In the stores are Lowney's chocolates, Gillette razors and Winchester rifles for sale. The vegetable stores are piled high with watermelons that are brought in by the shiploads. In fact, all the vegetables come by way of ship, usually from Peru. One sees all the vegetables one would expect to find elsewhere. Poor little weazened tomatoes, all wrinkled and no larger than walnuts, look forlorn and homesick.

Antofagasta is the port of entry for all this north part of Chile, and is an important port of export for tin, copper, silver, antimony and many other metals, some of which come from Bolivia. Those from the latter country can be easily identified because they are always in small packages, no heavier than fifty pounds to the package, so they can be carried on the backs of the llama, which refuses to carry more than a hundred pounds. If more is piled on him he simply lies down and refuses to budge until his load is lightened. The silver ore is put up in fat sausages of raw cowhide, with the hair-side out, and sewed with sinews. The other ores and concentrates are in stout jute sacks, while the tin sometimes is shipped in cakes as pure metal.

Dec. 17, 1917: The loading of metals is a slow process when it is taken from clumsy barges with rope and canvas slings. For four days the ship lay at anchor, while we, from our steamer chairs, could see the Tropic of Capricorn in the distance, Antofagasta being almost on the line. There was always a cool breeze, however, so one did not suspect the near presence of the tropics.

Dec. 18, 1917: All last night loading proceeded and at 6 A.M. today we hoisted anchor and in a few minutes we had crossed the line and were in the torrid zone.

Dec. 19, 1917: The morning finds us quietly at anchor in Mejillones, the port "just around the corner" from Antofagasta. It is a much better natural harbor than Antofagasta, and in the rising mists it is as smooth as glass. Not a ripple except that caused by the occasional seals that break the surface of the water. A crowd of gulls eager for their breakfast, hovering overhead, follow him and snatch the small fish which rise to the surface as the seal dives. The astounding sight, however, is the thousands and thousands of grey and white long-necked cormorants or ducks that manoeuver in perfect order over the quiet waters of the bay. They sweep over the surface in endless lines until a school of fish is located, then quickly settle with only their long black necks sticking up above the water. Through

the field glasses they can be seen continually diving for the fish. Suddenly all come to attention as if a command has been given and then one by one the birds rise in the air, not in confusion, but already formed into single file as they rise. In this way thousands of birds take flight and each apparently awaiting its turn until at last the entire body is on the wing. They follow the leader absolutely, now waving into the air, now skimming close to the water and at times countermarching with the precision of soldiers, all wheeling at exactly the same spot with never a cut across nor an attempt to shorten the turn. They appear like a long waving ribbon of birds, so exactly do they copy the action of the one just ahead. When they have once settled and have begun to fish, the sea gulls that have tagged along fly back and forth, hovering over their diving friends, and pick up what they can, for the gulls do not dive. Occasionally a party of dignified-looking pelicans will fly by, now flapping heavily and then with wings taut, sail grandly, their bodies all but touching the water. This is the first place we have seen the latter, though there are great numbers of them as far south as Coquimbo.

Mejillones is a loading port for nitrates and metals. It is on the north side of a point and so protected from the south winds prevailing at this time. It is connected with Antofagasta by railroad, and to all appearances is a much more favorable port than the latter. Both towns have been destroyed in times past by tidal waves and earthquake.

It is a small village, half railroad and half town, for it exists only by grace of the railroad which occupies most of the space with its shops and yards. Here we load nitrates and copper concentrates. By seven in the evening we are loaded and again on our way. The lights of Tocopilla show on the dim coast line at about 9 P.M. Here is located a large copper mine.

Dec. 20, 1917: While the mists are still shrouding the town we glide slowly into the little harbor of Iquique (pronounced E-key-kay). From the port-hole as we are arriving the smooth rollers appear shot full of spray points. Upon watching closely we find that it is caused by the fins of large fish chasing their morning breakfast, which would occasionally leap clear of the water in their efforts to get away. Acres of sea are covered by this huge school of fish.

Iquique is the capital of Tarapaca, which province was ceded by Peru to Chile as a result of the Chile-Peruvian war

of 1879-1880. This province is rich in nitrate which Chile viewed with a covetous eye. No more need be said except that the province now belongs to Chile and is very liable to stay there. The town lies on a quiet little harbor well protected from any but a northwest wind and affords a good anchorage. A hull of a large French vessel lying on her side at the very inside tip of the harbor is evidence of what can happen, however, when a storm does blow into the neck of the bottle.

Probably the most lasting recollection of these arid coast towns is the stale stable smell which rises from the streets and is everywhere. Practically rainless since the first animal used the streets, copious water sprinkling of the accumulation of years only tends to accentuate the smell which rises with the moisture into the thirsty air.

