Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 52.djvu/489

Rh told by a manufacturer that a change of wind from east to west often makes a difference of seven or eight per cent in the product of a weaving shed. To secure the precious humidity, factories have even at times been built half under ground, emulating the example of the Oriental makers of Dacca muslin, or "woven wind," who work sitting in holes in the ground, so that their delicate fabrics may be rendered supple by the moisture of the earth. Thus, perhaps, acting in this way, has the factor of climate been able to overcome the inertia of the large population once centering in southern England for it has been compelled to transfer itself to the spot marked out by Nature for the industry.

To decide between race and environment as the efficient cause of any social phenomenon is a matter of singular interest at this time. A school of sociological writers, dazzled by the recent brilliant discoveries in European ethnology, show a decided inclination to sink the racial explanation up to the handle in every possible phase of social life in Europe. It must be confessed that there is provocation for it. So persistent have the physical characteristics of the people shown themselves, that it is not surprising to find theories of a corresponding inheritance of mental attributes in great favor. Yet it seems to be high time to call a halt when this "vulgar theory of race," as Cliffe-Leslie termed it, is made sponsor for nearly every conceivable form of social, political, or economic virtues or ills, as the case may be.

This racial school of social philosophers derives much of its data from French sources. For this reason, and also because our anthropological knowledge of that country is more complete than for any other part of Europe, we shall confine our attention primarily to France. Let us refresh our memories of the subject. For this purpose we reproduce herewith a map from a former article, showing the distribution of the head form. This we hold to be the best expression of the racial facts. On this map the dark tints show the localization of the Alpine broad-headed race common to central Europe in the unattractive upland areas of isolation. The light tints at the north, extending down in a broad belt diagonally as far as Limoges and along the coast of Brittany, denote the infusion of the blond, long-headed Teutonic race; while the similar light strip along the southern coast, penetrating up the Rhône Valley, measures the extension of the equally long-headed but brunette Mediterranean stock. The dotted area about Périgueux, in the southwest, we have