The climatic difference is illustrated more clearly still when we consider the matter from the climatological side. Voyekov, the great Russian climato pzeshasiemlogist, [[235]]expressly the slight cover of snow in the Ukraine, the relatively high temperature of the warmer periods of the winter, and the abnormally warm spring, which is due to the lightness of the snow-cover, which requires only a little of the spring warmth to melt it. The snow cover of Poland, Lithuania or Northeastern Germany is much more similar to that of Muscovy than the Ukrainian. The January isotherms in the Ukraine switch over from the N. to S. direction to the N. W. to S. E. direction. The isotherm of the typical Russian winter (January -8 to -10°) avoids the region of the Ukraine entirely. It is true that the Dnieper and Dniester have the same amount of ice as the Volga or the Dvina. But here the main consideration should be the period of freezing; the Dvina is covered over for 190 days, the Volga 160, the Dnieper in the Ukraine only 80 to 100 days, the Dniester 70 days. These are certainly greater differences. Still greater differences between the Ukrainian and the Muscovite climates become evident when we compare the length of the winter, or the time suitable for work outdoors. In Great Russia this time is at most four months; in the Ukraine, at least six and a half; and in its southern borderlands even nine months. Such differences play a great part in the life of the people. The time of the winter obstructions and enforced idleness is twice as great in Russia as in the Ukraine. The struggle with the cold takes on forms in the Ukraine which are entirely analogous to the Western European forms. In the Muscovite country we observe polar elements in the winter-life of the people. The Ukrainian winter does not depress the people, does not bore them to death, but only steels their bodies in the struggle with the cold and gives them the desired rest after the summer’s heat. The winter is the time of the most intensive social life among the Ukrainian peasantry.
The spring of the Ukraine, warm and sunny, has quite [[236]]a different influence upon people to that of the cool, damp Russian or Polish spring. The sunny climate of the spring and the cloudlessness of the summer have produced in the Ukrainian a quiet, fundamentally cheerful temper. Yet, we find in him none of the gaiety which is characteristic of the people of the south as compared with the people of the north, but rather a quiet melancholy. It is just the Russians or the Poles that are of a much gayer sort than the Ukrainians, livelier, more easy-going in their social life, more frolicsome; not the Ukrainians, but the Russians and Poles, are the very ones that are vying with one another for the epithet of the “Frenchmen of the North” or “of the East,” respectively. (This remarkable fact is due, in the first place, to the unhappy history of the Ukraine). But, on the other hand, the melancholy of the Ukrainians is quiet, while the occasional melancholy of the Russians turns into despair and pessimism.
The Ukrainian summer and fall, warm and beautiful, has made the Ukrainian, in contrast with the Russian, a farmer par excellence. The warmth of these seasons is very similar to Southern European conditions, and gives to the life of the Ukrainian people many southern characteristics. The life in open communion with Nature, the accessibility of her organic treasures, is much more pronounced in the Ukraine than in Russia, White Russia or Poland. In the warm seasons the Ukrainian lives much of the time outside his house. In the day he works continuously in the field or in the garden, and even at night he usually sleeps outdoors in the orchard or the yard. If the fields are at a distance from the village, a large part of the population of the place camp out in the open fields for several days during harvest time. These are all characteristics of the life of the south. Yet we see in our people no real characteristics of the people of the south. Despite all this, the Ukrainian is much more domestic than the [[237]]Russian, more frugal and more temperate; the “extravagant Russian nature” is entirely foreign to him. We have already seen that the Ukrainians do not have gay manners, and in like manner their activity of thought is less than that of the northern peoples, the Russians and the Poles. Yet the depth of thought of the Ukrainians is much greater, and their popular poetry incomparably deeper than that of the Russians or Poles. Dreaminess and reserve of character is much greater in the Ukrainians who live in the south than in the Poles and Russians who live in the north. All these are the effects of a sorrowful past. Only in one respect do the Ukrainians bear out their southern type of character; in their great abilities and their generally rich intellectual gifts. Every unprejudiced observer must admit that the Ukrainian peasant, almost the only typical representative of our nation, surpasses almost all his neighbors in his natural accomplishments.
