nt
upward to form a kind of prow. Catamarans of a larger size are in use in
the West Indies and South America. The name is also given to two boats
lashed together. Apparently through an erroneous connexion with cat, the
name has been applied to a noisy scolding woman.

CATAMARCA, an Andean province of the Argentine Republic, lying W. of
Santiago del Estero and Tucuman and extending to the Chilean frontier,
with Los Andes and Salta on the N., Cordoba on the S.E., and Rioja on
the S. Pop. (1895) 90,161; (1904, estimate) 103,082; area, 47,531 sq. m.
The surface of the province is extremely broken, the Andes forming its
western boundary, and the Aconquija, Ancaste, Ambato, Gulampaja and
other ranges traversing it from north to south. It is composed very
largely of high plateaus with a general slope southward broken by a few
fertile valleys. The greater part of the province is arid and barren,
being sheltered from the moist, eastern winds by the high mountain
barriers of Aconquija and Ancaste. The rivers are small, and some of
them are lost in the barren, sandy wastes. Others, especially in the
foothills of the high sierras, are utilized to irrigate the fertile
valleys. The climate of some of the low, sheltered valleys is extremely
hot and unhealthy, but on the open plateaus it is peculiarly dry and
bracing and is probably beneficial in the treatment of pulmonary
diseases. The mineral resources of the province include gold, silver,
copper, lead, nickel, iron, coal and malachite, but of these only copper
and silver are mined, and these chiefly in the Andalgala district. Salt
deposits also exist, but are worked only to a limited extent. Cereals,
alfalfa and fruit are grown. Large numbers of cattle, fattened in the
alfalfa fields of Pucara, Tinogasta and Copacabana, are driven into
northern Chile across the San Francisco pass (13,124 ft. above sea
level) and mules are bred for the Bolivian market. Wine of an excellent
quality is produced and exported. Tanning leather is another industry of
the province, some of the trees growing in the Catamarca forests being
rich in tannin. Catamarca is traversed by the Northern Central railway
between Cordoba and the city of Catamarca, its capital, which passes
around the southern extremity of the Sierra de Ancaste and makes a long
detour to Chumbicha, near the Rioja frontier. The more important towns,
after Catamarca, the capital, are Andalgala and Tinogasta with
populations (estimated