FOOTNOTES:

[214] Fully one-third of Armenian consists of words of Persian stock. Some Armenian philologists point to the existence of a small remnant of highly ancient words which cannot be traced to Aryan forms and which probably represent the survival of a language indigenous to the Armenian highlands.

[215] H. R. Hall: The Ancient History of the Near East, London, 1913, pp. 31-79.

[216] R. Dussaud: Les civilisations préhelléniques dans le bassin de la Mer Egée, Paris, 1914, pp. 414-455.

[217] D. G. Hogarth: The Nearer East, New York, 1902, p. 102.

[218] D. G. Hogarth: Ionia and the Near East, Oxford, 1909; J. L. Myres: Greek Lands and the Greek People, Oxford, 1910.

[219] In many of these Anatolian communities Greek is written with Turkish characters.

[220] G. de Jerphanion: La région d’Urgub (Cappadoce), La Géogr., Vol. 30, No. 1, July 15, 1914, pp. 1-11.

[221] In the Levant they are called Mezzo-Mezzos.

[222] J. Garstang: The Land of the Hittites, London, 1910, p. 318.

[223] Many Moslem immigrants from eastern Europe are also found in Asia Minor. Bosnians, Albanians, Pomaks and, in general, members of every Mohammedan community in the Balkan peninsula consider Asia Minor as a favorable land in which to settle.

[224] R. Leonhard: Paphlagonia, Berlin, 1915, pp. 359-373; J. W. Crowfoot: Survivals among the Kappadokian Kizilbash (Bektash), Journ. Anthrop. Inst., Vol. 30, 1900, pp. 305-320.

[225] The distribution of Kizilbash villages in the Yechil Irmak valley is shown in G. de Jerphanion’s Carte du Bassin du Yéchil Irmak, 1:200,000, Paris, 1914.

[226] J. G. Frazer: The Golden Bough, the Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings, London, 1911, Vol. 2, p. 126, footnote 2.

[227] H. F. B. Lynch: Armenia, London, 1901, Vol. 2, p. 430.

[228] Earl Percy: Highlands of Asiatic Turkey, London, 1901, pp. 89-90.

[229] C. Wilson: Handbook for Travelers in Asia Minor, Transcaucasia, Persia, etc., London, 1911, p. 68.

[230] The gipsies of Syria are known by the name of Nawar, or Zotts.

[231] Cf. inset on accompanying map entitled “Part of Asiatic Turkey showing Distribution of Peoples.”

[232] The Mexican parallel is too striking to be omitted here. The southern end of the plateau of Anahuac, on which the waters of Lake Texcuco receded within historical times, is the center of the stage of Mexican history. Surrounding this open land numerous narrow valleys were peopled by independent tribes which eventually banded together under the leadership of the community living near the central body of water. This lake confederacy became Cortez’s most powerful opponent when the conquistadores undertook their memorable expedition. Cf. F. J. Payne: History of the New World Called America, Oxford, 1899, pp. 450-463.

[233] D. G. Hogarth: The Ancient East, New York, 1914, p. 74.

[234] Notably t is entirely eliminated from the third person singular.

[235] Handbook for Travelers in Asia Minor, Transcaucasia, Persia, etc., London, 1911, p. 75.

[236] Petermanns Mitt., Vol. 42, Jan. 1896, p. 8; and for details V. Cuinet: La Turquie d’Asie, Paris, 1891-94, Vols. 1-4.

[237] The Armenian population of Turkey is divided by creed into three distinct communities. The vast majority—probably about ninety per cent—belong to the Gregorian sect of Christianity. Adherents of the Roman Catholic faith are found chiefly in western Asia Minor. Protestant congregations have sprung up around the educational institutions maintained by British or American missionary societies. Let it be noted here that many Mohammedan communities in Armenia consist of Armenoid individuals whose membership in the fold of Islam is the result of forcible conversions since the rise of Ottoman power. The Dersimlis, who inhabit the region between the two main branches of the Euphrates, have the reputation of being crypto-Christians of Armenian blood. Moslems of Armenian origin are also known in the village of Karageben on the Tehalta river east of Divrik. In Russia the Armenians number a scant million souls. Half of this community is scattered in the valley of the Arax and in the Erivan province.

[238] F. von Luschan: The Early Inhabitants of Western Asia, Ann. Rept. Smithsonian Inst. for 1914, pp. 561-562.

[239] “Rarely of unusual stature ... complexion dark” is Wilson’s description. Handbook for Travelers in Asia Minor, Transcaucasia, Persia, etc., London, 1911, p. 64.

[240] Mark Sykes: The Kurdish Tribes of the Ottoman Empire, Journ. Anthrop. Inst., Vol. 38, 1908, pp. 451-486.

[241] B. Dickson: Journeys in Kurdistan, Geogr. Journ., Vol. 35, No. 4, April 1910, p. 361.

[242] De Torcy: Notes sur la Syrie, La Géogr., Vol. 27, No. 3, March 15, 1913, pp. 161-197; No. 6, June 15, 1913, pp. 429-459.

[243] L. Gaston Leary: Syria, the Land of Lebanon, New York, 1913, p. 10.

[244] R. Dussaud: Les Nossairis, Bibl. de l’École des Hautes Études, Sciences, Philosophie et Histoire, Paris, 1900, Vol. 129.

[245] J. Garstang: The Land of the Hittites, London, 1910, pp. 15, 16.

[246] About forty towns and villages are held by the Druzes in the southern Lebanon. In the Anti-Lebanon districts they people eighty villages and share possession of about two hundred with their Christian kinsmen, the Maronites.

[247] Hakem was a Fatimite caliph of Egypt, who ruled in the early eleventh century. He incurred the hatred of his subjects by causing the incarnation of God in himself to be preached in Cairo by Darasi, his chaplain. Both became so unpopular that they were forced to escape from the capital to the Lebanon, where they succeeded in imposing their doctrines on the mountaineers. The name Druze is believed to be derived from Darasi.

[248] In recent years the Maronites have submitted to the authority of the Vatican. In return certain privileges, such as that of retention of Syriac liturgy, have been accorded to them. They constitute a veritable theocracy, all tribal and community affairs being handled by the clergy.

[249] The French military expedition to the Lebanon, undertaken in 1860, was caused by the massacre of over 12,000 Maronites by the Druzes in that year.

[250] This group comprises about 90,000 souls in Syria and 40,000 in Mesopotamia.

[251] E. Aubin: La Perse d’aujourd’hui, Paris, 1908, p. 418.

[252] The Elephantine papyri discovered on the island of Elephantine in southern Egypt between 1903 and 1906 contain Aramaic texts of great historical value.

[253] O. Procksch: Die Völker Altpalästinas, Leipzig, 1914, p. 30.

