than fifty million dollars in new work. Argentina and Chile are
pushing lines in all directions. Brazil is preparing to penetrate her
vast jungles, and all this means enormous expense, for the highest
points and most difficult construction that have ever been
encountered are found in Peru, and between Chile and Argentina there
has been constructed the longest tunnel in the world. [Footnote: One
railway ascends to the height of 12,800 feet.]

Most important of all, the old medieval Romanism of the Dark Ages is
losing its grip upon the masses, and slowly, but surely, the leaven
is working which will, before another decade, bring South America to
the forefront of the nations.

The economic possibilities of South America cannot be overestimated.
It is a continent of vast and varied possibilities. There are still
districts as large as the German Empire entirely unexplored, and
tribes of Indians who do not yet know that America has been
"discovered."

This is a continent of spiritual need. The Roman Catholic Church has
been a miserable failure. "Nearly 7,000,000 of people in South
America still adhere, more or less openly, to the fetishisms of their
ancestors, while perhaps double that number live altogether beyond
the reach of Christian influence, even if we take the word Christian
in its widest meaning." [Footnote: Report of Senor F. de Castello]
The Rev. W. B. Grubb, a missionary in Paraguay, says: "The greatest
unexplored region at present known on earth is there. It contains, as
far as we know, 300 distinct Indian nations, speaking 300 distinct
languages, and numbering some millions, all in the darkest
heathenism." H. W. Brown, in "Latin America," says, "There is a pagan