Influences of Geographic Environment Part 64

The relativity of geographical advantages in different historical periods warns us against a.s.suming in all times a sparsity of population in mountains, even when the adjoining lowlands offer many attractions of climate and soil. In ages of incessant warfare, when the motive of safety has strongly influenced distribution of population, protected mountain sites have attracted settlement from the exposed plains, and thus increased the relative density of population on the steep slopes.

The corrugated plateau of Armenia and Kurdistan, located on the uneasy political frontier of Russia, Persia and Asiatic Turkey, exposed for centuries to nomadic invasion from the east, shows a spa.r.s.er population on its broad intermontane plains than on the surrounding ranges.

Security makes the latter the choicer places of residence. Hence they are held by the overbearing and marauding Kurds, late-comers into the land, while the older and numerically weaker Armenians cower down on the lower levels.[1258] Here is an inversion of the usual order. The militantly stronger intruders, with no taste for agriculture, have seized the safer and commanding position on the hills, descending in winter with their cattle and horses to pasture and prey upon field and granary of the valley folk, whose better soil is a questionable advantage.

[Sidenote: Motive of protection in primitive peoples.]

Instances of this sort, rare in modern times, because of of general economic and social progress, multiply when we go into the history of primitive or ancient peoples. The Cherokee Indians of the Southern Appalachians, surrounded by powerful neighbors in the Chickasaws, Creeks and the encroaching whites of the seaboard colonies, attacked by war parties of Shawnees and Iroquois from the north, located the bulk of their nation in the mountains. The Overhill and Middle towns, numbering together thirty-three and situated wholly in the mountains, comprised four-fifths of their fighting force in 1775, while the nine towns distributed in the flat lands of Georgia and South Carolina were small and unimportant. The Indians themselves distinguished these two divisions of their country, the one as _Otarre_ or mountainous, and the others as _Ayrate_ or low.[1259] Similarly in ancient Gaul the three strongest tribes, the Sequani, Aedui, and Arverni, all had a large mountain nucleus. The Sequani held the Jura range with part of the Saone Valley; the Aedui held the northeast corner of the Central Plateau and some lands on the Saone, while the Arverni inhabited the western and central portion of the same highland. In a period of constant tribal migrations and war, the occupants of these high, protected locations were better able to defend themselves, and they maintained an adequate food supply by holding some of the adjoining lowland. Archaeologists generally agree that in central and southern Italy settlement first took place in the mountains, gradually extending thence down into the plains.

The superiority of the upland climate, the more abundant rainfall, the greater security against attack offered by mountain sites, and the excellent soil for agriculture resulting from the geological make-up of the Apennines, all combined to draw thither primitive and later settlement.[1260] [See map page 559.] Similarly in Britain of the Bronze Age, before the peoples of Aryan speech began to swarm over the island, the primitive inhabitants, involved in constant clan or tribal warfare, placed their villages on the hills, and left in the indestructible terraces on their slopes the evidences of a vanished race and an outgrown social order.[1261]

[Sidenote: Geographic conditions affecting density of mountain population.]

The advance of civilization, which brought the ancient pirate-ridden city from the inner edge of the coastal zone down to the wave-washed strand, also drew the hill town down to the plain, and the mountain population from their inaccessible strongholds to the more accessible and productive valleys. These facts contain a hint. The future investigation of archaeological remains in high mountain districts may reveal at considerable elevations the oldest and hence lowest strata of prehistoric development, strata which, in the more attractive valleys, have been obliterated or overlaid by later invasions of peoples and cultures. Ignoring this temporary attraction of population to protected mountain locations in ages of persistent warfare, we find that a comparison of many countries reveals a decreasing food supply and decreasing density of population, with every increase of height above a certain alt.i.tude, except in favored mining regions and in some tropical lands, where better climatic conditions and freedom from malaria distribute settlements far above the steaming and forest-choked lowlands. The density of population in mountains is influenced also by the composition of the soil, which affects its fertility; by the grade and exposure of the slopes, which determine the ease and success of tillage; by the proximity of the highlands to teeming centers of lowland population, and by the general economic development of the people.

In Great Britain, the spa.r.s.est population is found in the sterile highland moors of Scotland, where the county of Sutherland has only 11 inhabitants to the square mile, Inverness only 20.[1262] These figures reveal also the remoteness of a far northern location. In the southern half of the island the spa.r.s.est populations are found in the Welsh county of Radnor, with 49 to the square mile, and in English Westmoreland with 85, both of them mountain regions, but reflecting in their larger figures their close proximity to the teeming industrial centers of South Wales and Lancashire respectively. In France the most thinly settled _departements_ are Ba.s.ses-Alpes with 43 to the square mile and Hautes-Alpes with 50, which again owe even these figures in part to their situation on the margin of the densely populated valley of the middle Rhone. [See map page 559.] Norway, almost wholly a mountain country, averages only 18 souls to the square mile. Less than a thousand square miles of its territory are under cultivation, and these are distributed in small deltas at the heads of the fiords, in low strips here and there along its western coasts, or in the openings of its mountain valleys to the southeast. Here too is ma.s.sed the larger part of its inhabitants. A barren granitic soil, unfavorable zonal location, excessive rainfall, paucity of level land, leaving the "upright farm"

predominant, and remoteness from any thickly settled areas, together with the resulting enormous emigration, have combined to keep down Norway's population.

