Spain

span, a kingdom of the Old World. Together with the kingdom of Portugal, it occupies the entire peninsula of southwestern Europe. Meiklejohn likens the shape to a "bull's hide nailed on a board, the neck at Gibraltar." The surface is for the greater part an elevated tableland from 2,000 to 3,000 feet above the sea. The map shows no less than five peculiarly knotted mountain ranges running from east to west. The northern range faces the Bay of Biscay, extends eastward and becomes the Pyrenees, the boundary between France and Spain. The southern range is known as the Sierra Nevada, a name transferred by the Spaniards to our Pacific coast. The five ranges create four interior valleys or upland plains, from which rivers flow eastward to the Mediterranean or westward to the Atlantic. The key to the geography of Spain is the location of these parallel valleys. The chief towns are situated on the chief rivers, or their branches. Saragossa is to be associated with the Ebro; Seville, Cordova, and Granada with the Guadalquiver; Toledo and Madrid with the Tagus; Salamanca, Valladolid, and Segovia with the Douro. The coast is for the greater part bold. The seaports are Barcelona, Valencia, and Malaga on the Mediterranean; and Cadiz, Palos, and Corunna on the Atlantic, each at or above the mouth of a river. There are fever-breeding lagoons of brackish water on some parts of the coast, but the interior, though almost as mountainous as Switzerland, is without lakes of importance. In summertime many of the streams go dry.

MINERALS. The mountains consist of almost all varieties of rock found in Europe,--granite, serpentine, sandstone, limestone, chalk, marl, and gypsum. They are rich in ores of gold, silver, quicksilver, copper, lead, iron, iron pyrites, and zinc. There are also mines of coal. There were in 1901, not less than 2,291 productive mines. The silver mines of Alameda, reputed the oldest in Europe, are sixty miles northwest of Cordova.

TIMBER. Though once well timbered, Spain is now scantily supplied with forests. Except in the coal districts, fuel is scarce and timber for building purposes expensive. The coast towns import coal. The most characteristic trees are the chestnut and cork oak. In the day of archery, Spanish yew was celebrated for bows. The great diversity of surface gives rise to a corresponding variety of plants. Botanists have collected no less than 5,000 flowering species. Many are not found elsewhere. The southern coast has many plants, as date palms, peculiar to Africa. The northern provinces only are cool enough to have grassy meadows and copses like those of north temperate countries. Salt steppe districts are frequent. A considerable area near Granada is covered with esparto grass.

FAUNA. As to wild animals, the ibex and the brown bear are found in the Pyrenees. The fallow deer, porcupine, lynx, Spanish hare, fox, and weasel are characteristic animals still seen occasionally. Spain lies in the route of birds migrating from northern Europe to Africa. Song birds are numerous. Snipes, red-legged partridges, and quails are brought to market in season. Vultures watch for carrion on the plains, and eagles seek their prey in the mountains. Three-foot lizards and scorpions bask in the sun along the Mediterranean. In the vicinity of Madrid alone, butterfly collectors find 350 species, many of them rare or not found elsewhere. The streams are full of trout. The rivers and harbors abound in food fishes.

AGRICULTURE. In spite of a decided lack of moisture, Spain is an agricultural country. Wheat ranks first as a food plant. Barley is the chief food for horses and mules. Rice and corn are raised in the southeast. Millet and sorghum are raised for forage. Hemp and flax are important crops in some districts. The mulberry tree and the silkworm thrive in the south. Fruit is abundant. Olives, apples, pears, cherries, plums, peaches, apricots, dates, figs, citrons, pomegranates, pineapples, and bananas are raised extensively, according to locality. Grapes grow everywhere. Malaga is the great grape export city of the world. Xeres is noted for sherry wine. Walnuts, chestnuts, and pistachios are abundant.

CLIMATE. The climate of a large part of Spain is surprisingly like that of parts of Mexico and southwestern United States, in which the Spaniards planted colonies. Perhaps no other nation in the world has shown greater skill, industry, and patience in overcoming arid conditions. Irrigation has been managed for centuries. Water is conducted along the mountain sides in canals or across plains in arched aqueducts to water dry districts. As in our Southwest, districts too arid for cultivation are devoted to sheep and cattle raising. The merino sheep originated here. Dairy cattle are found only here and there. The famous animals used for bull-fighting are reared in the southern province of Andalusia. Sheep and goats are the most common domestic animals. There are four times as many mules and asses as horses. They are surefooted on the mountain roads and stand heat better.

MANUFACTURES. The principal manufactures are cotton, woolen, and silk goods, paper, glass, corks, sugar, wine, and pottery. Although there are 8,300 miles of railway and several well built royal highways in the kingdom, it cannot be said that communication is easy or the carriage of goods inexpensive. Mountain trails and pack trains are still the only means of reaching a considerable portion of the population.

POPULATION. The ancient inhabitants of Spain are represented by the modern Basques. The peninsula filled up with successive waves of Celts, Vandals, Goths, Suevi, Alans, and Visigoths. Spain was, in fact, a sort of land's end,--a pocket in which the migrations spent themselves. Spain was the Land of Tarshish of Scripture. It was the battleground of the Carthaginians, Hannibal and Hamilcar, and the scene of the triumphs of Scipio Africanus. It is said that under the rule of the Roman Empire Spain had a greater population than at any time since. The extent to which it was colonized by Greeks and Romans may be inferred from the birth of Seneca, Martial, Lucan, Quintilian, and other distinguished Latin writers in that province. The remains of Roman works are still a marvel.

