PAMPAS OF THE RIO GRANDE 460 OLD MARKET IN SAO PAULO 465 GOVERNER'S PALACE IN SAO PAULO 469 HOSPITAL AND OLD CHURCH AT PORTO ALEGRE 475 BRIDGE AT MENDANHA 480 CITY OF OURO PRETO 483 EMPEROR DOM PEDRO IN 1889 491 MILITARY SCHOOL OF RIO JANEIRO 493 GENERAL BENJAMIN CONSTANT 496 _From a woodcut._ THE EMPRESS IN 1889 498 AMERICAN LEGATION NEAR RIO 505 CAMPOS SALLES 510 _From a woodcut._ MAPS MAP OF ARGENTINA, PARAGUAY, URUGUAY, BOLIVIA, AND CHILE 38 OUTLINE MAP OF BRAZIL 288 MAP OF SOUTH AMERICA _At end_ _Showing the progress of settlement and present populated area_ INTRODUCTORY THE DISCOVERIES AND THE CONQUEST INTRODUCTORY THE DISCOVERIES AND THE CONQUEST _Spain's Discovery of America._--Town or communal government has been characteristic of Spain since before the Roman conquest. The Visigoths, who destroyed the advanced civilisation they found in the Peninsula, never really amalgamated with the subject population, and, happily, they did not succeed in destroying the municipalities. The liberal, civilised, and tolerant Saracens who drove out the Goths, left their Christian subjects free to enjoy their own laws and customs. The municipalities gave efficient local self-government while a system of small proprietorships made the Peninsula prosper, as in the best days of the Roman dominion. The population of Spain reached twenty millions under the Moors, but finally dynastic civil wars enabled the remnant of Visigoths who had taken refuge in the northern mountains to begin the gradual expulsion of the Mahometans. In the midst of these currents of war and conquest setting to and fro, the old municipalities survived unchangeable, and always supplying local self-government.