182 BIG AND LITTLE. 



Franco hy rail, from Marseilles to Calais, will 

 feel iininediately how hopeless is the attempt truly 

 to com})are their respective areas, otherwise than 

 as represented by railway time-tal)les, or by 

 l)ainted figures on a piece of paper. Now, France 

 alone is nearly half as big again as all Britain, 

 and the German Empire, fairly divided out, would 

 just split up into three Englands and three 

 Waleses. Russia in Europe, with Poland and 

 Finland, equals no less than thirty Englands, or 

 over fifteen British Isles; and Europe as a whole 

 is nearly twice as big as all Russia. Can anybody 

 pretend that he can i)icture to himself, however 

 inadequately, the real expanse of that vast area ? 

 Imajxine no less than sixtv countries as bicj as all 

 England and Wales, of which smaller unit most 

 of us have personally seen but a few counties ! 

 We say, imagine it; but, as a matter of fact, it is 

 quite uninuiginable ; we can only symbolically 

 represent to ourselves a far smaller and simpler 

 stretch of country. 



Again, we must bear in mind that Europe, as a 

 whole, huge as it seems, is but a tiny fraction of 

 the habitable land, the smallest and narrowest 

 of the great continents. The Indian possessions 

 of Britain, alone, are thirteen times as big as 

 Britain, or twenty-six times as big as England ; 

 and the population is two hundred and fifty- 

 eight millions, as against only thirty-six millions 



