The war had cost Brazil three hundred million dollars and over fifty thousand lives. She had gained no substantial result except assuring the safety of Matto Grosso and securing the free navigation of the Paraguay. The Emperor did not attempt to use his victory by establishing a hegemony over South America. Rather did the end of the Paraguayan war mark the beginning of a policy of systematic abstention from intermeddling with outside matters. Paraguay and Uruguay were left in full enjoyment of their independence, and the Argentine then began her marvellous industrial progress and political consolidation. The Plate republics reaped the benefits of the war, while Brazil bore its heaviest burdens. Most of the Argentine provinces had taken little part except to furnish provisions and horses at high prices, and the opening up of Paraguay redounded to the benefit of Buenos Aires and Montevideo--not to that of Rio. No spirit of imperialism spread among the Brazilian people, though they are still proud of the record their soldiers and sailors then made. Their bravery in field fighting and the assault of fortified places was proved beyond question, no matter how poorly they may have been commanded, and how deficient their organisation. The history of no war contains more examples of heroic and hopeless charges, or stories of more desperate hand-to-hand fighting. But a successful battle was followed by torpor; Brazilian tenacity was shown in the patience with which defeats were sustained, and in holding on month after month in camp, rotting in the miasmatic swamps, rather than in pursuing advantages obtained in the field. CHAPTER XX REPUBLICANISM AND EMANCIPATION