The laziness and weakness of will peculiar to the southern nations compared to the northern, have not developed into a typical characteristic among the Ukrainians. The often remarkable indifference of the Ukrainian is rather an outgrowth of sad historical events than of the climate and the nature of the land in general. At most one might blame the great fertility of the black soil. For the faith in this fertility is almost never misplaced and favors the indifference of the peasant. On the other hand, the five hundred years of Tatar oppression were actually able to produce an inherited indifference. And why strive and work, when at any moment the Tatar hordes might come and take or burn everything?
Despite this historically inherited indifference, as we may call it, the laziness peculiar to southerners cannot be ascribed to the Ukrainians. They are better farmers than all their neighbors, with the single exception of those who adopted progressive farming, as, for example, the Prussian [[238]]Poles. Domestic industry is also well developed among the Ukrainians, and the Ukrainian seasonal workers are actually sought after, especially in Germany, and earn a great deal. The Ukrainian harvest-worker is more sought after and better paid than the Russian. He works slowly but methodically, and achieves good results. The Ukrainian colonists find tolerable living conditions in places in which the Russian starves to death or from which he flees.
In like manner weakness of will is not a real peculiarity of the Ukrainians, in spite of their southern location. The thousand years’ struggle with piratical Asia, the independent establishment of two great state organizations, especially the second, after three centuries of slavery, the new awakening in the 19th Century under such difficult and hostile conditions, the splendid colonial expansion—all this speaks rather for great energy than for weakness of will. It is certainly true that in our people, oppressed by centuries of serfdom, energy and strength of character must hide beneath a thick crust of indifference, and our educated people find their energy weakened by the bad influence of foreign cultures. But these facts show most clearly that an enormous amount of energy and willpower is latent in the Ukrainian people, which, to this day, however, has not been properly developed.
Among historians and anthropogeographers it is a much used commonplace that the northern peoples always appear as conquerors who subjugate the southern peoples, and that they are always the founders of states in their particular climatic zones. The Germans overthrew the Roman Empire, the Northern Frenchmen founded the French state, the Northern Spaniards the Spanish, the Northern Italians, the Italian state, and the North Germans united Germany. It is natural, therefore, that this commonplace should be applied also in Eastern Europe. The “Northern” Russians have, by the natural necessity of [[239]]history, “united” the “southern” Russians. The same explanation should be accepted as a necessity by the Ukrainians, and nothing should be done to resist this condition!
In reality this commonplace, like so many others, is false. The Ukrainians, as we have already observed, possess no such characteristics, as opposed to the Russians, as a southern race possesses with regard to a northern neighbor. To be sure, the Russian state now dominates the Ukraine. But the present Russian state is, after all, only a branch of the ancient Ukrainian Kingdom of Kiev. The ancient Ukrainian Kingdom subjugated the present Russian territory, organized it as a state, even partly colonized it, and gave it a ruling dynasty. The ancient Ukrainian state tradition was usurped by the Muscovite states, and gave them all the prestige which the Muscovite possesses. It was only the Tatar invasion that entirely held up the political development of the Ukraine, and, at the same time, favored the development of the Muscovite Empire. Only the Tatar invasion brought Moscow the supremacy over the Ukraine which Russia still enjoys. It was a foreign conquest, which has nothing to do with climatic influences. The very name of Russia only came into use in the time of Peter the Great!
From this survey of climatic influences, it appears, unequivocally, that the Ukrainians cannot be classed with the so-called southern peoples. The Ukrainians have all the characteristics of the races of the North Temperate Zone, who are the representatives of the European culture of today. The growth of national consciousness and of culture will, without a doubt, raise the Ukrainians to the standard of the European family of cultured nations. The nature of the country has, by means of its influences, given them all the necessary prerequisites.
The significance of the flora and fauna, for a lowland [[240]]people like the Ukrainians, should be considered very great. From the physico-geographical description of the Ukraine, everyone will observe that the Ukraine may be naturally divided into two main parts, the forest country and the steppe country. The mountain formations take up only a comparatively small part of our territory.