Page:The National Geographic Magazine Vol 16 1905.djvu/31

Rh From Carnolia, Krainers have been coming here for 70 years, following some Krainer missionaries who came here and settled on the northwestern border. These missionaries have been followed by their countrymen, who have formed settlements. They are in most respects a desirable people, and come here to remain, and are rapidly becoming citizens.

Dalmatian settlements are rapidly forming in the United States, especially in the more growing sections of California. The whole Balkan territory is beginning to feel the fever of emigration, and only the prohibitive rates for passage keep the semi-civilized tribes of Bosnia, Servia, Herzgovinia, and Bulgaria from coming here. In the near future cheap river transportation will be provided on the Danube River to the Black Sea, whence they can come to the United States. Then we may expect them in large numbers.

Up to 1899 the Finlanders had lived contentedly enough under Russian rule, and, on the whole, the Czars punctili- ously observed their oath to maintain inviolate the constitutional liberties of Finland. In that year, however, the present Czar wiped out the Finnish constitution and promulgated a rescript that all questions held by the Russian ministers at St Petersburg to concern the Muscovite Empire of old should be treated by them and Finland put under the general conditions of other Russia.

Prior to that time no enactment had the force of law unless it emanated from the Finnish Parliament. The protest on the part of Finland to this action was immediately responded to by almost every other civilized country in the world, but without avail. The press is muzzled, the right of public meetings prohibited, and private gatherings for- cibly dispersed. In July, 1901, by spe- cial ukase, the Finnish military act of 1878 was abrogated and the army broken up. Those Finnish officers who did not choose to serve in Russian regiments were sent into private life.

When we consider that among the Finnish people it is stated that only one man in 1,200 cannot read nor write, while in Russia the illiteracy ranges from 47 to 66 per cent, according to districts, and Finnish customs, language, manners, religion, and ideals are all different, it seems that this movement will practically destroy the Finnish peo- ple. In 1899 we commenced to get what promised to be a considerable immigra- tion from this territory, but the British government, alert to the advantage of securing such a desirable people, have, by reason of special inducements, diverted the Finns to Australia and other British colonies.

Greek immigration consists mainly of boys and young men, there being but one woman to thirty males. Some work in mills in Massachusetts, but the bulk are brought over to peddle fruit and peanuts, in which business they are displacing the Italians. It is generally understood that they are brought over by padrones and paid $100 per year for their services in peddling.

The Syrian immigration now amounts to over 3,000 yearly. The movement seemed to receive an impetus by the World's Fair of 1893. Like the Greek, they are mainly controlled by padrones. Though the movement is actually less than ten years old, Syrians are now trudging over the whole of the Western continents with their packs and baskets of gew-gaws. They are not only around the well-settled districts, but are actually among the remote fishing hamlets of Newfoundland and Gaspe, everywhere among the villages of Mexico, in Brazil, Argentina, and in Patagonia.

In character they have changed little since they were described in the Old Testament. They have all the vices of