[254] At the end of the pre-Islamic period the region west of the Euphrates to the eastern slopes of the Lebanon mountains was known to the Arabs as “Beit Aramyeh,” or the land of the Arameans.

[255] H. Lammens: Le Massif du Gebal et les Yezidis de Syrie, Mélanges Faculté Orient. Univ. Beyrouth, 1907, pp. 366-407.

[256] W. B. Heard: Notes on Yezidis, Journ. Anthrop. Inst., Vol. 41, pp. 200-219.

[257] A. P. Stanley: Lectures on the History of the Eastern Church, New York, 1909, p. 58.

[258] H. Trotter: Geogr. Journ., Vol. 35, No. 4, 1910, p. 378.

[259] F. J. Bliss: The Religions of Modern Syria and Palestine, New York, 1912.

[260] The figures for Armenians and Greeks require revision in view of the systematic efforts of the Turks to extirpate these two peoples. The massacres of the entire Greek population of villages of the Ægean coasts and atrocities of a most inhuman character perpetrated on the Armenians of inland communities have largely depleted the ranks of these two Christian subject groups.

[261] Hellenes, or subjects of the King of Greece, number about 20,000.

[262] Figures supplied by Dr. W. W. Rockwell, Editor of the American Committee for Armenian and Syrian Relief. See Rockwell: Pitiful Plight, second ed., pp. 66.

[263] Abbreviations; R. C.: Roman Catholic Uniats, “Chaldeans.” R. C. s.: Roman Catholic Uniats, “Syrian Catholics.” J.: Jacobites. N.: Nestorians, “Assyrian Christians.” P.: Protestants.

[CHAPTER XIII]
SUMMARY AND APPLICATIONS

The science of geography attains its highest usefulness when called into the service of man. Having in mind the influence of regional environment upon human societies and particularly upon language and nationality as shown in the foregoing chapters, let us next look at the bearing of our conclusions on the determination of international frontiers. The problem consists in ascertaining the logical or natural limit of the spread of language and nationality. Growing at first in listless response to environment, natural frontiers eventually attain a stage where intelligent conformity to the same environment becomes necessary. Here the linguistic factor based on a sound geographical foundation acquires practical value though it is not necessarily the only determining element.

The spirit of nationality represents the highest development of the idea of self-preservation. Its growth can be traced from the individual to the family, thence to the tribe and city, until the formation of the political state is obtained. In the last stages of this process, nationality attains perfection through homogeneity of its component individuals. The men who compose a single nation must think together. Their ideals and aims must be one and they must be conscious of a common destiny. Language, as the currency of thought, naturally becomes the unifier. To a notable degree areas of homogeneous language in Europe have been spared the havoc of battle or siege. On the other hand, linguistic borderlands have always been scenes of armed struggle and destruction.

Community of origin is not essential among members of the same nation. The bond of language and identity of historical destiny suffice for the creation of nationality. An English-speaking immigrant on United States soil, imbued with the spirit of the principles on which the country’s independence is founded, finds himself in a state of response to the idea of American nationality. And yet, the idea of nationality is no mere integration of historical associations. It stands enthroned in the land. The poet touches his compatriot’s heart by recalling the murmur of the forest or by a picture of the winding shore. Through the charm of living green enshrined in circling hills, at times through an appreciation of the solemn peak rising heavenward, man found love of homeland. A strong tie between humanity and the land was created by these relations.

Nationality cannot depend on language alone, for it is founded on geographical unity. The past thousand years of European history contain sufficient proof of the fact. The three southern peninsulas Spain, Italy and Greece are homelands of an equal number of nations. A single language is current in each. To the north a similar differentiation of nations adapts itself to regional divisions. Plains, mountains and seas have limited European nationalities to definite number and extension.

Thus every people acquires a peculiar genius which expresses itself in characteristic fashion and cannot be made to assume a guise alien to its own spirit. It absorbs the idealism of its captors and molds it into its own form. The poet’s intuition rarely echoed deeper truth than in the oft-quoted passage which immortalized the spirit of Hellas:

Graecia capta ferum victorem cepit, et artes

Intulit agresti Latio.

Europe was stirred to the consciousness of nationality by the French Revolution. Nations began finding themselves when the doctrine of man’s equality, proclaimed on French soil, found responsive welcome among the peoples of the continent. But the new spirit caused dismay in every court circle. The inevitable reaction that followed was reflected in the treaty of Vienna of 1815, when national aspirations were ignominiously ignored and peoples beheld themselves bartered as chattels. The delegates in attendance sat as representatives of dynastic interests. Their interest in remodeling the political map of Europe was absorbed wholly by the idea of securing compensation for the spoliation of the territorial property of their sovereigns. Their labors meant triumph for autocratic rule. Popular clamor for national grouping was unheeded. Instead of quieting Europe, the treaty of Vienna was a virtual admission on the part of less than three dozen men that Europeans were incapable of bearing the glorious burden of their own destinies. The tares of monarchical despotism were left to stain the field of popular freedom.

But the seed sown by the great act of the French Revolution was hardy. It was too late to eradicate liberal spirit from European society. A mighty struggle of ideas ushered in the revolts of 1830 and 1848. Twenty odd years more, and for the first time in its history western Europe was parceled into linguistic nations. The birth of Germany during this period was significantly heralded by an outburst of patriotic literature which for fire and enthusiasm was unprecedented. Geibel’s demand for a united Germany in Heroldsrufe was but the echo of the aspirations of millions of his countrymen. France emerged out of these ordeals without loss of her linguistic territory. The area of German speech received marked attention. In truth the morning of modern German nationality may be said to have broken in 1815. A year prior to this historic date, the decision had been reached at the treaty of Paris (March 30, 1814) to unite the German states into a single confederation. The dominating thought of European diplomacy, at the time, was to prevent a recurrence of Napoleonic disturbances.

With their restricted territories, as well as by the jealousies which animated their rulers, the German states lay, an easy prey, at the mercy of any ambitious foreign leader. In their union, Europe hoped to lay the foundations of continental peace. Such a federation, it was thought, would safeguard the other European countries from a concerted German attack, as it seemed highly improbable that the entire confederacy would join in a war undertaken by any one of its members for purposes of self-aggrandizement. By this arrangement provision was made for the strengthening of a number of weak states without the creation of a new powerful unit in the group of European nations. Thirty million Germans, comprising by far the majority of the German-speaking inhabitants of the period, were thus politically welded for the first time in modern history.

The idea of nationality had received scant attention in Germany before the nineteenth century. Kant, Fichte and Hegel contributed powerfully to its awakening. Hardly had the concept become familiar to German thought before its relation with language became established. The trend of feeling on the subject is best expressed by Arndt about half a century before the fruition of Bismarck’s life project at Versailles:

Was ist das deutsche Vaterland?

