quintal. At that time the selling price, on hoard ship, was 7.50 pesos to 8 pesos per quintal. Under favorable conditions, therefore, this oficina could market about 2,000,000 quintals a year, with profits amounting to 4,000,000 pesos. This particular oficina cost more than 6,000,000 pesos, but with the trade good, it would pay for itself in two years and give annual dividends of. 10 per cent, at the same time. About five and a half square miles of nitrate lands have been set aside for the Pinto, a supply calculated to keep it going for twenty years, in most of which time the plant has nothing to do except pay dividends. The making of nitrate millionaires, therefore, is easy to understand.
The construction of a modern oficina uses supplies from widely separated places. Most of the buildings are of corrugated iron, for it withstands the intense darkness better than wood does. It commonly comes from Europe. The timber which is used is likely to be Oregon pine, for it is strong, durable and about as cheap as the Chilean product. German steel for tanks, cement from the United States, boilers from England, Belgian locomotives to haul the tiny cars and United States electrical equipment are found at one oficina.
Most of the laborers are Chileans, Peruvians and Bolivians, attracted there by the higher wages than are to be had elsewhere in most other pursuits. In fact, the complaint is often made that the nitrate industry has retarded development of other activities in Chile, especially greater agricultural progress in the south. by absorbing not only the capital, but the labor as well. About 40,000 persons are said to be employed directly in the oficinas, some of the larger of which have more than 1,000 hands each. Wages run from about 3 pesos to 4 pesos per day for boys and 6 pesos per day for the poorest paid men. up to as high as 15 pesos for some of the men working in the maquina. Perhaps
