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THE NATIONAL, GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



Photograph by Francis P. Farquhar 



A GROUP OF GREEK PEASANTS IN THE REGION OF PARNASSUS (SEE PAGE) 477) 



Lineal descendants of men who two thousand years ago were the custodians of the 

 world's art, culture, and science, these peasants, uncouth in appearance yet friendly and hospi- 

 table, possess the heritage of a glorious past. 



Esthonians, mostly in the north; 1,500,000 

 Letts and Lithuanians, toward the south, in 

 Livonia and Courland ; 200,000 Germans, and 

 100,000 Jews. The Russians at no time consti- 

 tuted more than 2 per cent of the inhabitants. 



THE ESTHS 



The Esths are a Finno-Ugrian people, once 

 savage and adventurous, terrifying the Baltic 

 with their piracy, constantly attacking and at- 

 tacked by the Danes and Swedes. Their final 

 subjection by the Brothers of the Sword and 

 their enforced acceptance of Christianity 

 crushed their spirit and rendered them serfs 

 to their German masters. 



The Esths outnumber the Germans in the 

 old Province of Esthonia twenty-nine to one; 

 yet nine-tenths of all the tend is held by Ger- 

 mans. In the former Province of Livonia the 

 Esths constitute nearly half the population, 

 while the Germans are less than one-fifteenth. 

 There the land is divided into estates averag- 

 ing over ten thousand acres in extent, none 

 owned by an Esth or Lett, but almost invariably 

 by a German. The Russian Government at 

 times endeavored by agrarian laws to alleviate 

 the condition of the peasant. Such efforts 



failed against the stolid resistance of the great 

 proprietors. 



The Esths have clung devotedly to their na- 

 tional language, the sole inheritance from their 

 past. They love poetry and song. Their phy- 

 sical characteristics are Finnic; their faces 

 short, broad, beardless ; their foreheads low, 

 mouths small, arms long, legs short. Despite 

 their extreme poverty, education is relatively 

 advanced. All but 4 per cent are Lutheran 

 Protestants. 



Since the sudden universal awakening in 

 1918, the Esths or the land-owners have been 

 insistent upon national recognition. But own- 

 ership in the land is their greatest need. 



THE LETTS 



The Letts are one of three cognate tribes, 

 distinct from any other in Europe, which once 

 dwelt side by side on the eastern shores of the 

 Baltic ; farthest west, the Borussi, who became 

 the Prussians ; toward the middle, the Lithu- 

 anians proper, and farthest north the Letts. 

 So much do the two latter resemble each other 

 in personal appearance, language, occupation, 

 and the hardships of life that foreigners usually 

 identify them as one. No distinction of the 



