Page:Statesman's Year-Book 1871.djvu/631

 TRADE AND INDUSTRY. 595

dollars, or 1,056,355l., and the expenditure at 6,521,000 dollars, or 1,304,200l. The greater part of the revenue is derived from customs, which produced, according to semi-official reports, 1,488,712 dollars, or 297,742l. in 1862, and rose to 1,895,013 dollars, or 379,003l. in 1864, and the duties having been greatly raised, to 4,268,807 dollars, or 853,761l. in 1869. About one-half of the expenditure of 1869 was stated to be for payment of interest on the public debt.

The republic owed in September 1870, a of reign debt of 7,000,000l., including a six per cent. loan of 3,000,000l., authorised by Act of Legislature of 16th July 1868, 7th July 1869, and 4th May 1870, and negotiated at the London exchange in August 1870, at the price of 77 per 100. There are unsettled foreign claims against Uruguay to the amount of 6,000,000 dollars, or 1,200,000l. The amount of the internal debt is unknown. It was decreed by the government in June 1869, in consequence of suspension of payments by the chief banks, that the notes of all of them, to the amount of 8,000,000 dollars should be under state guarantee, with forced currency, redeemable within eight years out of the customs receipts.

The army of Uruguay was reported of the following strength in September 1870: —

Number of Men. Garrison of the capital......... 1,700

Garrisons in the provinces.......1,900

National guard ..................25,000

The army of the republic was considerably increased in the spring of 1865, when Uruguay entered into an alliance with Brazil and the Argentine Republic, and declared war against Paraguay. The troops which actually took the field were stated to number 3,500 men, but a portion of this force was disbanded before the end of the war in 1870.

The area of Uruguay is estimated at 73,538 square miles, with a population, according to the census of 1860, of 240,965, or little more than three inhabitants per square mile. Other statements, of more recent date, report the numbers of the population to be 470,000. The country is divided into 13 provinces. The capital, Montevideo, had, according to an enumeration of the year 1862, a population of 45,765, of whom about one-half were foreigners. There is a steadily increasing flow of immigration, numbering 9,327 individuals in 1866; 17,381 in 1867; 21,892 in 1868; and 27,362 in 1869. Fully one-half of the immigrants of 1866-69 were Italians.

Trade and Industry.

Uruguay carries on a very active commerce with foreign countries, greatly developed in recent years. In the year 1862 the total