520 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1907. 
were thickly populated in the Roman period, as to the poor adminis- 
tration, which marks all Mohammedan countries. Egypt, Tunis, and 
Algeria all show that such countries under European and Christian 
administration rise quickly, economically, and increase in population. 
The superiority of the Christian people over the Mohammedans in 
the-Mediterranean region, although it must be discounted somewhat 
by the clannishness of these latter due to their religion, is heightened 
by the fact that the followers of Islam inhabit even to the present day 
the dryest districts on the Mediterranean and are all landsmen and 
have an aversion to the water, Turks as well as Arabs. The Greeks, 
Italians, and the other Christian peoples tend entirely to the sea 
traffic. The Turks have never had any knowledge of maritime lore 
and to this day are ignorant of it. In those periods when there was 
a powerful Turkish fleet, the ships were commanded by renegades 
and manned by Christians. The Barbary pirates were “Andalu- 
sians” driven out of Spain, and Berbers, and their leaders in the 
sixteenth century were mostly renegades also. 
The last and most important indication of the table is that, of the 
106,000,000 inhabitants of the Mediterranean countries, 34,000,000, 
or 32 per cent, are Italians. This is a highly important fact and 
one to be well considered in the near future, for the national unity 
of the Italians, which has resulted in great economic development, 
will make itself felt with growing political importance and render 
active the advantages of central position and other geographical fac- 
tors. This is all the more hkely because the characteristic tend- 
ency of pushing toward the sea and centralization on the coast, which 
marks the distribution of all the Mediterranean peoples, is especially 
pronounced in Italy. 
Italy must naturally be a thoroughly maritime country from its 
long and slender shape, for its extension across from the foot of 
the Alps almost to the Atlas Mountains furnishes long coast lines 
and slight distances from the.sea. The people there press toward the 
sea, a fact which is most marked in Liguria, Apulia, and in the north 
and east coasts of Sicily. All the larger cities he on the seacoast; 
even Milan is only 120 kilometers (75 miles) from the ocean. Eighty 
per cent of the surface of the kingdom is within 100 kilometers (62 
miles) from the sea; that is, in two hours one can reach the sea from 
any part of this country. Fully 16 per cent of the population live 
directly on the ocean. This is a fact of great importance for the 
prestige of Italy in the Mediterranean. The Italians have been skilled 
sailors from time immemorial and the fisheries of the Mediterranean 
are for the most part in their control. 
Likewise in almost all the other countries on the Mediterranean the 
people live principally near the sea. In Spain there has recently de- 
veloped a sharp contrast between the interior and coast provinces; 
