The main supports of the country are, therefore, cereals and cattle, the latter being undoubtedly the more profitable investment, but requiring a much larger capital. By Argentine, as by French, law property at death is compulsorily divided, and this tends to split up the now immense tracts of land occupied by individuals. Whatever the social advantages of such a system may be, it is not conducive to the most economic working, nor yet to the breeding of the finest strains of stock, for which a large capital is required. A form of evasion, however, has been found in the formation of limited liability companies, often private, to run big estancias. These have everything to recommend them from the economic point of view. A capable manager is put in charge of the work on the spot, and, as capital is usually forthcoming, the estancias are run in such a way as to yield the greatest possible return. They are usually well-maintained, up-to-date in management and fittings, and supplied with good home-bred strains. There are, however, other natural sources of wealth in the Argentine; notably, the forests of hard-woods (of the acacia order) which abound in the Chaco, in Corrientes and Entre Rios, and are also found in the province of Córdoba and elsewhere; the sugar industry in the north-west (of which more will be said under "The Tariffs"); the hitherto undeveloped fruit cultivation in all parts of the country (this in the sub-tropical and central provinces would be especially liable to suffer from the depredations of locusts); perhaps, too, cotton growing in the Chaco, where, however, the supply of labour is much questioned, and some pests peculiar to the cotton-bole are reported as existing; and, lastly, the minerals, as yet wholly undeveloped. Although these are undoubtedly much more scarce than in Bolivia and Chile, the absence of an impartial geological survey has rendered the flotation of bogus companies easy, and practically prevented any genuine development, in spite of their greater accessibility than in the former country. The recent boom and collapse in gold ventures was the result of stock exchange transactions, probably fraudulent, as, with the exception of the sea-bed to the very south of the country (where it cannot be recovered), gold is probably one of the few minerals which does not exist to a workable extent.