[Sidenote: Sparsity of population in the Alps.]

If we turn to Switzerland, a country poor in the resources of its land but rich in the resourcefulness of its people, we find a high average density, 218 to the square mile; but this is due to the surprising industrial development of the marginal plains, which show in the Canton of Geneva 1356 to the square mile, and in Canton Zurich 705, while the rugged upland of Graubunden (Grisons) shows only 38 to the square mile, Uri only 48, and Wallis (Valais) only 59. How limited is the food supply of the country is evident from the fact that only 2400 square miles, or fifteen per cent. of its area, can be ranked as arable land, fit for garden, orchard or grain field, while a larger proportion, or twenty-eight per cent. is made wholly useless by watercourses, glaciers, rock and detritus. One half of the entire country lies above the region where agriculture is possible. In the Cantons of Uri and Valais, more than half the area is absolutely unproductive, scarcely less in the Grisons, and a third even in sunny Ticino.[1263] The three strictly Alpine provinces of Austria, Tyrol, Salzburg and Carinthia, reproduce approximately these geographic conditions. Nearly half of their area is uninhabited, and only one-seventh consists of arable land. In consequence they support only 75 inhabitants to the square mile, while just outside the mountains, in the piedmont or Alpine foreland, this density is doubled.[1264] Many tracts of the Carpathians, especially about the sources of the Theiss and Pruth and the wooded mountain borders of Transylvania, are among the most spa.r.s.ely inhabited parts of Europe.[1265]

j.a.pan, ridged by steep volcanic ranges, drenched by mountain-born rains, strewn with detritus from plunging torrents, can cultivate only 15.7 per cent. of its area, and is forced to leave 59 per cent. in forest reserves.[1266]

[Sidenote: Terrace agriculture.]

These figures tell of the hard conditions of life characteristic of most mountain regions. Population under normal circ.u.mstances settles in the narrow valleys between the ranges and along the borders of their drainage stream. Soon, however, the food supply becomes inadequate for the growing numbers, so that artificial means have to be employed to expand the area of arable land. The soil on the mountain slopes is so thin that it yields only a scanty return to the labor of tillage.

Moreover, under the operations of ploughing and harrowing, it is exposed to the danger of washing; so that after a few croppings the underlying rock of the mountain side may be laid bare, and all that was valuable in the quondam field deposited in the valley as silt or swept away to enrich the distant delta of the nearest trunk river.

To obviate this difficulty and to secure the desired increase of arable land, mountain peoples the world over have resorted to terrace agriculture. This means hand-made fields. Parallel walls, one above the other, are constructed on horizontal lines across the face of the steep slopes, and the intervals between are filled with earth, carried thither in baskets on the peasants' backs. The soil must be constantly renewed and enriched by manure in the same way, and the masonry of the retaining walls kept in repair. Whenever possible these costly terraced fields are located by preference on southward facing slopes, where the tilt of the land makes the fields catch the rays of the sun almost at right angles and thus counteracts the chill of the higher alt.i.tude, while the mountain behind protects the growing crops from cold northern winds.

Good arable land, being limited in amount, commands a high price; and especially do choice terraced fields in vine-growing countries, since they make the best vineyards. Such fields in Switzerland will bring from $300 to $2,000 an acre, and are estimated to produce annually two bottles of wine for every square foot.[1267]

[Sidenote: Geographical distribution.]

Terrace agriculture, rare in new countries, in the more densely populated Old World is widely distributed in mountainous areas. In Germany, where it is nearly identical with the culture of the vine, it is found along the steep slopes overlooking the valley of the Moselle and the Rhine; also in the Vosges Mountains, the Black Forest and the Swabian Jura, to the limited alt.i.tude in which the vine will flourish in these northern regions. In the Alps it is widespread, and not confined to the culture of the vine. The traveler pa.s.sing along the upper Rhone through the sunny Canton of Valais follows these terraced fields almost as far as Fiesch (alt.i.tude 3458 feet), beyond which agriculture proper becomes more and more restricted on account of the elevation, and pa.s.ses rapidly into the mere hay-making of a pastoral community. Between Leak and Sierre, not only the mountain sides, but also the steep gravel hills const.i.tuting the old terminal moraine deposited by the receding Rhone glacier across the valley floor, are terraced to their very tops.

Terrace cultivation prevails in the mountains of Italy; it is utilized not only for the vine, but for olives, maize, oats, hemp, rye and flax.

On the gentler declivities of the Apennines, the terraced walls are wider apart and lower than on the steep slopes of the Ligurian Apennines and along the Riviera of the Maritime Alps, where the mountains rise abruptly from the margin of the sea.[1268] Careful and laborious terrace cultivation has produced in Italy a cla.s.s of superior gardeners. The Genoese are famous for their skill in this sort of culture. The men from the Apennine plateau of the Abruzzi readily find positions in the lowlands as expert gardeners.[1269]

[Sidenote: Terrace culture of the Saracens.]