So nenne endlich mir das Land!

So weit die deutsche Zunge klingt

Und Gott im Himmel Lieder singt,

Dass soll es sein, dass soll es sein,

Das ganze Deutschland soll es sein.[264]

A literary history of a country is, in great measure, the mirror of its political growth. The development of social aptitudes, of intellectual faculties or of material wants within a given area is, in the last resort, an expansion of the living forces which make for nationality and which, ultimately, find their way to literary records. Nationality and literature are thus bound together by geography and history. Whatever be the period under observation, the spirit of the day pervades them both. A striking example of this relation is observable in medieval France, where the troubadours personified the feudal conditions which prevailed in the country. And furthermore literature, as a human product, partakes of all the limitations which are subtly imposed by the land on the fancy. It varies therefore, according to region, in mental temperament, tastes and emotions or modes of thought.

So because it is part of life and a living influence, literature has always consolidated the nation-forming power of language. Poetry, especially, is often an intensified reflection of national thought and life. In the words of Irving, “Poets always breathe the feeling of a nation.” The cultivation of literature serves national ends. In the very child, love of country is instilled through the medium of doggerel—sometimes through lines of exquisite simplicity. In thus strengthening the idea of nationality, literature may be compared to the statue hewn from the marble of language by patriotic and artistic thought.

Belgian writers, in this respect, occupy a place of their own in European literature. Verhaeren and Maeterlinck voice the depth of their sincerity in the language of their Walloon colleague Lemonnier. Love of country in Spaak, a Fleming, is sung in French verse:

Oui, sois de ton pays. Connais l’idolâtrie

De la terre natale! Et porte en toi l’orgueil

Et le tourment de ses jours de gloire et de deuil.

Antoine Clesse, the poet of Mons, likewise expresses popular feeling in French:

Flamands, Wallons,

Ne sont que des prénoms

Belge est notre nom de famille.

No matter how the works of these poets are analyzed, in the inmost souls of these writers it is the land that speaks. Belgium is fathomed in their hearts. Their eyes lingered lovingly on the scenery in the midst of which they lived. Flat roads winding interminably over flat lands, chimes whose tones mellow with age ring from the crumbling tops of old towers, rustic feasts enlivened by the roaring mirth and joviality celebrated by Flemish painters, these are the visions which are evoked by the French words assembled by Belgian writers in their compositions. One would seek in vain, however, for these Belgian scenes in French literature. Like the Belgicisms which abound delightfully in every Belgian writer’s works, they portray the soul of Belgian poetry as sincerely as they afford genuine glimpses of Belgian lands. The same subtle sensation of the living earth has been felt on the troubled surface of mountainous Switzerland. For of Swiss lands and life few descriptions will ever combine the charm and faithfulness which characterize the works of Gottfried Keller, foremost among the country’s writers who drew on the joint inspiration of flaming patriotism and the incomparable beauty of Swiss landscape.

And how often has the written or spoken word fanned the flame of nationality among downtrodden peoples! The story is the same from land to land and age to age. The soul of a nation in bondage is wrapped around its patriotic literature. Generation after generation of Bohemians, Finns or Poles have drunk at the national fount of poem and song. Within the peasant’s thatched home as in the city abode, the well-worn volume, pregnant with past glory, becomes the beacon of hope. It lights the darkness of oppression’s heaviest hours. For men of feeling, destiny will ever be hailed in the word that stirs. The harvest reaped by Cavour was of Dante’s sowing.

In the bitter linguistic struggles waged in Europe two gratifying facts are discernible. The dominance of the majority by an intellectually gifted minority prevails in every country and age. Furthermore, the survival of oppressed minorities in the midst of oppressing majorities appears to be general. The one is the reward of competence; the other is the triumph of right over might. Both are victories of the human will. Both have been purchased by dint of hard struggle. Humanity is the better for them.

Neither has conquest always been able to introduce a new language. The widening sphere of Roman influence carried the original dialect of the capital to the confines of the world. But it is unlikely that Latin was spoken in the Nubian provinces or other outlying districts to a greater degree than English is spoken in India today. It was only the language of the dominant element and the one in which official transactions were recorded. As a rule the oldest language of a country is spoken by its peasants. The tillers of the soil usually represent the oldest stratum in the population of a region. The principle holds in territories which have borne the brunt of successive invasions. It is the same in Macedonia, Poland or Transylvania. On the other hand, the land-owning class is generally recruited from among past invaders.

The value of language as a national asset was shown in France during the trying days of war when the very existence of the country was at stake. Respect for the mother-tongue is deeply immured in every Frenchman’s heart. In no other country does the feeling reach the same pitch. The French educational system provides ample facilities for the early initiation of students to the beauties of their vernacular. The clear and connected thought for which French writing stands preëminent, its capacity for expressing the most subtle shades of meaning, are largely results of literary discipline.

A perusal of war-time literature cannot sufficiently indicate the part played by French language in periods of stress. One must preferably have had the privilege of acquaintance with correspondence exchanged between relatives and intimates. Patriotism pours unfaltering from the artless lines never intended for strangers’ eyes. It is as if the crowded consciousness of French nationality found constant release through its language. Every observant foreigner in France has been struck by this fact. In some instances where perception was more than usually attentive we find, as in E. Wharton’s “Fighting France,” that:

“It is not too much to say that the French are at this moment drawing a part of their national strength from their language. The piety with which they have cherished and cultivated it has made it a precious instrument in their hands. It can say so beautifully what they feel that they find strength and renovation in using it; and the word once uttered is passed on, and carries the same help to others. Countless instances of such happy expression could be cited by any one who has lived the last year (1915) in France. On the bodies of young soldiers have been found letters of farewell to their parents that made one think of some heroic Elizabethan verse; and the mothers robbed of these sons have sent them an answering cry of courage.”

One of the most remarkable instances of the influence of poetry on national destiny is found in Serbian nationality, which has been cast altogether in the mold of the country’s epic ballads or “pjesmes.” Although primarily inspired by the valorous deeds of legendary heroes, these indigenous compositions describe Serbian life and nature with extraordinary verisimilitude and beauty. They are national in a significant sense, not merely because the very soul of the Serbian people is displayed in their lines, but also because they have perpetuated Serbian history and language. The purity of the Serbian tongue, its freedom from alien words, no less than the maintenance of historical continuity in Serbia are due, in a large measure, to the wandering of native minstrels—the guzlars—who went to and fro reciting or singing the wonderful exploits of their noted countrymen. Their unconscious, though passionate insistence provided the Serbian with the only schooling in national sentiment which he has undergone for generations beginning with half-mythical times. However slow, the method was effective, for it prevented atrophy of national hopes. Without this influence the Serbians would probably have degenerated into a people listless and inert to the call of nationality. The very name of Serbia might never have been recorded in modern history.

