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 settlement. Nor is there a sufficient water supply concentrated at any point to tempt a considerable agricultural population. Development of the pasture land is the only known way of increasing the population and production, When we consider the small forage resources of the Puna and its bordering valleys at the present time it might seem to be a matter of small! im- portance to the world that the pastures are capable of improved use; but to take this view is to overlook the growing im- portance of pasture to the world asa whole. In the pioneering belt of the world the shepherd has everywhere retreated before the farmer.

With every advance in settlement at the expense of the open range, man has been driven to explore the limit of possi- bilities in pasturage. The example of Australia is interesting in this respect. The natural ranges have given way to wheat farms over large territories, and the inner ranges and plateaus have been explored with the result that some of them have been found to have highly important pasture land which needs only a supply of drinking water from artesian wells to make them of use to the rancher. South Africa has had similar experience, and government aid in the drilling of wells has become a part of government policy.

Every advance into the range country has meant larger cities and denser communities outside the range and an increase in the demand for leather and leather products as well as for wool and meat. During the past one hundred and fifty years, that is to say during the modern industrial period, the popula- tion of the world has doubled, and almost everywhere city populations have had an abnormal increase. This means that there must be a diminished use of the products of the range, particularly meat and skins, or utilization of ranges hitherto neglected, or an increase in the number of expensive stall-fed cattle. These aspects of the case lend peculiar interest to the pastures of the Andes. Throughout their extent they are undeveloped except near the larger towns and mining centers or along the routes of rail or pack-train transportation. Yet little effort has been made by any of the governments to turn this resource to account. The Bolivian government is re-