FINLAND 



2176 



FINLAND 



their round heads, low foreheads, fair hair and 

 blue eyes. There is in their appearance some- 

 thing akin to the Mongolians, to whom they 

 are racially related, for their features are rather 

 flat, their cheek bones prominent and their 

 eyes set somewhat obliquely. Mentally and 

 morally they are well advanced and show a 

 keen interest in education. Over ninety per 

 cent of the adult population, it is estimated 

 can read and write, and ninety-seven per cent 

 of the children of school age receive regular 

 instruction. While they are a clean, moral 

 people, devoted to the Lutheran religion, the 

 Finns have nevertheless, until recent years, suf- 

 fered from a fondness for strong drink, but 

 temperance principles have made great head- 

 way. Particularly noteworthy is their love for 

 freedom; they never had been forced to sub- 

 mit to the system of serfdom which was the 

 curse of other parts of Russia. All things con- 

 sidered, Finland was the freest part of the Rus- 

 sian Empire under the czars. 



The Finns speak a language which is re- 

 lated to those of the Lapps and the Hungarians 

 a beautiful, flexible tongue, so highly devel- 

 oped that it can express the finest shades of 

 meaning. There are various works written in 

 it, some old and some modern, but the greatest 

 of these is the Kalevala, the famous folk epic 

 from which Longfellow took the meter for his 

 Hiawatha. 



The Country. This "Land of the Thousand 

 Lakes" is for the most part a low-lying country, 

 which ages and ages ago lay under the great 

 sheet of ice that covered all Northern Europe 

 (see GLACIAL PERIOD). Here and there hills 

 and mountains rise as high as 4,000 feet above 

 the sea, and all of these but the tallest show 

 the rounding, smoothing effect of the glacial 

 ice-sheet. The low coast is deeply indented, 

 and the thousands of little rocky islands with 

 which the shores are studded make navigation 

 difficult and dangerous. It was the ancient 

 glaciers which carved the beds for the laby- 

 rinth of lakes, many of which are of consid- 

 erable size. The largest of them, except Lake 

 Ladoga, of which only the northern part be- 

 longs to Finland, is Saima, which has an outlet 

 into Ladoga over the Imatra Falls, the finest 

 and most beautiful rapids in Europe. 



A very large part of the land surface is 

 covered with forests, and only about three per 

 cent is available for agriculture. The soil on 

 this cultivable area is fertile, however, and 

 during the short, hot summers produces large 

 crops of wheat, rye, oate and potatoes. There 



is an abundance of pasture land, so the dairy 

 industry is of importance, but much of the 

 foodstuff of Finland must be imported. Iron 

 ore, copper and granite are the only mineral 

 products worthy of mention; and manufactur- 



LOCATION MAP 



ing, despite the enormous motive-power latent 

 in the rapid streams, has had no great develop- 

 ment. Flour-mill products, lumber and timber 

 products and textiles are the chief manufac- 

 tures. 



History and Government. The Finns, or, as 

 they call themselves, the Suomi, lived as inde- 

 pendent tribes up to the twelfth century, when 

 the Swedes began campaigns which resulted 

 a century later in the establishment of Swedish 

 domination. Christianity was introduced, and 

 when Sweden became Lutheran the new faith 

 was passed on to Finland. Russia had long 

 cast envious eyes on this Swedish possession 

 which was so close to the Russian borders, and 

 more than once waged war for it, but not until 

 1809 was the grand duchy actually conquered 

 from the Swedes. Every czar of Russia since 

 then took a solemn pledge to preserve the 

 laws and liberties of Finland, and in the main 

 the pledge was well kept until 1897, when the 

 Russification of the country was begun. Much 

 in this direction was accomplished, but in 1905 

 a popular rising occurred in Helsingfors, the 

 Finnish capital, which for a time secured the 



