Great peninsulas stretch away into both the great inland seas of Europe—that of the North and that of the South; the Danish and Scandinavian peninsulas into the complex, and yet, physically speaking, single body of water, embracing the North Sea, Baltic, and Gulf of Bothnia; Spain, Italy, and the Grecian peninsula extending southward into the Mediterranean. In the latter there is the greatest contrast between the deeply-indented northern shore and the bare, sandy coast of the African side. In just as great contrast is the uniformly unbroken sea-line of northern Siberia, compared with the articulated shore of northern Russia. How entirely different would the development of northern Asia have been, if a Siberian inland sea had penetrated to the very foot of the Altai, as the seas of northern Europe have pierced to the center of the continent! And had the shallow Syrtis cleft northern Africa as far as Lake Tchad, as the Adriatic has done on the opposite coast, Central Africa would not now be a terra incognita. The northern as well as the southern extremities of Europe, so far as they are projected into inland seas, have received an equal size and equal natural advantages, each of its own kind, so that, conditioned by its own peculiarities, its population have helped it to attain its rightful place, and an individuality independent of continental influences. The abundant resources which each of these extremities enjoys have insured it, in a physical as well as historical view, an independence which has reacted favorably upon the whole continent. What a debt does not Europe owe to the Greeks, Italians, Spaniards, Dutch, Danes, Scandinavians! How entirely different would the whole development of the shores of Europe have been, had they been bold, inaccessible rocks, an unbroken line of coast, like Uralaska, or the smaller Asiatic peninsulas of Kamtchatka and Malacca! And where would the accomplished European stand to-day, in comparison with his black neighbor on the south, were it not for the articulated coast-line of the continent which gives him his home? And still there remains, out of the inexhaustible richness of nature, one leading feature to be taken into account. To estimate it properly, we must pay attention briefly to the islands of the three continents of the Old World. Islands.