How Belgium became a Victim to Location.—Belgium illustrates the effect of location in quite a different way. Because she is located between Germany and France and on the best route from one to the other, Germany sent her armies across that little country in 1914. Thus Belgium, in a quarrel with which she had nothing whatever to do, suffered the loss not only of hundreds of thousands of men but of a multitude of women and children. Through starvation, oppression, and cruelty her people suffered as much as any of the chief parties to the quarrel except northern France. She also lost an enormous quantity of machinery and treasure; her factories were ruined, and her material progress set back for decades.
(2) How Relief Influences Political Allegiance.—While location causes political differences chiefly between people who live at some distance from one another, the form of the land may cause equally great differences between those in closely neighboring regions. In the Civil War the main line of cleavage was between the North and the South, but within the South the relief of the Appalachian Moun tains caused a split between the highlands and the lowlands. The highlanders, by reason of their geographical surroundings, were poor and scattered, and their farms were small and unproductive. They could not raise large amounts of money-making crops like cotton and tobacco. Hence slave labor did not pay. Moreover, the mountaineers did not have the capital to purchase slaves. Hence throughout the whole Appalachian region from West Virginia south ward the mountaineers did not agree with the slave-owning plains men, and would not consent to secede. Many of them joined the Northern army, and all welcomed the coming of Northern troops.
How Relief Keeps the Balkan Problem Astir.—On a map of the Balkans notice the numerous mountain ranges, and the many direc tions in which they run. Between them lie numerous plains, some of considerable size like those of eastern Roumelia in Bulgaria, and others mere little pockets among the mountains.
Into this region have come many sorts of people. Some, like the Turks, have found a resting-place here when want and famine or hos tile invasions caused them to migrate from Asia to Europe. Others, such as the Jugoslays, have been forced out of the plains of eastern Europe by similar causes. Thus Montenegrins, Albanians, Serbians, Greeks, Bulgarians, Turks, Wallachs, and Roumanians are inex tricably mixed. In a broad plain these people might gradually have
become more or less unified as have the races from which sprung the English or the French. Each little valley or plain in the Balkan Peninsula, however, is more or less isolated by a mountain wall, so that the various races preserve their own social, political, and religious characteristics. Consequently they engage in almost continual quarrels. In addition to this, all alike have been discontented because of the poverty which generally prevails among mountains, and have been inclined to attribute their troubles to their neighbors or to the government.
For all these reasons the Balkans have always played a trouble some role in Europe. The Turks, when they were in power, abused and massacred the Christian races until they appealed to the powers of Europe for protection. When the Christians became supreme, they often ill-treated the Turks. Moreover, the Christians have abused one another most cruelly because of differences in creed, language, and race. First one Great Power, then another, and finally all together have tried to bring order out of the Balkan chaos, but always the mountains and the conditions which go with them have baffled such attempts. Austria took possession of the provinces of Bosnia and Dalmatia and gave them a stable but repressive govern ment, but the mountaineers did not like foreign rule, and the Serbians of Serbia were continually inciting their fellow Serbians of the Aus trian provinces against the government. Troubles of this kind in 1914 were the immediate cause of the Great War, although other and deeper factors were still more important. When Austria demanded a reckoning with Serbia the Russians stood by that little Balkan country and thus the great conflict was precipitated.
After the war the various Slavic races of the northern Balkans united in the republic of Jugo-Slavia, while Bulgaria, Roumania, and Greece remained much as before. At once, however, there arose great difficulties because Bulgaria and especlially Jugo-Slavia each needed an outlet to the sea, while Greece and Italy wished to keep control of the whole /Egean and Adriatic coasts. Jugo-Slavia and Italy almost went to war over the port of Fiume, because this was almost the only place where the relief gave Jugo-Slavia an outlet to the sea.