Chapter XXIV: Europe as it Should Be

Natural boundaries of nations in Europe.—Peoples outside of the
nations with whom they belong.—The mixture of peoples in
Austria-Hungary, and Russia.—The British Isles.—The Balkan
states.—Recent changes in the map.—The wrongs done by mighty
nations upon their weak neighbors bring no happiness.

We have several times shown you, in the course of this little
history, maps drawn by kings and marked off by diplomacy and
through bloodshed. Let us now examine a map of Europe divided
according to the race and language of its various peoples. It
often happens that the boundaries set by nature, like seas, high
mountains, and broad rivers, divide one people from another. It
is natural that the people of Italy, for instance, hemmed in by
the Alps to the north and by the water on all other sides, should
grow to be like each other and come to talk a common language.

In the same way, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Greece, Spain, France,
Great Britain, and Switzerland have boundaries largely set by
nature. On this account, it is not surprising that the map of
“Europe as it should be” which unites people of the same blood
under the same government, agrees rather closely in some places
with the map of Europe as it is.

The boundaries of the kingdom of Spain and those of the kingdom
of Portugal fit pretty closely the countries inhabited by Spanish
and Portuguese peoples.

There are a few Italians in France, also a few Walloons and
Flemish. Otherwise France is largely a unit. Some of the French
people are found in Switzerland and others in that part of the
German Empire which was taken away from France after the
Franco-Prussian war of 1870.

The Danes are not all living in Denmark. A great many of them
inhabit the two provinces of Schleswig and Holstein which were
torn away from Denmark by Prussia in 1864. The high mountains of
the Scandinavian peninsula separate the Norwegians from the
Swedes about as well as they divide the countries geographically.

The Hollanders make a nation by themselves, but part of the
northwestern corner of the German Empire is also peopled by
Dutch. The territory around Aix-La-Chapelle, although part of the
German Empire, is inhabited by Walloons, a Celtic people who
speak a sort of French. Belgium, small as it is, contains two
different types of population, the Walloons and the Flemish.

The German Empire does not include all of the Germans. A great
many of these are to be found in Austria proper, Styria
(sty̆′rĭȧ), and the northern Tyrol (ty̆′rol) (western counties
of the Austrian Empire), as well as in the eastern half of
Switzerland and the edges of Bohemia. Germans are also to be
found in parts of Hungary; and in the Baltic provinces of Russia
there are over two million of them.

All of the Italians are not in the kingdom of Italy. The Island
of Corsica, which belongs to France, is inhabited by Italians.
The province of Trentino (trĕn ti′nō) (the southern half of the
Austrian Tyrol) is inhabited almost entirely by Italians, as is
also Istria, which includes the cities of Trieste, Pola, and
Fiume. Certain islands off the coast of Dalmatia are also largely
Italian in their population.

The republic of Switzerland is inhabited by French, Italians, and
Germans. Besides the languages of these three nations, a fourth
tongue is spoken there. In the valleys of the southeastern corner
of Switzerland are found people who talk a corruption of the old
Latin, which they call Romaunsch or Romansh.

Austria-Hungary, as has already been said, is a jumble of
languages and nationalities. This empire includes nearly a
million Italians in its southwestern corner, and three million
Roumanians in Transylvania. It has as its subjects in Bosnia and
Herzegovina several million Serbians. In Slavonia (slȧ vō′nĭ
ȧ), Croatia (crō a′tia), and Dalmatia (dăl mā tia), it has
two or three million Slavs, who are closely related to the
Serbians. In the north, its government rules over several million
Czechs (chĕcks) (Bohemians and Moravians) who strongly desire to
have a country of their own. It controls also two million
Slovaks, cousins of the Czechs, who also would like their
independence. In the county of Carniola (car ni ō′lȧ), there
are one and a half million Slovenes, another Slavic people
belonging either by themselves or with their cousins, the
Croatians and Serbs.

The German Empire includes several hundred thousand Frenchmen,
who want to get back under French control, a million or two
Danes, who want once more to belong to Denmark, and several
million Poles, who desire to see their country again united.

Russia rules over a mixture of peoples almost as numerous as
those composing Austria-Hungary. The Russians themselves are not
one people. The Red Russians or Ruthenians are quite different
from the people of Little Russia, and they in turn are different
from the people of Great Russia, to the north. The Baltic
provinces are peopled, not by Russians, but by two million
Germans, an equal number of Letts and a somewhat greater number
of Lithuanians. North of Riga are to be found the Esthonians,
cousins of the Finns. North-west of Petrograd lies Finland, whose
people, with the Esthonians, do not belong to the Indo-European
family, and who would dearly love to have a separate government
of their own.

You have already been told in Chapter V that the country of the
English, if limited by race, does not include Wales, Cornwall, or
the north of Scotland, but instead takes in the north-eastern
part of Ireland and the southern half of the former Scottish
kingdom.

Turning to the Balkan states, we find our hardest task, for the
reason that peoples of different nationalities are hopelessly
mixed and jumbled. There are Turks and Greeks mixed in with the
Roumanians and Bulgarians in the Dobrudja. Parts of southern
Serbia and portions of Grecian Macedonia are inhabited by people
of Bulgarian descent. Transylvania, with the exception of the two
little mixture islands mentioned before is inhabited by
Roumanians. The southern half of the Austrian province of
Bukowina also ought to be part of Roumania, as should the greater
part of the Russian state of Bessarabia. Whereas Roumania now has
a population of 7,000,000, there are between five and six million
of her people who live outside her present boundaries.

The shores and islands of the Aegean Sea should belong to Greece.
Greek people have inhabited them for thousands of years. The
Albanians are a separate people, while Montenegro and Bosnia
should be joined to Serbia.

Turn back to previous maps of Europe in this volume and you will
see that most of the changes that have been made of late years
are bringing boundaries nearer where they should be. You will
also note that wherever there have been recent changes contrary
to this plan, they have always resulted in more bloodshed. The
partition of Poland, the annexation of Schleswig, Alsace, and
Lorraine to Germany, the division of Bulgarian Macedonia between
Serbia and Greece, and the seizure of Bosnia and Herzegovina by
Austria are good examples.

Questions for Review

What countries of Europe have fairly well-marked natural
boundaries?

Who are the Walloons?

Who are the Romansh people?

To what other people are the Esthonians related?