Page:Lars Henning Söderhjelm - The Red Insurrection in Finland in 1918 - tr. Annie Ingebord Fausbøll (1920).djvu/13



For the last twenty years Finland has lived under politically abnormal conditions. For twenty years an intense struggle against Russian oppression has set its stamp on the whole spiritual existence of the people. At the same time the material conditions of life have run through a rapid development for great portions of the people. The last decades have seen industrialism making more and more headway into a people which before may be said to have virtually consisted of farmers and Government functionaries only. Towns and manufacturing centres have grown with American swiftness, the city population has been increased chiefly by influx from the country, the housing question has become pressing, the labour movement has grown like an avalanche. Social as well as political conditions have thrown the country off its balance.

Finland is sparsely populated, her soil yields but grudgingly, her climate is cold. The character of her people bears the impression of these harsh conditions. Dogged, tenacious, stubborn, the Finn has accustomed himself to fight a troublesome, slow and silent battle against the hard forces of Nature. He has few neighbours, and has learnt to trust to himself alone. His thoughts revolve round his own toil and trouble, and find their expression in the necessary action, not in sociable words. He is a hermit, and his emotions are of a strong and primitive order. He lives for himself only, and is an out-and-out individualist.

The stranger is to him a stranger, therefore suspected