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extending the White empire on the Caspian and the Euxine, and along the Oxus and Jaxartes into Central Asia.
Vaster still have been the marches and the conquests of Great Britain, her command of the ocean giving her facilities which are not possessed by any other power.
Within a hundred years, or thereabouts, she has grown from a kingdom of ten millions of people into an empire of two hundred and twenty millions, with a territory covering nearly one-third of the earth.
Hardly less striking than the progress of Russia and England has been that of the United States.
Starting with a population no larger than that of Greece, the Republic has advanced so rapidly that in a hundred years she has become the third power as to size of territory, the fourth as to wealth of population, in the world.
Soil and population are the two prime elements of power.
Climate and fertility count for much; nationality and compactness count for more; but, still, the natural basis of growth is land, the natural basis of strength is population.
Taking these two elements together, the Chinese were, a hundred years ago, the foremost family of mankind.
They
1875.
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