HISTORICAL. In 711 Spain was conquered by the Moors (Arabs) of Africa. For eight centuries the Christians were subject to Arab rule--a rule, it must be confessed, far more liberal than that of the Spanish princes. Not only was the Christain religion tolerated, but Cordova, Saragossa, Toledo, Valencia, and Seville, seats of Moslem power, became centers of education and culture that ought to have put the Christians to shame. The Mohammedan universities of Spain attracted students from all Europe and were the most advanced in the western world. However, the contests between Moslem and Christian went on for centuries and afford the most spectacular picture of warfare in the history of the West. The last Moors, and with them the Jews, were not crushed or expelled until the reign of Ferdinand and Isabella. A large part of the intelligence, industry, and manufacturing skill of the kingdom went with them, a loss from which Spain has never recovered fully.

The Spanish people are naturally proud and haughty. In the sixteenth century they were the predominant political power in Europe and owned the greater part of the New World. Wealth flowed in without effort. The exploits of Pizarro, Cortez, Balboa, De Soto, and others led their countrymen to neglect home affairs and internal improvements. It is held that, as the fortunes of Spain rose abroad, the prosperity of the country at home actually decreased.

Of late the foreign possessions have been reduced to the Balearic Isles in the Mediterranean, the Canary Isles in the Atlantic, and certain holdings on the coast of Africa. The country has begun to pick up and seems on the point of entering upon a new era of national prosperity.

GOVERNMENT, ETC. Continental Spain has an area of 190,150 square miles. The population in 1900 was 18,618,086, a gain of 3,000,000 in forty years. The government is a constitutional monarchy. The capital is Madrid. The national church is Catholic. A few thousand Protestants are tolerated on condition that they worship in private. In 1857 a system of public instruction was ordered, but in 1900 only 26,000 public schools had been organized. As late as 1889 sixty-eight per cent of the population was unable to read and write. Twenty-five years earlier the rate of illiteracy was eighty per cent. There are nine universities with 16,000 students. The government is maintained chiefly by a direct tax on land, by customs, and by monopoly of tobacco and royalties on ore. The national coin is the peseta, nominally corresponding to a franc, worth five to a dollar.

Andalusia is one of the most celebrated and characteristic provinces of Spain. It occupies the plain of the Guadalquiver. It is considered one of the granaries of Europe. It contains the ancient cities of Cadiz, Xeres, Seville, Malaga, Cordova, and Granada. It is rich in grain, wines, and fruit. It has mines. The inhabitants are graceful, eloquent, elegant in manner, given to song and dance and picturesque costume, but they are lazy, poor, and happy-quite content to remain so. The siesta or afternoon nap is a regular institution. At that hour the streets and houses are seemingly like those of a city of the dead.

The Spanish language is soft and musical. It resembles the Italian. Three-fifths of the words of the peasantry are Latin; two-fifths are Moorish, Gothic, etc. Of European languages, Spanish ranks next to English in geographical extent.

STATISTICS. The following statistics are the latest to be had from trustworthy sources:

See Alhambra; Moors; Isabella; Columbus; Seville; Madrid; Sherry; Cork; Cortes; Cervantes; Pyrenees; Escorial; Gibraltar; Basques; Merino; Roland; Charles V; ARMADA; CASTANETS; MURILLO; CUBA; PHILIPPINES; ECUADOR, etc.

The people standing at the threshold of the twentieth century have viewed the collapse of the last important edifices in the Spanish colonial domain. Spain, after a reign of just about four hundred years over an empire on which the sun never set, retained, at the termination of the war with the United States, but a remnant of its vast realms. A detailed discussion of the reasons for the misfortunes suffered by the Spaniards in colonization is not necessary. In every epoch and region the seeds were sown to reap the whirlwind. Too centralized an administration, utter lack of self-government, corrupt officials, avaricious greed for quick returns at the sacrifice of future prospects, a restrictive commercial system, trade monopoly, erroneous economic doctrines, the admission of the church to an exaggerated share in public affairs, and general wastefulness of resources, accompanied with enormous taxation, are the elemental defects to which disaster was due. The crown always clung to the maxim that it was the right of the parent state to draw all possible benefit and advantage for itself from the colonies, irrespective of the interests of the latter. Conquest would more aptly designate its motive of action in taking possession of foreign territory. Whatever may have been the temporary objects, the results are clear; the record must inevitably be closed with the verdict of failure due to false policy and deplorable methods.-Morris, History of Colonization.

Spanish-American War. A war between the United States and Spain was declared April 25, 1898. Hostilities ceased August 12, and a treaty of peace was concluded in December of the same year. Spain conceded the independence of Cuba and ceded Porto Rico, Guam, and the Philippines to the United States for $20,000,000. The war cost the United States $165,000,000; 360 American soldiers fell in battle and 2,604 died from disease. See Cuba; Dewey; Philippines; Manila; Porto Rico; Pensions