The guzlars were therefore peddlers of nationality. The most convincing evidence of their vital contribution to the formation of the modern Serbian state is found during the five hundred years in which the Turk’s benumbing rule was felt in the land. Marko Kraljevitch, the popular hero-knight, feudal lord and outlaw, according as occasion demanded, embodies Serbian resistance and Serbian revolt against Moslem invaders. The stirring accents in which tales of his deep attachment to Serbia were recounted awakened exultant delight in the heart and brain of listeners and inspired them to the hope of liberation from the hated yoke. Serbia was prepared for the day of national independence by means of this slow and century-long propaganda.

Replete with the glow and color of Serbian lands, the pjesme voices Serbia’s national aspirations once more in the storm and stress of new afflictions. Its accents ring so true that the geographer, in search of Serbian boundaries, tries in vain to discover a surer guide to delimitation. For Serbia extends as far as her folk-songs are heard. From the Adriatic to the western walls of Balkan ranges, from Croatia to Macedonia, the guzlar’s ballad is the symbol of national solidarity. His tunes live within the heart and upon the lips of every Serbian. The pjesme may therefore be fittingly considered the measure and index of a nationality whose fiber it has stirred. To make Serbian territory coincide with the regional extension of the pjesme implies defining of the Serbian national area. And Serbia is only one among many countries to which this method of delimitation is applicable.

In Finland, nationality is embodied in the heartening lines of the “Kalevala,” that Iliad of the north which takes its coloring from nature with no less delightful sensitiveness than the Homeric masterpiece. The lines of the poem define this Finnish epic as:

Songs of ancient wit and wisdom,

Legends they that once were taken

————

From the pastures of the Northland,

From the meads of Kalevala.

————

In this poem the beauty and color of Finland’s inland seas and the bleakness of surrounding plains are painted in bold strokes and with loving effusiveness. The Finn finds in its lines a reminder of the scenes among which he has been reared and the link which binds him to his past and to his land. As a mosaic of national life pieced together by patriotism the Kalevala occupies a unique position among literary productions of northern countries. Even a note of Asiatic melancholy pervades its verses as if to recall the share of Asia in the formation of Finnish national life.

The lyrics and songs collected in the Kalevala were brought together in the beginning of the nineteenth century at a critical period of Finnish history when national feeling had sunk to its lowest ebb. Swedes and Russians vied with one another in their efforts to denationalize Finland and bring the peninsula within the sphere of their respective influence. No sooner was the Kalevala published, however, than Finnish nationality asserted itself with renewed vigor. Today after the lapse of almost a century since this revival, Finland’s spirit of national independence is diffused more widely than ever among its people. Such was the influence of a literary echo of their land.

Among the peoples of Turkey, nationality and literature become largely expressions of religious feeling. It could not be otherwise in a country in which creed is the only medium of intellectual progress. The oppressed native found refuge from the tyranny of his Turkish masters in his church. His natural yearning for a higher life found solace only within the sanctuaries of his faith. All the education he received was obtained in schools attached to the churches.

But to unravel the hopeless confusion which, at first glance, seems to permeate human groupings in Turkey is, in the main, a problem of geography. The region consists of a mountainous core and a series of marginal lowlands. Its elevated area is a link in the central belt of mountains which extends uninterruptedly from Asia into Europe. This long chain of uplifts is the original seat of an important race of highlanders collectively known as Homo alpinus.[265] As far as is ascertainable to date, the mountaineers of Turkey have all the anatomical characteristics pertaining to this branch of the human family. Their religion and language may differ but the physical type remains unchanged. Basing themselves on this relation, anthropologists have assumed that Asiatic Turkey is the brood-home of a sub-species of Homo alpinus which is gradually acquiring recognition as a primordial Armenoid element.[266] This type exists in its greatest purity today among the Mohammedan dissenters of the Anatolian table-land as well as among the Druzes and Maronites of Syria.

By geographical position, Asiatic Turkey is the junction of land thoroughfares which trend from south to north as well as from east to west. Its aboriginal population came inevitably into contact with the races whose migrations are known to have begun about 4,000 B.C. A second group of peoples is thus obtained in which the old strain is considerably modified. Armenians, Turks, upland Greeks, Jacobites, Nestorians and most of the Kurds represent this mixed element. A third group consists of lowlanders who never made the ascent of Turkish mountains and consequently carry no traces of Hittite ancestry. Maritime Greek populations and Arabs fall under this classification.

In the main we see that the mountain bears in its central part a homogeneous and coherent people. Distance from the core has slight effect upon the physical characteristics of the mountaineers, as long as they do not forsake the upland for the lowland. Their ideas, however, undergo modifications which can be interpreted as concessions to the views of more powerful peoples with whom contact is established. Customs, however, generally remain unchanged even if they have to be maintained in secrecy.

Nevertheless, relief alone cannot account for the variety of peoples and religions in Asiatic Turkey. The easternmost fringe of Christianity emerging sporadically out of an ocean of Mohammedanism discloses, by the variety of its discordant elements, the extent to which distance from Constantinople, the religious capital of the eastern church, had weakened the power of ecclesiastical authority. Armenians, Nestorians, Chaldeans, Jacobites and Maronites, one and all heretics in the eyes of Orthodox prelates, were merely independent thinkers who relied on the remoteness of their native districts in order to protest, without peril to themselves, against the innovations of Byzantine theologians, or to stand firm on the basis of the rites and doctrines of early Christianity.

From the social standpoint the eastern half of Asiatic Turkey deserves investigation as the seat of an immemorial conflict between nomadism and sedentary life. Every stage of the transition between the two conditions may be observed. The feuds which set community against community in Turkey often originate in the divergent interests of nomad and settled inhabitant, and are enforced by economic factors. As an example the Kurds of the Armenian highlands may be mentioned. The perpetuation of nomadism in their case is the result of extensive horse-breeding[267]—their chief source of revenue—which compels them to seek low ground in winter.

Viewed as a whole, Asiatic Turkey has changed from an ideal nursery of hardy men to a land of meeting between races and peoples as well as between their ideals. It may be safely predicted that the future of its inhabitants bids fair to be as intimately affected as their past by the remarkable situation of the country and its physical features. One can only hope, for their sake, that a thorough invasion of highland and lowland by the spirit of the west will not be delayed much longer. This much may be said now, that the establishment of Christian rule in the land would probably be attended by wholesale conversions to Christianity in many so-called Mohammedan communities, where observance of Islamic rites has been dictated by policy, rather than by faith.

