Then there is the island, lake, and forest region between Smyth Channel, say, and Valdivia. In the southern part, the principal industries are lumbering and fishing, but in the north, especially in the Province of Chiloé (both the island and mainland) and in Llanquihue, there are also wheat and barley fields, and the fruit, dairy, and cattle-raising industries rank ahead of the timber and fishing, though in Chiloé this last is among the most important. The inhabitants are mostly immigrants, _mestizos_, and Indians, though of a better and far more amenable class than the races farther south. Most of them are descendants of those famous Araucanians, whom it took nearly four hundred years to subdue. Here, throughout nearly the whole of the country, in the uplands as well as near the coast, is the towering _alerce_ (the Chilean pine), often two hundred feet high, sometimes two hundred and fifty, which has a superb white trunk, varying from ten to fifteen feet in diameter, according to height—the rival of the California giant redwoods—and here is the _dingue_, that resembles the mighty German oak, and supplies wood for railroad cars, carriages, casks, and ship-building, of wonderful toughness and durability. There are cypress, walnut, cedar, ash, beech, and others excellent for general building and cabinet purposes, too, and other species of value for their barks. Then, from Valdivia north through the Province of Coquimbo, comes the great central valley, which is excelled by few, if any, of the temperate agricultural regions of the world. It is here, of course, that the principal centers of population are located—Valparaiso, the most important seaport south of San Francisco, and Santiago, the capital, and the ports of Concepción and La Serena, or Coquimbo. In this region all the cereals, fruits, and vegetables are produced in abundance. There are immense vineyards and sugar-beet and tobacco plantations, stock and dairy farms, copper, silver, and coal mines, and factories of almost every description.