The climate of Europe is thus characterized by uniformity as a whole, and by a compensatory action in its contrasts. Regularity and freedom from excess, such as are not known in other continents, mark its ocean currents, its winds, its temperature and rains, and the course of its rivers. These great advantages have benefited its inhabitants in the past, and will not cease to do so in the future. Though small in extent, Europe possesses by far the largest area of acclimation. Man may migrate from Russia to Spain, or from Ireland to Greece, without exposing himself to any great risk of life. The inhabitants of the Caucasus and the Ural Mountains were thus able to cross the plains and mountains of Europe, and to establish themselves on the shores of the Atlantic. Soil and climate are equally propitious to man, and enable him to preserve his physical and intellectual powers wherever he goes. A migratory people might found new homesteads in any part of Europe. Their companions of travel—the dog, the horse, and the ox—would not desert them on the road, and the seed-corn which they carry with them would yield a harvest wherever confided to the earth. VI.—INHABITANTS. A study of the soil and a patient observation of climatic phenomena enable us to appreciate the general influence exercised by the nature of the country upon the development of its inhabitants; but it is more difficult to assign to each race or nation its due share in the progress of European civilisation. No doubt, in their struggles for existence, different groups of naked and ignorant savages must have been acted upon differently, according to their numbers and physical strength, their inborn intelligence, their tastes and mental tendencies. But who were those primitive men who first turned to account the natural resources of the country in which they dwelt? We know not; for, if we go back for a few thousand years, every fact is shrouded in darkness. We know nothing even as regards the origin of the leading nations of Europe. Are we the “sons of the soil,” and the “shoots of oak-trees,” as told in the poetical language of ancient tradition, or are we to look upon the inhabitants of Asia as the ancestors to whom we are indebted for our languages, and for the rudiments of our arts and sciences? Or did those immigrants from a neighbouring continent settle down amongst an indigenous population? Not many years ago the Asiatic origin of European nations was accepted as an established fact, and the original seats of our forefathers were pointed out upon the map of Asia. But now most men of science are agreed to {19} seek our ancestors upon the very soil which we, their descendants, still occupy. Caverns, the shores of oceans and lakes, and the alluvial beds of our rivers have yielded the remains of human industry, and even human skeletons, which clearly prove that long before these supposed immigrations from Asia there existed in