Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 3.djvu/326

 3 1 2 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY

nuclei together stands to that of the whole United States as i : 62.

Since historic movements, even in the making of states, almost always advance from the periphery towards the interior just as commerce and civilization do, the marginal countries are therefore necessarily the smaller, older, and earlier matured. That advance is just for this reason a progress to larger from smaller states which first spring up on the periphery and often suddenly expand enormously when they have reached the broad spaces of the interior. The youthful but powerful states and colonies of America and Africa afford numerous examples of this fact. This process takes on astonishing proportions when an insular posi- tion enables a large territory to be occupied at the same time from all sides, as Australia, for instance, whose population con- centrated on the rim of the continent, whose large cities and prompt, bold enterprise offer the sharpest contrast to Siberia, with its one accessible side. Similar in its effects is a great river system with its thousands of miles of course, which has prepared the country for both dominion and commerce, as the rapid growth of Brazil, the Congo State and the spread of the French on the St. Lawrence and Mississippi abundantly show. These natural conditions are among those which make themselves felt ever' again and through all political forms, for the reason that they exert not only a formative but also a conservative influence. Even though the example of powers of continental size in other parts of the world should some day have its effect on Europe, Europe's much articulated west and south will always promote the development of numerous medium and smaller states ; just as the great streams and land-forms of eastern America have so far effectuated the construction of political territories on a corresponding scale, in spite of all the disintegrating tendencies at work in the development of states. The influence exerted by the land upon historic movements continues to operate in less striking ways upon the further evo- lution of political territories. The peculiar character of the land and vegetation, together with the natural supply of domes-