Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 83.djvu/232

228 others. A crescentic indentation in the coast is called the harbor, for want of any other name. All vessels must anchor far out, owing to shallow water, the presence of reefs, or entire lack of docks. Cargoes are lightered to and from shore, while passengers run the gauntlet of the boatmen, or fleteros, and the surf, both of which at times are rather unpleasant. Protection for the vessels is poor in most cases, but fortunately storms are not frequent along this coast. Around the harbor, barren, colorless mountains rise to heights of 2,000 feet or more, and at their base lies a featureless town sprawled over a narrow, flat or sloping shelf. Within the town, wide, unpaved, dusty streets are lined with frame houses in varying degrees of dilapidation. Here and there one may catch a glimpse of some carefully watered plants or even a tiny patch of grass in a private "garden," and the main plaza of the town is sure to have some highly prized and proudly exhibited palms and other plants. But for the most part there is nothing to relieve the impression of dinginess and dejectedness that hovers over the place. Dirty hotels are crowded with patrons of a dozen nationalities, for all who come and go must use the only accommodations offered. For a time, the busy waterfront, and perhaps seals in the harbor, prove interesting, but even these quickly prove boresome, since every lighter piled with sacks of nitrate is like every other lighter, and after the seals have bobbed up a few hundred times, only to disappear as often, it ceases to be a novelty. Waiting for a steamer, the only means of escape from these ports makes one wish he had staid in the pampa, where the world seems big and less forlorn.

Ships of many nations come to carry away the nitrate, while many coastwise vessels bring supplies from the fertile valleys farther south. Nearly half the oficinas operating in 1912 shipped their product through Iquique, giving this port more nitrate traffic than is carried on by any other two ports combined. Antofagasta and Tocopilla are next in order. The value of nitrate exports is more than 70 per cent, of the total value of Chilean exports, and its tonnage is as great as that of any other South American export. As the nitrate goes out, the Chilean government levies an export duty, just as Bolivia tried to do when Chile took up arms on that account. The export duty sometimes is regarded as a device for checking overproduction, whereas it is simply an effective means of raising revenue for the national treasury. For a long time nitrate duties and proceeds of sales of nitrate lands have amounted to more than half, and in some years to not less than 85 per cent., of the total national income. These revenues alone represent more than ten dollars per capita or as much as the United States government spends from all sources of income. It is easy to see, therefore, why Chile often is charged with extravagance. Yet large sums have been employed wisely in the building of state railroads; something has