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beauty mirrored in the lake below. As though night were jealous of those colors of the dying day, a full moon rose to pay her respects to the mountains, and to cast her shadows among the wild foxgloves. It was peaceful and calm with only fairy bells tinkling in the distance-a gurgling waterfall among the mountains.

The dawn was equally beautiful, the shadows grayer with the snow mirrored in the peaceful lake below the swaying Lombardy poplars along the water's edge. Amid this beauty we left Peulla for a motor trip over the mountains to Argentina and Lake Nahuel-Huapí.

This was our first glimpse of Cerro Tronador, with its three peaks, snowcrowned the entire year. It was brilliant in the early morning from the best vantage point, the border of the two countries, with myriads of wild flowers spreading a carpet of many colors up the opposite mountainside to pay tribute to it. Here the ascent began through the mountains, where there were flowers unknown to the North American. Not far from the summit is located Lake Frías, Argentina, about six miles from the border. The lake is small, but the mountains rise in sheer grandeur from its unknown depths. Tronador, with its adjacent snowy range,

towers above it, but does not offer as magnificent an effect as that from the border. Only a short distance overland is Puerto Blest, at the headwaters of Lake Nahuel-Huapí, said to be one of the finest of all the lakes. Even though it was almost lunch time, one could not say that there was complete daylight among these almost vertical snow-capped mountains which rose from the water's edge and were an echo's playground. Beyond the headwaters were tiny islets still unmarred by the track of the tourist. . .

As it was spring, there were wild flowers everywhere. There were yellow violets as large as the American quarter dollar, all kinds of flowering grass, and a white flower so delicate that it seemed a breath of air might blow it away. It sprang from the ground on a six-inch stem. It was snow-white with three bearded petals an inch in length, its center a delicate lavender which resembled a tiny orchid, and its perfume that of our water-lily. There were carpets of them. Farther on were rustic steps leading to another point of the waterfall, and surrounding this were low evergreens, tree fuchsias and a

brilliant red flower unknown to us. From here it was not far to the snow-line and to the birth of the waterfall.

of the Americas and Spain

ARTURO QUESADA

Director of the International Office of the Postal Union of the Americas and Spain

THE action taken by the Fifth Congress of the Postal Union of the Americas and Spain, held at Rio de Janeiro in September 1946, included revision of the 1936 convention and of regulations of execution of the convention, new provisions relative to air mail, various resolutions, and revised agreements on money orders and parcel post.

All the American republics, Canada, and Spain sent representatives to the meeting. It was a Congress unprecedented in the history of the Postal Union of the Americas and Spain. Good results were assured by the fact that the various national delegations were for the most part composed of technical experts. Among the delegates were thirteen postmasters general, forty-four other postal officials, and eleven members of the diplomatic corps.

Furthermore, the technical delegates submitted excellent papers to the Congress. Since it was supposed to meet earlier and had been postponed from time to time, there was ample opportunity for detailed preparation and consideration of the reports presented. This resulted in a thorough and conscientious review of the decisions made by the preceding Congress (Panama, 1936), bringing them up to date in accordance with the demands of the present-day AmericoSpanish postal services.

The results of the regional regulations which, by complementing the universal system, extend and facilitate mail service

within the territories of the Union are well known to have been very favorable to the public interest.

It would take too much space to mention in detail all the amendments introduced into the convention with the explanation of the reasons therefor. It should be emphasized, however, that the basic principles of this Postal Union were firmly upheld and resolutions were generally adopted by a decisive majority.

No mention can be made of the Postal Union of the Americas and Spain without referring to the free transportation of mail and to the application of the domestic postal rates of each country in its international relations. These are pillars of a system which differs greatly from that of the Universal Postal Union. This remarkable economic structure, now thirtyfive years old, has become indispensable to postal interchange in the territory of our Union.

From the gratuitous transit of mail the last vestige of restriction was removed. Each country concerned agreed in the new convention to transport mail of the others free of charge in any boats of their respective registry or flag-not simply in those used for its own mail services. sequently there will be no transit accounts among us, and any means of transportation available to one will be equally available to all the others.

Con

An Argentine delegate maintained that the sender of a letter appreciates the unity of a postal territory when he puts on a

FIFTH CONGRESS OF THE POSTAL UNION OF THE AMERICAS AND SPAIN

letter sent abroad the same postage as for his own country, and notices the frontier when he has to put on a different amount. This privilege of the same national and international rate that anyone using the mails between the countries of our Union enjoys is undoubtedly a most efficient measure for the development of postal interchange. It costs the sender no more to send a letter by ordinary mail from New Orleans to Buenos Aires than from New Orleans to Chicago.

It is interesting to record that among the marks of respect paid by the Congress to the late President Franklin D. Roosevelt was the decision to name the Montevideo headquarters of the Postal Union of the Americas and Spain in his honor and to request each country to issue a commemorative stamp.

The Congress took into account that only in very special cases is it advisable to depart at this time from the provisions of the Universal Postal Union, and postponed action on subjects which might be settled by the Twelfth Universal Postal Congress to be held in May 1947 at Paris. The present world situation requires a prudent policy. In many cases the status quo took

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precedence over ideas for changing and improving service. As a result it was decided that another Congress of the Americo-Spanish Postal Union should be held at Lima two years after the Twelfth Universal Postal Congress so as to take any action required by the decisions of the latter.

One resolution of the Rio Congress was of special interest to the Philatelic Section of the Pan American Union. Created in 1940, this section receives on consignment, for sale at cost, stamps from a number of countries, members of the Americo-Spanish Postal Union, an arrangement that has proved of great service to many of the ten million stamp collectors in the United States. By action of the Rio Congress the Philatelic Section is now made the depository of all stamps issued in the Americas and Spain from January 1, 1941 on. Each country is requested to send to the Section three unused stamps of each issue and value, accompanied by a copy of the law or order authorizing such issue. Undoubtedly this action will result in amplifying the interesting stamp collection that the Pan American Union has been building up for many years.

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Art at the

Pan American Union

THE autumn season of exhibitions at the Pan American Union was opened on September 23, 1946, when several recent works of the well-known Argentine artists Rodolfo Castagna and Hemilce Saforcada were put on display. Both of these artists studied under the distinguished painter Alfredo Guido at the Ernesto de la Càrcova School in Buenos Aires, and Castagna himself is at present a teacher in the same school.

The exhibition at the Pan American Union consisted of 8 oils by Castagna and 13 prints by Saforcada. Castagna's 8 canvases were particularly interesting, demonstrating not only his

HEAD, DRYPOINT BY HEMILCE
SAFORCADA

ROOFS ON A RAINY DAY, OIL BY RODOLFO CASTAGNA

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abundant technical knowledge but also his interest in aligning himself with present-day expression. His reactions to reality were well tempered by a tranquil idealism. Among the pictures on exhibition, Roofs on a Rainy Day offered an outstanding example of richness of color, impasto, and a most adroit distribution of light.

Hemilce Saforcada is one of Argentina's most gifted engravers. The limpid dexterity of her art was expressed in the exhibition through etchings, dry points, and lithographs, representing different periods in the development of her career as an artist. The predominatingly feminine theme was treated throughout with a smooth and amiable sensibility of an unmistakably Botticellian stamp.-J. G. S.

CORNER WITH JACARANDA, OIL BY
RODOLFO CASTAGNA

FLORINA, LITHOGRAPH BY HEMILCE SAFORCADA

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