The Basque element in the population of France is at the present time centered in the old province of Aquitaine, in which the jet-black hair and eyes, and swarthy complexion, strike the eye of the traveller, now as in the days of Strabo,[149] and form a vivid contrast with the brown hair and grey eyes of the inhabitants of Celtica and Belgica (see Map, Fig. 68). If Fig. 68 be compared with the map published by Dr. Broca (“Mémoires d’Anthropologie,” t. i. p. 330), which shows at a glance the average complexion prevailing in each department, and the relative number of exemptions per 1,000 conscripts, on account of their not coming up to the standard of height (1·56 metre = 5 feet 1½ inches), it will be seen that the only swarthy people outside the boundary of Aquitaine constitute five ethnological islands. Of these Brittany is by far the largest, probably because its fastnesses afforded a shelter to the Basques, who were being driven to the south-west. The department of the Meuse, in the north, and those of Tarn and Arriège, in the south, are also sundered from the main body, while those of the Upper and Lower Alps present us with the descendants of the ancient Ligurian tribes. The people with dark-brown hair, considered by Dr. Broca to be the result of the intermingling of a dark with a fair race, are scattered about through Aquitaine, and occur only in two departments in northern Celtica. The fair people, on the other hand, are massed in northern Celtica and Belgica. The relation of complexion to stature may be gathered from the following table of exemptions per 1,000 for each department:-- Départements noirs 98·5 to 189 ” gris-foncés 64· ” 97 ” gris-clairs 48·8 ” 63·8 ” blancs-clairs 23· ” 48·5 From this table it is evident that the swarthy people are the smallest and the fair the tallest, the intermediate shades being the result of fusion between the two extremes. The distribution therefore of the small swarthy Basque, and tall fair Celtic and Belgic races in France at the present time, corresponds essentially with that which we might have expected from the evidence both of history and of the neolithic caves and tombs.[150] When we consider the many invasions of France, and the oscillations to and fro of peoples, the persistence of the Basque population is very remarkable. It is not a little strange that the type should be so slightly altered by intermarriage with the conquering races. _Whence came the Basques?_