Unlike Antofagasta, these streets are entirely unpaved and almost too high for the sidewalks, for, of course, as there is no rain, such things as gutters are unnecessary. The moistened dust is rapidly tracked to the sidewalks so that the general impression of a newcomer is summed up in the single disgusted exclamation "dirty." The houses are generally of wood. There are a few good-looking stores and there seems to be much business, though as yet there are few automobiles because of the unsatisfactory street and country road conditions. But one may hardly speak of country, for if one does not go into the sea there is nowhere to go but up. The railroad finds its way out by long zigzag gashes in the grey-brown mountainside behind, switchbacking back and forth until it disappears over the top in the distance. There are tennis courts and a golf course, because there are English men, but one wonders where "country" enough is found to locate them. Unlike most of the coast towns in this arid region, she does not advertise her dead to the world, but has hidden the cemetery modestly away somewhere. At Antofagasta, next to the mountainside advertisement of tea, it is the most prominent part of the landscape.

Iquique now has a water supply that gives fire protection. and water for those who can afford to have it piped into their houses. To the poor it is peddled from fat-bellied oval barrels mounted on carts. These are the first water carts I have seen in South America that do not leak. Water is too precious. The scarcity of it is only too apparent. One of our passengers who is going back to his home in El Paso, Texas, stopped at Iquique a year ago. The friend who met him then said that there were

five cases of typhoid at the hotel (his wife being one of the victims) and two cases of bubonic in the town. Incidentally, there are no sewers.

A complete system of light open horse cars serves the town and seems to be very popular. The fare is 20 centavos, or about 5 cents U.S.gold. As in other towns of Chile, the conductors are women or young boys, and tear off tickets from a roll hidden in a little brass cylinder. The color of the ticket tells the price. Later in the journey an inspector or "adjudante" boards the car and tears the ticket diagonally in half. This system of inspection is generally practiced in Uruguay, Argentine, Chile and Peru and does not admit of much "knocking down" by the conductor. The police are dressed in spotless white, with white pith helmets and appear very smart with their black belt and holster. They seem to be decidedly above the average in intelligence and contrast most favorably with the police seen at Santiago. They are probably a branch of the army "Carabineros."

Aside from the two or three little plazas with their mass of bloom and fragrance, for flowers do wonderfully well when really given a chance, there is an attractive little stretch of beach beyond the business centre, where the clean blue sea curls into long sparkling rolls and breaks into a dazzling whiteness as it boils over the low-lying moss-brown rocks which face the shore. To one coming unexpectedly upon this delightful stretch with the evil smells of the town still strong upon one, the effect is startling and decidedly pleasant. One is surprised to find that there is anything so absolutely clean and spotless about the place.

The ship unloads into lighters, and passengers go ashore in row boats, just as in the other ports, but the landing for passengers is much more simple here, for the "mole" is well protected in a tiny inner harbor. We discharge hay, machinery and cloth, while at the same time we load nitrates and crystals of iodine. The latter is so valuable it is locked up in the species room along with the bars of tin and silver. It is packed in little hundred-pound kegs no higher than a foot and completely sewed up in a rawhide jacket (with the hair turned inside) as a protection against moisture on its trip to England. Each keg is valued at about $700 and makes one more valuable article to our already precious cargo of silver, tin, copper, antimony, hides and nitrates. The iodine comes as a by-product in the extraction of the sodium nitrates.

RESOURCES, RISKS AND REMUNERATION

BY G. W. LEE

"The trouble with the American Library Association is it hasn't brains." So exclaimed Mr. Dana at the recent Asbury Park Convention. It would have been also to the point had he accused it of lacking instinct and courage. The librarians had been pulling splendidly together for the exigencies of the war, and the question under discussion was how to maintain as good service in time of peace; and consequently whether an endowment fund would help the cause.

This Association has been in existence over forty years, and John Cotton Dana is one of several who feel that the day has long since arrived when it becomes the library fraternity to do what will generally be acknowledged a "big business.' The natural resources which the libraries are capable of developing in their associate capacity are enormous, and it is only through such development that we may see for librarians what many men desire: larger salaries, salaries commensurate with what are received by the brain workers of big industries.

How, then, shall the libraries work to develop their joint resources? By various means, in which one factor is likely to be dominant, a factor which in normal times librarians, even more than most people, seem to shrink from risk. To paraphrase a familiar quotation, some people can play safe all the time and win, all people can play safe some of the time and win, but not all can play safe all the time and win; and librarians are certainly in this third category. Why is it they are loath to take risk? Why does their pursuit have such "oslerizing" effect? They have ideas and they talk ideas; yet the majority would go to the extreme before expressing outward discontent with their modest salaries; and for the reason that they find their work so interesting, so filled with the sense and satisfaction of rendering service, and so free from having to think in terms of money. But, with the vast increase in the cost of living, even the otherwise most contented should feel the call for special effort to make possible a service that the community will consider worth a larger remuneration. Moreover, there is a growing minority that boldly expresses its unrest by unionizing and affiliating with the American Federation of Labor. Such unrest affords added reason why leaders