Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 75.djvu/222

218 to the value of $32,600,000. The total annual mineral output of Italy is about $20,000,000.

When we remember that Italy imports much of her food as well as iron, coal and other things, we are pressed with the question—where does she get her exchange values? Five of her imports pass the hundred million lire mark. These are wheat, raw cotton, coal and coke, boilers and machinery and raw silk. But one export passes this mark, viz., raw silk, rising, however, to nearly 600,000,000 lire. There are, indeed, many exports of smaller value, but these are more than offset by minor imports, so that, as a whole, her imports exceed her exports by nearly 600,000,000 lire, or by about 33 per cent. It is not easy to see how Italy maintains her people. Certain reliefs suggest themselves. It is admitted that many Italians exist rather than live; but this must not be said of Rome or Tuscany or the valley of the Po. We allow something for a genial climate which at once gives quick returns from the soil and reduces the need of clothing and fuel. And we may not forget the great sums brought into Italy by travelers and foreign residents, for the winning of whose money Italian arrangements sometimes seem peculiarly effective. However difficult it is for one not trained in economic studies to see how this thing is done, it is done, and conditions are improving. We are thus warranted in looking to this middle kingdom of the Mediterranean for lessons concerning ourselves.

As has been already intimated, 70.6 per cent, of Italy is registered as productive, the rest being barren or negligible. Let us consider the territory of the United States east of the arid regions. We will (let us hope to be forgiven) eliminate New England, the Appalachian Mountain belt, the Appalachian Plateau, the interior timbered region and the Ozark Hills. The lands thus thrown out as relatively poor contain 28 per cent, of the area under consideration, which it will be seen is not far from the 29.4 per cent, rejected in Italy. And they contain 30,000,000 people, which is not far from the population of Italy. We have left a vast expanse of prairie, alluvial and lacustrine lowland, and of coastal plain. We may at least please our fancy by giving these selected lands the density of Italy. The resulting population is about 334,000,000. Adding the present population of the rejected areas, we have a total east of the arid belt, of 364,000,000. If we allow half the density of Italy for this entire area, we have a total population east of the arid belt, of 230,000,000.

We have just referred to a classification of lands which is comparatively new. For some years physiographers have seen that new categories were needed in the description of continental surfaces. The forms of the land have been taken into account, in respect both to their origin and to their present characteristics. A plain is more than a plain for it may be of a variety of origins and types, with its peculiar phases of structure, relief, soil, climate and vegetation. Similar statements