In dealing with the varied influences which engage attention in a study of linguistic areas the student is frequently compelled to pause before the importance of economic relations. Inspection of a map of Europe suggests strikingly that zones of linguistic contact were destined by their very location to become meeting-places for men speaking different languages. They correspond to the areas of circulation defined by Ratzel.[268] The confusion of languages on their site is in almost every instance the result of human intercourse determined by economic causes. Necessity, far more than the thought of lucre, compels men to resort to intercourse with strangers. In Belgium, after the Norman conquest, the burghers of Flanders were able to draw on English markets for the wool which they converted into the cloth that gave their country fame in the fairs of Picardy and Champagne.[269] We have here a typical example of Ratzel’s “Stapelländern” or “transit regions.”

In very small localities the spread of language brought about by economic changes has occasionally come under the scrutiny of modern observers. At Grimault, in the ancient land of Burgundy, the deterioration of the local patois due to intensive working of quarries between 1860 and 1880 has been studied by E. Blin.[270] Laborers from remote districts were attracted by the prospect of work. Some intermarried with the natives. The influx of the foreign element was followed by the replacement of the locality’s vernacular by French.

In west-central Europe the line of traffic along the Rhine at the end of the twelfth century ran from Cologne to Bruges along the divide between French and Flemish. Lorraine, a region of depression between the Archean piles of the Ardennes and Vosges, invited access from east and west and was known to historians as a Gallo-Romanic market place of considerable importance.[271]

In our time the river trade between Holland and Germany along the Rhine has caused expansion of Dutch into German territory as far as Wesel and Crefeld. The intruding language, however, yields to German wherever the latter is present.[272] Prevalence of French in parts of Switzerland is generally ascribed to travel through certain Alpine passes.[273] The area of human circulation between Lake Constance and Lake Geneva has endowed Switzerland with 35 different dialects of German, 16 of French, 8 of Italian and 5 of Romansh.[274] The penetration of German into the Trentino has already been explained. In Austria the entire valley of the Danube has provided continental trade with one of its most important avenues. Attention is called elsewhere to the Balkan peninsula as an intercontinental highway. In a word, language always followed in the wake of trade and Babel-like confusion prevailed along channels wherein men and their marketable commodities flowed.

This retrospect also leads to the conclusion that the influence of physical features in the formation of European nationalities has been exerted with maximum intensity in the early periods of their history. This was at the time when man’s adaptation to environment was largely blind and unconditioned by his own will. Freedom from this physical thralldom is attained only through man’s practical knowledge of human necessities and a sound vision of the welfare of his descendants. Manifestations of nature can then be made subservient to the human will. In this regard historians may eventually be induced to divide their favorite study into two main periods characterized respectively by man’s submission to, or his intelligent control of, environment. A proper understanding of this conception may contribute to the establishment of frontiers with a view to eliminating conflicts due to relics of national or historical incompatibility.

The development of modern boundaries should be regarded as a process originating in barriers first provided by nature and subsequently elaborated by the human will for its purposes. Gradually however natural features of the land lose value as national boundaries. This is the result of man’s progress, of the development of railways or wireless stations. It is the removal of natural obstacles; the conquest of distance by speed. All these advances tend to promote intercourse. They are opening the vista of a day when an international boundary will have no greater importance in world affairs than the limiting line of a city plot.

National frontiers, at best, become established by virtue of historical accidents. At given times and in order to promote fellowship among nations it becomes necessary to define the areas over which certain principles of political jurisdiction are recognized as valid by a given body of men. A national frontier in the strictest sense of the term cannot, therefore, be limited by the surface feature which has shaped its development. It has generally outgrown this phase of its extension together with the constantly increasing range of activity of the peoples it once inclosed. Factors of an ethnological, economic or linguistic nature must, therefore, be considered. Then only will the new delimitation be entitled to be qualified as natural.

The preëminence of the linguistic factor set forth in these pages may be illustrated concisely by the accepted recognition of the “langue d’oïl” as the national language of France by all Frenchmen of the present day, although this would have been impossible five centuries ago. Adoption of the linguistic criterion in boundary delimitation becomes, therefore, a mere matter of expediency. Its worth is not due to any assumed abstract value of language. It is merely a practical manner of settling divergences regarding national ownership of border territories. It is of value because the guiding consideration in boundary delimitation or revision is to eliminate future sources of conflict.

The European war is no exception to the fact that almost every conflict of magnitude has been due, in part, to ill-adjusted frontier lines. Slight regard for national aspirations seems to have prevailed in the delimitations determined upon by the signatory powers of every important treaty. The seed of ulterior fighting was thus sown, for one of the main features of modern history is the growth of national feeling as a dominating force in human affairs.

With Europe rid of Napoleon, the treaty of Vienna was framed by his allied foes in 1815 for the purpose of recasting the political map. No heed was paid, however, to the legitimate desire of smaller European nations to rule themselves. An instance of some of the gross blunders committed then was the merging of Belgium and Holland into one nationality in spite of the protests of their representatives. Feelings of the bitterest nature between Belgians and Dutch engendered by this act ultimately forced a war between the two countries in 1830. It was only after their separation that the enmity of the two peoples gave way to cordial relations. Subsequent history has shown that these two nations have often been of greater help to each other while retaining separate political entity than under forced union. In Italy also the progress made towards union by Italian-speaking peoples was checked by this treaty and the country split once more into a number of small independent states. The assignation of Lombardy and Venetia to Austria led eventually to the war of 1859.

In contrast with these cases, Germany’s rise to power with unprecedented rapidity in the history of the world is a striking instance of the splendid development attainable within boundaries peopled by inhabitants of the same speech. With language and an efficient army in control Prussia only needed a leader to direct the gravitation of other German-speaking states within its own orbit. Bismarck stepped in, the right man at the right time. In 1864 he hurled the Prussian fighting machine against Denmark and wrenched the provinces of Schleswig-Holstein from that country. Two years later he turned on Austria and imposed Prussian leadership on the German-speaking world. These warlike moves gave Prussia the ascendency in the North German Confederation. Only the states of southern Germany were now needed to form the German Empire his patriotic mind had conceived. To enlist their sympathies he found it necessary to strike at France. His task was accomplished when a united Germany annexed Alsace-Lorraine.

Bismarck’s work was flawless as long as he added Germans to the empire of his creation. He erred grievously, however, in including a small number of Frenchmen with Alsace-Lorraine. Had linguistic boundaries been respected at the treaty of Frankfort, and the French districts of the conquered provinces left to France, it is safe to say that Franco-German relations would not have been marked by the lack of cordiality which has characterized them since 1871. From whatever standpoint the subject be approached, the inclusion of a handful of Frenchmen within German territory was neither politic nor economic. Today Germans may well ask themselves whether the move was desirable.

