The Santa Fé Land Company has been one of the pioneers who steadily fought down these reports, and by showing what good cattle could be bred there, and what crops grown, has gradually opened up the possibilities of the northern lands to colonists and investors. Slowly but surely workers came north, first in fear and dread, but later with confidence, and now the cry is "They come, and still they come." Before we had gone far on our journey we had an opportunity of conversing with one lately arrived colonist. A wonderful crop of maize attracted our notice, and we stopped to speak to the great, jolly, strong-framed Italian who had grown it. He has moved up from the south with his wife and family, and his fellow-workmen. They started ploughing, and though it was late in the season, he was persuaded to try a catch-crop of maize, with the result that he has to-day banked $5,000, when he never expected to secure a chance harvest. And so sure is he that the land will repay all labour and time expended upon it that he is anxious to take up a league and colonize it with his fellow-countrymen. It is the same story all through the northern lands; anyone with pluck, adaptability and grit can do what this man has done: indeed hard work and perseverance will as amply reward the labourer in the northern lands as they have done in the south. The sight of this great crop of valuable maize, on land which a few months before was a mere waste, brings the words of the Psalmist forcibly to one's thoughts, for surely of no country could it more truly be said than of the Argentine, "Dwell in the land, and be doing good, and, verily, thou shalt be fed"; and perhaps there are few countries in which there are less openings for the man whose mind is not set towards "doing good": the Argentine has little room for the shirker. [Illustration: _Horses awaiting Inspection._]