442 feet in length altogether, and it lies at an elevation of 10,778 feet above the sea-level. It is nearly 1,500 feet higher than the highest carriage road in Europe, that over the Stelvio Pass, and more than 3,500 feet higher than the Mont Cenis, St. Gothard, and Simplon tunnels. So well were the levels and lines kept that the difference at the junction was only ¾ inch, and of the line 2¾ inches, while the chainage was only 2.14 inches less than calculated. At one period 1,700 men were engaged on the works.
Unfortunately, the beautiful and impressive bronze statue of the Christ is not visible to passengers in the train, but it can easily be reached by coach or mule from Inca. It stands some 3,000 feet higher than Las Cuevas, and is situated on the dividing line between Argentina and Chili. It was the gift of a pious Buenos Aires lady, Señora César de Costa, and was erected as a monument to the signing of the peace treaty between the two countries.
The Pacific Railway has expended over £80,000 in snow protection for their line during the past two years, with the result that through traffic can be maintained throughout the severest winter with perfect safety.