THE EFFECTS OF GEOGRAPHIC ENVIRONMENT 1G9 



would have been impossible. "No coniinunity," says Maine, 

 " when first known by the historian, can certainly be said to 

 occupy its original seat." No instance can be found where a 

 race has risen from savagery to civilization without contact and 

 intermingling with races from countries wiiere difierent environ- 

 ments have developed different intellectual activities. If, how- 

 ever, the disparity is too great between the old and tlic inniii- 

 grant race, then the inferior fades away, for scarcely a single 

 race has been found that can bear the contact. In trying to 

 civilize we destroy. 



We have referred to the immigrants from the east as having 

 advanced the progress of Europe. These emigrations were the 

 result of environment. As population increased in the plains 

 of Asia, the land became insuflticient for the support of a nomad 

 people, with their vast herds of cattle. Few realize the amount 

 of land required for the support of even a single family; the 

 hunter and fisher required for his sustenance and that of his 

 family a tract of one hundred square miles. For a small nomad 

 tribe on the steppes of Asia, 500 to 600 square miles are required. 

 In these regions man will ever remain content to be a savage or 

 a barbarian. Where agriculture, trade, and industry are com- 

 bined, the same land that supported one hunter is sufficient for 

 the sustenance, in India and Europe, of 10,000 inhabitants, and 

 in the state of Massachusetts of 25,000. One-fourth of the popu- 

 lation of the world — savages and barbarians, constant wan- 

 derers — require three-fourths of the surface of the earth for their 

 support. As population increases, the time invariably comes 

 when the land is insufficient for the support of the increased 

 number. The people must die of hunger or immigrate to other 

 lands. Such immigrations, apparently always from the east to 

 the west, or from the north to the south, have frequently occurred 

 in the world's history. They have usualh' followed the same 

 route, through passes and over plains to rich fertile regions. 

 Forced by hunger, great hordes of Huns and Mongolians gath- 

 ered under great warriors, of whom no record exists, left the 

 plains of Asia, long before the time of Alaric or Attila, and 

 wandered over the steppes, through the Pass of Dariel in tiie 

 Caucasus to Asia, and on across Asia Minor and the Dardanelles 

 to Greece, or else traveled across Russia, north of the lilack sea, 

 into Hungary, and thence spread over Europe. These early 

 nomads belonged to the j^eriod of the Stone and Bronze Ages, 

 and met in Europe the men of the later Stone Age, and as their 