The task of uniting all Germans under a single scepter was not completed by Bismarck. Ten million Germans are still subjects of the Austrian Emperor. But Austria as a political unit stands on exceedingly shaky foundations. This is due to the inclusion within its boundaries of 10 million Hungarians, 20 million Slavs and several million peoples of Romance speech. As a result, Austria is likely to be split into a number of independent states. Should this dissolution come about, the natural desire of Germans is to witness the crumbling of Austria’s pieces into Germany’s lap. The union of all German-speaking inhabitants of Europe into a single nation would then become an accomplished fact.

Considered from the broad standpoint of human migrations England, France and Italy may be regarded as understudies in the drama staged on the old continent. The star performers are Russia and Germany, and the issue is between these two nations. The grouping of European nations with Russia is a mere result of Germany’s preponderant strength. The end of the conflict will necessarily witness the recasting of alliances along with changes of frontier lines.

For at the bottom of it all the fight is between Slav and Teuton. It is a grim and unrelenting struggle for existence that is shaping itself into one of the world’s fiercest racial contests. The Slavic peoples are steadily pressing in from the east though not with the barbarity which characterized their earlier onslaughts. It is the turn of Russians, Poles, Bohemians, Slovenes, Serbians and Croats, slowly to crowd on the descendants of the blue-eyed flaxen-haired barbarians, representing Germanic peoples.

This Slavonic westerly push has always been blocked by the leading power in the west. France opposed it in the Napoleonic period. Great Britain checked it in the latter half of the nineteenth century. Today it is Germany’s turn to stand the brunt of its pressure. As matters stand both Germany and Russia are vigorous, young and fast-growing. The two peoples have taken root on adjacent land like two sturdy oaks. They are now in the stage at which the soil’s nourishment at the border suffices only for one. The weaker must wither. The Teuton is expanding eastward, the Slav is spreading westward. Their main clashing-zone happens to be the Balkan peninsula. The ceaseless agitation in this area and its menace to the world’s peace is a consequence of the antagonism between the Pan-Slavic Colossus and the Pan-German Titan.

Germany’s expansion is a natural phenomenon. The country is overpopulated. It must expand. The sea is a barrier to its westerly expansion. The north is uninviting. The south is being drained of its resources by active and intelligent inhabitants. The “Drang nach Osten” of German Imperialism is therefore inevitable. The line of least resistance points to the east, where fertile territory awaits development.

Little wonder, then, that the attention of Germany’s far-seeing statesmen has been directed toward oriental countries, whose wealth of natural resources and genial climate combine to render them ideally attractive. The verdant vales and forest-clad mountains of Serbia, Greece and Bulgaria abound with raw material needed for Germany’s increasing industries. Beyond the narrow watercourse, intervening between Europe and Asia, at the Dardanelles and Bosporus lies Asia Minor, a land marvelously rich in minerals and susceptible of great agricultural development. Farther east the exceedingly fertile Mesopotamian valley, once the granary of the civilized world, stretches between the western Euphrates and Tigris, and bids fair to provide humanity anew with vast supplies of cereals.

This is the vision which has floated alluringly before the minds of German and Austrian statesmen, working hand in hand, Austria paving the way in the Balkans, Germany forcing herself successfully in the control of Asia Minor, which today is a German colony in all but name. By their joint efforts, the Teuton brothers have laid the foundation of an empire whose northern shore is washed by the Baltic and whose southern boundary may extend to the Persian Gulf. The great obstacle to this scheme of German expansion is constituted by the neighborhood of Russia and the predominance of the Slavic element in the population of the Balkan peninsula. Montenegrins, Serbians, Macedonians and even Bulgarians dread annexation by Germany.

At the end of the Balkan wars, Russia had scored heavily against Germany. An enlarged Serbia had been constituted directly in the path of Teutonic advance. In addition to this Slavic victory, every Balkan country had been strengthened considerably by the new delimitation of their frontiers. For the first time in their history, Greeks, Bulgarians and Serbians found that their national border could be made to coincide with their linguistic boundary. This national sifting is by no means complete in the Balkan peninsula. But there is no question that notable progress in the recognition of patriotic aspirations was made as soon as the region was rid of its Turkish masters.

With the history of the past hundred years in mind, statesmen engaged in the task of framing peace treaties may well heed the lessons taught by political geography. They might conclude then that greater possibilities of enduring peace exist whenever the delimitation of new frontiers is undertaken with a view to segregating linguistic areas within separate national borders. Commerce and industry will overcome ultimately these barriers and pave the way to friendly international intercourse. These are the lines along which intelligent statecraft will earn its reputation in the future.

The practical value of linguistic frontiers as national boundaries is due to their geographical growth. They are natural because they are the result of human intercourse based largely on economic needs. Having developed naturally, they correspond to national aspirations. Such being the case, the task of frontier delimitation can be made to assume a scientific form. Only in the case of uninhabited or sparsely populated regions will an artificial boundary—say, of the straight line type—prove adequate. But in tenanted portions of the earth’s surface where human wills and desires come into play the problem cannot be dismissed so lightly. The ordinary laws of science must then be applied. This, after all, merely implies drawing on the stock of common sense accumulated by the human race in the course of its development. The clear duty of statesmen engaged in a revision of boundaries is to put the varied interests at stake into harmony with the facts of nature as they are revealed by geography. This is possible because the science deals with the surface of the earth considered as the field of man’s activity. Its data can be drawn upon just as successfully as the engineer draws upon the energy of a waterfall or a ton of coal. Soundness and permanency of the labor of delimitation can thus be insured.

The preceding remarks should not be considered as implying that a mountain, or a river, or even the sea are to be arbitrarily regarded as frontiers. Lines of water-parting deserve particular mention as having provided satisfactory national borders in history. But in boundaries each case should be treated upon its own merits. There was a time when, in Cowper’s words:

Mountains interposed

Make enemies of nations who had else

Like kindred drops been mingled into one.

And yet the passes of the Alps refute the poet’s statement. Their uniting function eventually overcame their estranging power. The easterly spread of French language over the Vosges concurs in the same trend of testimony. The imposing mass of the Urals is no more of a parting than are the Appalachians. To be pertinent, it will be necessary, in each instance, to consider the complex operations of natural laws and the process of fusing and building up of nationality brought about by their agency.

The value of mountains in the scheme of useful boundary demarcation has been attested in the European war. Towns and villages sheltered behind rocky uplifts have suffered relatively little from the devastation which has marked the struggle in lowlands and plains. The fact is true for the Vosges mountains, the Trentino uplands and the Carpathian region. Although fighting of an exceedingly bitter character was maintained in each of these areas, the loss in property was never extreme. This is one of the many instances where land configuration lends itself advantageously to delimitation work. The need of trustworthy geographical information in partitioning and dividing up territory is obvious. Upon this basis only can boundary revision be satisfactorily pursued.

