188 RACE 



our own personality, inconsistent, not greatly 

 interested in our material surroundings, and 

 without any desire to improve them, except in so 

 far as the object of our affections was concerned. 

 Northmen, on the other hand, under ordinary 

 conditions, are distinguished by the practical 

 energy 1 with which they meet their surroundings: 

 they are continually impelled to improve them, 

 and, by altering them, they create novelties in 

 environment which reinforce the impulse for 

 further reform. A southerner accepts without 

 disgust conditions of life which in the north would 

 excite the strongest repulsion. The effect of these 

 two contrary proclivities the reproductive and 

 the provident is to be seen very clearly in the 

 position of woman. In the south she is treated 

 as a sexual appendage of man, to be guarded very 

 safely, as is the rest of man's property. In the 

 north, from the earliest historical times, she has 

 been man's companion and partner, and love for 

 her is clarified by sentiments of chivalry and 

 romance that is to say, by feelings which have 

 their origin not in self-abandonment, but in 

 self-control. 



Our generalizations respecting the southern 

 temperament may be extended to the East. 

 There is much in common between the features 

 of the Mediterranean and the Eastern character. 

 Orientals are easily excited to impulsive self- 

 abandonment, are swayed by ambitions which 

 are rather social than individual, regard the 

 government under which they live as a force 

 apart from themselves, are not shocked by in- 

 consistencies between opinions and behaviour, 



1 The number of spindles to which a mill hand can attend is a 

 very good indication of his practical efficiency. In English cotton 

 mills only three hands are employed for 1,000 spindles ; in Germany 

 (North and South) seven are needed; in Italy thirteen; and in 

 Bombay twenty-fix e. 



