As for French commerce, it retained, as lately as 1884, a place in the first rank with regard to the exchange of manufactured articles or the products of the soil, the trade being carried on especially through the medium of the Rio da la Plata; indeed there was a time when French commerce represented 51 per cent. of the total trade of the Argentine, while now it is responsible for only 20·7 per cent. of the total value of Argentine imports and exports united. We may therefore consider that the part played by French capital in Argentine affairs is much too small as compared to the function of English capital, and we must regret that France is not more deeply interested in the great movement towards national prosperity. After France the European nation which has invested the largest amount of capital in the Argentine, and which has fully understood the true importance of the latter country, is Germany. In the remarkable increase and expansion of her industries Germany has not forgotten the shores of the Rio de la Plata. She has entered upon a struggle with England; all her electrical and chemical undertakings have taken root; factories have sprung up due entirely to German capital; a German Transatlantic Bank has been established in Buenos Ayres; the Hamburg South American Company flies its ensign on the ocean, swiftly carrying passengers and merchandise between the two continents; a German electrical company has established its power-houses in the Argentine capital; an extract of meat company is drawing its profits from the live-stock industry; several quebracho mills have been founded; many other factories have been established, and the Germans have thus absorbed a large proportion of the Argentine export trade.[114] The commercial relations between Germany and the Argentine increase each day. Twenty years ago the exchanges between the two countries represented hardly 19·4 per cent. of the general foreign trade of the Argentine——at a time when France possessed 51 per cent. instead of her present 20·7 per cent. of the trade——while in 1908 the exchanges with Germany amounted to 23·4 per cent. of the entire trade. [Footnote 114: In the course of the year 1908 there left Buenos Ayres, in the vessels of various lines, 10,805 first-class passengers for Europe, of whom 2750 left by the _German Company of Hamburg_; 2041 by the _Royal Mail Steam Packet Co._; 1193 by the _Messageries Maritimes_; 791 by the _Transports Maritimes à vapeur_; 711 by the _General Italian Navigation Co._; 688 by _La Véloce_; 588 by the _Italia_; 556 by the _Lloyd Sabando_; 377 by the _Lloyd Italiano_; 340 by the _Spanish Transatlantic_; and the rest by vessels of various less important lines.]