The long borderland of the French language which marks the northern and eastern boundary of French lands from the English Channel to the Mediterranean, lies unruffled by political agitation in its southeastern stretch, where Italian and French become interchangeable languages. Modifications in this section of the political frontier hardly need be considered. Their occurrence, if any, will probably come as peaceful adjustments dictated by economic reasons. To the north, however, the line has a history tainted by deeds of violence. In this stretch it forms the divide between two civilizations, the French and the German. These, although having flourished side by side, are distinctly opposed in spirit and method. Here, beginning north of the Swiss border, frontier changes appear inevitable.

In the Vosges uplift, certain facts of geographical import have direct bearing on the international boundary problem. The very occurrence of a mountain in this zone of secular conflict has a significance of its own. Aggression has generally made its way up the steep slope and, since the treaty of Frankfort of 1871, strategic advantages lie on the German side. Moreover the crest line shows French linguistic predominance.

The American Geographical Society of New York

Frontiers of Language and Nationality in Europe, 1917, Pl. IX

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PART OF EUROPE SHOWING LANGUAGES
having political significance.

In Lorraine, the steady expansion of French over German territory reveals the assimilative capacity of French civilization. France, unable to send forth colonists because of her lack of numbers, nevertheless contains within herself by virtue of superior civilization the ability to absorb the foreigner. Of this, evidence is to be found in the Alsatian’s sympathy for France no less than in the unanimous verdict of impartial foreigners. Belgium’s unhesitating rally to the French cause in the present war was also the spontaneous response to the greater cultural appeal emanating from France. The fact is attested by history since the earliest times, for much of the civilization of Germanic peoples has invariably taken its source in the inspiring ideals of the wonderfully endowed inhabitants of French territory.

Upon this historical basis, the intermediate zone between French and German languages might be converted into a number of buffer-states which, from the Alps to the North Sea, would represent the borderland of the central mountain zone and the northern plain. Switzerland, Alsace-Lorraine, Luxemburg and Belgium have been weak spots of European diplomacy on account of geographical circumstances. A just appreciation of this fact alone can provide against a continuance of past weakness.

Whatever the result of the present war, boundary rectifications from the easternmost wedge of Switzerland to the head of the Adriatic may be expected. They were the subject of negotiations between Austria and Italy prior to the latter country’s entry into the war in 1915. Austria at that time proposed to cede to Italy a portion of the Trentino or “Süd-Tirol” as it is illogically called by the Germans. The territory which Austria was willing to abandon to prevent Italy from joining the Allies coincided roughly with the extension of Italian language north of the Italian frontier. Italian demands presented then were based, however, upon strategic necessities as well as linguistic considerations. Italy therefore outlined a frontier much nearer to the Adriatic watershed.

The Italian claims may be summarized as follows:[275] From Switzerland the present boundary line is to be maintained to Mount Cevedale, whence it is to strike east to Illmenspitze and thence northeast to Klausen passing through Gargazon. From Klausen the line leads to the south until latitude 46° 30′ is reached, after which it resumes its easterly course, passes through Tofana and reaches the old boundary at about 4 miles northeast of Cortina d’Ampezzo. The population of the last-named district, formerly Ladin, is now Italian. This boundary revision will give political validity to the Italian Alps, a region which is geographically Italian.

Fig. 67—Sketch map showing proposed changes in the Austro-Italian frontier according to Austrian and Italian views.

Through this line the transfer of the command of the passes to Italy would become an accomplished fact. It would mean that the entrance to the Vintschgau, the valley of the Upper Adige and of the gorge of the Eisack at Klausen with the issue of the Brenner and Pustherthal railways would be controlled by Italy. Moreover the frontier has the merit of being identical with the old bishopric boundary maintained from 1106 A.D. to the Reformation. The flaw, if any, in such an eventual settlement might be found in the fact that the Botzen district, although economically Italian, is Teutonic in speech and feeling. The rest of the population in the Trentino favors annexation to Italy.

The Austrian offer to Italy diverges from the Italian project at Illmenspitze[276] and strikes south, carefully avoiding abandonment of territory of German speech to Italy. In doing this, however, it leaves some of the Italian-speaking northeastern districts of the Noce valley in Austrian territory. All the mountain outlets which open into the Adige valley are retained by Austria. This from the Italian standpoint is inadmissible, as it would leave the southern country exposed to aggression from the north. On the basis of the Austrian census for 1910 the changes in population consequent upon such a boundary revision are as follows:

Italians and
Ladins 		Germans
In territory offered by Austria366,83713,892
In territory retained by Austria18,863511,222

In case the Italian claim is granted the following changes will result:

Italians and
Ladins 		Germans
In new Italian territory371,47774,000
In territory retained by Austria14,229440,805

A margin of coastland along the eastern Adriatic is mainly Serbian in nationality though Italian in culture. It was once the nest of pirates who terrorized the Adriatic and Mediterranean. We catch historical glimpses of their retreats to the admirable shelters teeming along the coastland which skirts the Dalmatian mountains. The fringe of long islands deployed like a protecting screen enabled their vessels to evade capture. This feature of the region still exercises its influence, for a strong naval power in control of such a base might easily dominate the Mediterranean lane of traffic between east and west. The political fate of the eastern shores of the Adriatic cannot therefore be sundered from their geographical aspect.

The Italians have been exhibited elsewhere in these pages as a vanishing minority throughout this Dalmatian coast. We are in the presence of Serbians, disguised under various appellations, among which the most familiar are Croatians, Slavonians, Bosnians, Herzegovinians, Montenegrins, Dalmatians and Illyrians. All these elements were susceptible of being strongly knit into a single nationality. The inclusion of a sympathizing, though numerically small, Slovene group could only introduce wholesome competition among them.

Nationalism in this region was awakened by French achievements and influences at the time of its conquest by Napoleon’s armies. The French provinces of Illyria, which included Slovene territory on the north and extended as far south as Montenegro, were converted in 1816 into a kingdom of the same name which survived, up to 1846, as part of the Austrian Empire. The taste of political independence acquired by southern Slavs in that interval of time never lost its savor. Schemes for the formation of an independent Jugoslavia were naturally thrown into sharper relief through the medium of linguistic unity.

Such a south Slavic political entity must necessarily be identified with Serbia. Its extent is admirably defined by geographical, ethnographical and linguistic lines all of which coincide, thereby pointing irrefutably to national unity. The Drave, Morava, Drina and Lim rivers, with the Adriatic Sea, encircle this genuine Serbian area. It comprises the entire system of parallel ranges which form the mountainous rearland of the Adriatic. Because of its arduous character the region was never thoroughly mastered by foreigners. Invaders established themselves in force only along the sections of international highways which cross the land. The rest remained accessible to the Serbian natives only.

