726 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



broader, that is to say, than the standard for the Anglo-Saxon peoples. 

 In places the breadth of head in Russia increases, especially among 

 the Polesians isolated in the marshes of Pinsk and along the swamps 

 of the Pripet River. These people are supposed to be infused with 

 Polish blood, which may account for it,* as the southeastern Poles 

 are quite brachycephalic (broad-headed). At other times, as in 

 southern Smolensk, the index falls to 80. f Our widest range of 

 variation in Russia is about five imits. Compare this with our former 

 results for western Europe. In France, less than half the size of this 

 portion of the Russian people covered by our map, the cephalic index 

 runs from 78 to 88. In Germany the limits are about the same; 

 while in Italy, only one eighteenth the size of European Russia, the 

 head form changes from an index of 75 in Sardinia to one of 89 in 

 the Alps of Piedmont. These are about the extremes of long- and 

 broad-headedness presented by the human species; the Russian type 

 is about midway btween the two. 



One cause of this unparalleled extension of a uniform type, 

 measured by the proportions of the head — a variability, notwithstand- 

 ing the size of the country, only about one third of that in the 

 restricted countries of western Europe — is not far to seek. It lies in 

 the monotony of the Russian territory, which we have emphasized 

 above. Once more are we confronted with an example of the close 

 relation which exists between man and the soil on which he lives. 

 A variety of human types is the natural accompaniment of diversity 

 in physical environment. Intermixture and comparative purity of 

 race may coexist side by side. Switzerland and the Tyrol offer us 

 violent contrasts of this sort. Russia, devoid of all obstacles in the 

 way of fusion, presents a great mean or average type, about halfway 

 between the two limits of variation of which the European races else- 

 where can boast. But pass beyond the foothills of the Caucasus, and 

 behold the change! A Babel of languages — no less than sixty-eight 

 dialects, in fact — and half as many physical types, of all complexions, 

 all head forms, and all sizes. Truly it seems to be a law that moun- 

 tains are generators of physical individuality, while the plains are 

 fatal to it. 



The population of Russia is not alone made up of Russians. We 

 have in our preceding paragraph expressly excluded the population 

 of the Baltic provinces. For the Letto-Lithuanians are not Slavs, 

 as we have already observed, and of course the Finnic peoples, Estlis, 



* Talko-Hryncewicz, 1894, p. 159, on the anomalous position of the Polesians. Rittich, 

 18V8 b, divides them dialectically between White and Little Russians. Talko-HrjTicewicz, 

 1893, p. 133, and 1894, p. 172, gives his observations on head form. The seriation points 

 to a strong brachycephaly. 



\ Denlker asserts an index of 80.8 in southern Volhynia and of 86 in southern Kiev ; 

 but I am unable to confirm it by adequate data. 



