We have, then, in this department of industry a market for goods of proportions that quite exceed those of any other in the country, the greatest impetus to its development being given by the admission into the country of all railway material duty-free. In any estimate therefore, of the true position of any country's trade, this privileged demand must be considered. And in estimating future conditions, the tendency noted in the chapter on railways must be borne in mind, viz., the tendency to discourage the continuance of the quasi-monopoly of one country. Turning next to the immigration returns, the predominating position held by the Latin races, and, especially, of the Italian, is at once apparent. Although in many cases the special requirements of these people can only be satisfied by the goods produced in their own several countries, the greater part of the demand for imported goods is for clothing, and, in the case of the country portion, for agricultural materials. In both these departments the market is open. On the other hand, while the greatest attention seems to have been paid to this market by foreign merchants, the wants of the inhabitants of British and other Northern extraction living in the far South have not been studied at all. In this context the following extract from a recent consular report is of interest. Writing from Puerto Gallegos in Patagonia the Acting Consular Agent declares:-- "German and French exporters are gradually securing the best part of the trade in consequence of the greater attention shewn by them to the large importing houses in Gallegos. It is said that the merchant prefers to order British goods to suit the taste of their farmer clients but so little attention is shewn to them by the British exporters that they are obliged to place their orders on the Continent. Many British firms refuse to attend to orders in Spanish, and their catalogues and price-lists are almost invariably printed in English." From the same report comes a remark of the Vice-Consul at Bahia Blanca emphasising the energy with which the Hamburg South American Company fosters the coasting trade. The Pacific Steam Navigating boats pass to and from the West Coast, but the local trade is scarcely touched by them. Although a German line does not imply nothing but German trade, the tendency must, of necessity, be in its favour.