So well wooded are certain areas that the forests of the 'Gran Chaco' are said to contain sixty thousand square miles of timber. The forest-woods include the quebracho, the nundubay (acacia) lapacho (bignonia, red and white cedar, amarillo (mimosa) the palm-tree introduced by the Jesuits, poplar, willow, walnut, and the celebrated yerba mate, whose leaves make a stimulating tea. The valuable quebracho (break-axe) takes a hundred years to arrive at maturity. It is largely used in the making of railway sleepers, etc., and also provides an export trade of about a quarter of a million tons annually, mainly for tanning purposes. This wood bears so strong a resemblance to red marble that it is a difficult matter to distinguish between the two. The 'Gran Chaco', the northern division of the country, is singularly interesting. It is the home of the native Indian tribes, and, in sharp contrast to the Mendozan area, its climate is tropical. Its fauna include the jaguar, the puma, wildcate, fox, tapir, many varieties of deer, and the alligator. The north is marshy, the south covered with dense forests. The capital of the Chaco is Resistencia.
Image Description from historic lecture booklet: "Its population of 1,674,000 makes it almost as large as Philadelphia, with a change of exceeding it in time. in other ways it compares with Chicago, for it is conspicuously modern, its present development having been begun and achieved within the last quarter of a century, although the city itself is nearly four hundred years old, and is the industrial complement of an agricultural and pastoral activity even great than that of our Middle West. Indeed, its banks and clearing houses are said to transact quite as much business as those of Chicago."
We have mentioned the high per cent of college graduates in Buenos Aires. Argentina spends more money on educating her children than any country save Australia. Primary education is secular, and is free and compulsory for children from six to fourteen years old. As for secondary education (not compulsory) there are twenty-six national colleges maintained by the Government with some five thousand pupils, and nearly double that number of normal schools. There are Universities at Buenos Aires, Cordoba, La Plata, Santa Fe, and Parana.
Image Description from historic lecture booklet: "Mendoza is one of the most important inland cities. Here, by means of irrigation, the people have cultivated large vineyards, and a great deal of win is made."
Image Description from historic lecture booklet: "Their great opera house, the Colon, that cost 10,000,000 and occupies a whole square, is one of the most beautiful in the world. There is none in New York or Chicago, or any of our cities, to compare with it. It is of french design and built of stone, and the interior is finished in white marble, gold-bronze ornamentation's and rich red drapery and upholstery It is not quite as large as the Metropolitan, the two lower tiers of boxes are occupied by the families of the "Four Hundred", for their grand opera down there is just as much of a social function with them as it is with the smart set in our greatest city; and, as their season is in July and August--winter months with them--not a few of the singers that are heard at the Metropolitan later on are heard there in their season. Above the boxes are two balconies and a gallery where the gods congregate and howl for encores for all the world like our own. It appears that they are not very fond of Wagner and the German music, these Bonarenees, but are keen for the Italian and French; so, aside from the opera, competent French and Italian companies are brought over every year for long engagements at other theaters. Also there are French opera comique, Italian farce, and English musical comedy companies, French cafe' chantant, English music hall and our own vaudeville entertainers without end, and dramas, even Shakespearean occasionally., and the other classes of performances, following each other at the many theaters continually."
Image Description from historic lecture booklet: "The Avenida de Mayo, whose broad, beautifully paved road way runs through the very hearty of Buenos Aires, from the Plaza de Mao near the harbor front, to the Plaza del Congreso upon which the Palace of Congress stands, is among the finest boulevards in the world. It may be classed with the Champs Elysees in Paris, the Ring "
