as far north as San Pedro and even beyond, penetrating most of the valleys of the Cordillera Domeyko (Fig. 87). They brought with them small and thin dogs that could enter the chinchilla holes, and so thoroughly did they clear out the chin- chilla that they have been scarce ever since. I paid 30 pesos Chilean, or $6 in U. S. money, in San Pedro for a good chin- chilla skin in July, 1913. (It is worth $25 gold in the United States.) In Albert’s account of the chinchilla quoted above there are given statistics of the export of chinchilla skins from Chile and the measures best calculated to conserve the indus- try. He estimated that out of the departments of Vallenar and Coquimbo half a million skins were shipped annually (1900) and that the extinction of the animal would follow unless conservation measures were enforced.