The defining of an independent Hungary presents little confusion if approached from the main highway of geography. Agreement between the land and its inhabitants appears to exist here, for the Magyar is, in the first place, a lowlander accustomed to live within the precincts of a fertile plain. He has always shunned the mountain and is rarely to be met above the 600-foot contour. As soon as the hills to the north of the vast field of his birth are attained he disappears, leaving a few officials to represent him. Slovak, Rumanian and Ruthenian hillmen then come upon the scene. On the western side, west of the Raab, the heights drained by the river are peopled by Germans and, in spite of a complex boundary zone, a convenient line of demarcation could be drawn upon the basis of elevation. Southward the old-time utility of the Drave as the dividing line between Croat and Hungarian remains unimpaired to this day. In the east, however, around the confluence of this river with the Danube and towards the Theiss valley the swamp lands have repelled the ease-loving Hungarian as effectively as the mountains to the east and north. The Serb, less particular in his choice of residence, advanced northward as far as the swampy land extends. In this section any physical map contains the data for a territorial division.

With regard to Transylvania, conditions may be summarized as follows: the region is scantily populated, valleys constituting centers of human habitation almost exclusively. The inhabitants are overwhelmingly Rumanians.[277] The dominating Hungarian element inhabits isolated communities in their midst. This separation of the rival peoples is of the utmost interest in boundary revision, for which it provides a reliable geographical basis. Wallis has ingeniously shown[278] that a line separating the majority of Hungarians from Rumanians can be obtained by taking language as a guide and that this is possible because there exists no mixing of peoples in the eastern borderland of Hungarian language. In reality, throughout Hungary the only element that has insinuated itself in the midst of Hungarian, Rumanian or Slav populations is the German. This element is generally absorbed except where present in large numbers. The Magyar, however, has never mingled with his neighbors. One is almost led to seek the reason for his aloofness in his Asiatic origin.

Poland also has its natural place in the European political system. The majority of Poles live in Russian Poland. Out of a total of over 20,000,000 Poles about 12,000,000 are found in the “governments” or administrative districts created by Russia in the sections of Poland within Russia’s boundaries. These districts are ten in number and adjoin each other. Geographically they form a unit—the westernmost appendage of the vast united Russian territory which aggregates between one-sixth or one-seventh of the total land surface of the world. Detachment of this Polish section from Russia and its creation into part of an autonomous Poland is practicable without serious loss to Russian unity. Slavic solidarity would in fact be consolidated if Poland were constituted a sovereign state.

To Germany, however, an autonomous Poland which would encompass the million Poles living in the Kaiser’s empire implies abandonment of a territory which reaches far into the heart of the country. The Polish strip ends less than a hundred miles east of Berlin. The province of Posen, a considerable portion of Silesia, a narrow strip of West Prussia reaching the Baltic west of Danzig and the Masurian Lakes district are peopled by Poles. Furthermore, and this is of capital importance in German eyes, East Prussia which is German by language and tradition, as well as Prussian to the core, would become isolated from the main mass of the German-speaking people. It is improbable that such a cession of territory will take place as long as Germany has the power to prevent it. It need only be remembered that the first partition of Poland was engineered by Frederick the Great merely to join East Prussia to the rest of his kingdom. Against this last fact, however, the imperative necessity for an independent Poland to obtain an outlet on the Baltic will always prevail in anti-German circles.

Nature therefore points to the existence of a real German menace to Polish autonomy. It is needless to minimize the significance of the points at issue. Prussia, the dominant state in the German nation, will never consent to the impairment of her territorial unity by the surrender of her Polish sections. On the other hand the reconstruction of Poland must be complete if the creation of a Balkanic state of affairs west of the Gulf of Danzig is to be avoided. A partial reunion of Polish-speaking groups under an autonomous government would be the prelude to irredentist questions. This however is precisely what an enlightened world is seeking to prevent.

In reality the German nation would be the gainer by the creation of a reunited Polish state. No better barrier to Russia’s westerly advance in Europe could be devised. Conversely Teutonic encroachments on Slavic territory—bound as they inevitably are to be attended by bloodshed—would be effectively arrested. A buffer state between Russia and Germany is the safest guarantee of peace between the two nations. All the inextricable tangles in which Europe has been involved by Polish problems can be unraveled by the restoration of Polish national entity. The problem requires solution for the sake of the peace of the world.

The problems arising along the remaining linguistic boundaries have been exhibited in earlier chapters and require but little mention here. In Schleswig an extension of Denmark’s political frontier as far south as the Danish language prevails would be welcomed as the harbinger of lasting harmony between Danes and Germans. The historical frontier between the Danish duchy and Holstein could be utilized to advantage in this change. In this, as in other cases, the principles of geography, modified by national aspirations and economic needs, must in the last resort be recognized as practical and applicable. Bohemia, which has been shown to be splendidly laid off on a physical map, deserves political independence because it is endowed with geographic individuality. This method of solving the problems which for centuries have burdened Europe with strife would, like the splitting of Austria into national fragments, mark an improvement in the lot of a notable proportion of the population of Europe. New impetus would be granted to the development of national sentiment. Humanity owes much to the free play of this feeling. The claims of world brotherhood have received greater attention through its existence. The energies of submerged nationalities have hitherto been absorbed by the struggle for survival. Relief from this stress will be accompanied by respect for alien rights instead of hatred of the oppressor.

Throughout the nineteenth century, as well as in the beginning of the twentieth, reconstruction of nationalities was effected on a linguistic basis. The part played by language during that period is of tantamount importance to the religious feeling which formerly caused many a destructive war. Practically all the wars of the last hundred years are the outcome of three great constructive movements which led to the unification of Germany and of Italy as well as to the disentanglement of Balkan nationalities. These were outward and visible signs of the progress of democratic ideals. The Congress of Vienna failed to provide Europe with political stability because popular claims were ignored during the deliberations. At present, inhabitants of linguistic areas under alien rule are clamoring for the right to govern themselves. The carrying out of plebiscites under international supervision can often be relied upon to satisfy their aspirations and serve as a guide to frontier rearrangements.

All told, the growing coincidence of linguistic and political boundaries must be regarded as a normal development. It is a form of order evolved out of the chaos characterizing the origin of human institutions. The delimitation of international frontiers is as necessary as the determination of administrative boundaries or city lines. Human organization requires it and there is no reason why it should not be undertaken with fair regard to the wishes and feelings of all affected. For nations, like individuals, are at their best only when they are free, that is to say when the mastery of their destiny is in their own hands.