during mule or the less powerful but even more abstemious burre. Supply of these animals had to be replenished con- stantly, for under the hard conditions of desert work they are very short-lived. Argentina is the great basis of supply not only for this means of transportation but also for one of the important food requirements of the mines—cattle, a commod- ity that can move itself to market. Cattle also come from the south of Chile. As far north as the Coquimbo valleys it is com- mon to find the large farmers with two complementary farms —the small, irrigated, intensively cultivated hacienda in the lower valley and the range, or estancia, on the mountain spurs with pasture dependent on rain. Cattle from the estancia are brought down to the hacienda for a few months’ fattening be- fore shipment north to the mines. Farther north the oases of both the desert and the puna carry on a like profitable business with cattle brought across the cordillera. Huasco, Vallenar, Copiapó, Calama, San Pedro de Atacama, all derive an im- portant income from the system of ta/aje as it is called.
The Copianó Railroad
The mines first brought the railroad to Chile. The Caldera- Copiapó line, fifty miles long, built by William Wheelwright, was the first important line to be constructed in South Amer- ica.[1] Tt was opened to traffic on December 28, 1851. Subse- quently the line was extended to Chafiarcillo, and its builder projected its continuance as a trasandine line to Rosario on the Parana. In pointing out the advantages of such a line he gives an interesting example of the costs of transportation involved from the cordillera to the plain. Salt from the inter- cordilleran salars is sold in Copiapó at $250 a hundred pounds. He estimates that it could be delivered at Los Chilenos, a point on the projected line, for 50 cents, and thence “the ac- tion of gravity alone would take it to Copiapó on the rail- road.”[2] The opening of the railroad brought about distribu-
- ↑ The oldest line on the continent is the Georgetown line, British Guiana, opened 1848; it is only 5 miles long. The Lima-Callso line, another short line, comes second, having been opened in April, 1851.
- ↑ William Wheelwright: Proposed Railway Route across the Andes, Journ. Royal Geogr. Soe., Vol. 31, 1861, pp. 155-162; reference on p. 160.