The Saracens of Spain in the tenth century converted every mountain slope into a succession of green terraces. They built walls of heavy masonry, and brought water, loam, and fertilizing materials from great distances. The slopes of Granada back of Malaga and Almeria were covered with vineyards. Every foot of land susceptible of cultivation was turned to account, every drop of water from the ill-timed winter rains was conserved for the growing season. The application of intelligence and labor to tillage enabled the Hispano-Arab provinces to support a dense population.[1270] These Saracen cultivators had come from the severest training school in all Eurasia. Where the arid tableland of Arabia is b.u.t.tressed on the southwestern front by high coast ranges (6000 to 10,500 feet or 2000 to 3200 meters) is Yemen, rich in its soil of disintegrated trap rock, adequately watered by the dash of the southwest monsoons against its towering ridges; but practically the whole country is atilt. Consequently the mountains have been terraced from the base often up to 6000 feet. The country presents the aspect of vast agricultural amphitheaters, in which the narrow paths of ancient paving zigzag up and up through successive zones of production. Here is a wide range of fruits--oranges, lemons, figs, dates, bananas and coffee; then apricots, apples, plums, grapes, quinces, peaches, together with grains of various zonal distribution, such as millet, maize, wheat and barley.

The terrace walls are from five to eight feet high, but toward the top of the mountains they often increase to fifteen feet. Though laid without mortar, they are kept in perfect repair. Reservoirs filled with water from the two rainy seasons, supply the irrigation channels.[1271] In the narrow valleys of the Nejd plateau in central Arabia and on the mountain slopes of Oman are found the same irrigated gardens and terraced plantations. This laborious tillage underlay the prosperity of the ancient Sabaean monarchy of Yemen, as it explains the population of 35,000 souls who occupy the modern capital of Sanaa, located at an alt.i.tude of 7600 feet (2317 meters).[1272]

[Sidenote: In the Himalayas.]

Turning eastward, we find terrace agriculture widely distributed in Himalayan lands. The steep mountain sides of the Vale of Kashmir are cultivated thus to a considerable height. The terraces are irrigated by contour channels constructed along the hillsides, which bring the water for miles from distant snow-fed streams. Their shelf-like fields are green with fruit orchards and almond groves, with vineyards and grain fields.[1273] The terraced slopes about the Himalayan hill-station of Simla (elevation 7100 to 8000 feet) feed the summer population of English, who there take refuge from the deadly heat of the plains. The mountain sections of the native states of Nepal and Bhutan present the view of slopes cut into gigantic stairs, each step a field of waving rice kept saturated by irrigating streams from abundant mountain springs. Farther north, where Himalayas and Hindu Kush meet, terrace agriculture is combined with irrigation in the high Gilgit valleys, and farther still along that mere gash running down from the Pamir dome, called the Hunza Valley. Here live the once lawless robber tribes of the Hunzas and Nagaris, whose conquest cost the British a dangerous and expensive campaign in 1892, but whose extensive terraces of irrigated fields and evidences of skillful tillage gave the whole country an appearance of civilization strangely at variance with the barbarous character of its inhabitants.[1274]

[Sidenote: In Tibet and China.]

North of the outer Himalayan range, near the sources of the Indus and Sutlej rivers in Ladak or Western Tibet, this same form of cultivation has been resorted to by the r.e.t.a.r.ded and isolated Mongolian inhabitants.

Here at an alt.i.tude of 11,000 feet or more (3354 meters), along mountain ranges of primitive rock yielding only a scant and sterile soil, terraces are laboriously constructed; their surfaces are manured with burnt remains of animal excrements, which must first serve as fuel in this timberless land before they are applied to the ground. In this stronghold of Buddhism almost every lamasery has its terraced fields yielding good crops of grain and fruit.[1275] In the densely populated Sze Chuan province of western China, cultivation has climbed from the fertile basins of the Min and upper Yangtze rivers far up the surrounding mountains, where it is carried on terraces to the foot of vertical cliffs.[1276] Farther north where the mountain province of Shensi occupies the rise of land from the Chinese lowlands to the central highlands of Asia, terraces planted with wheat or other grains cover the mountain slopes.[1277]

[Sidenote: In ancient Peru.]

Terrace tillage is rare in new countries of extensive plains, like the United States and Canada, where the level lands still suffice for the agricultural needs of the people; but in the confined mountain basins and valleys which made up the Inca's territory in ancient Peru, every available natural field was utilized for cultivation, and terraces brought the obstinate mountain sides under the dominion of the Andean peasant. They were constructed, a hundred or more in number, rising 1000 or 1500 feet above the floor of the highland valley, contracting in width as they rose, till the uppermost one was a narrow shelf only two feet broad. These were extended by communal labor year after year, with increase of population, just as to-day in Java and the neighboring islands, and became the property of the Inca. Streams from the higher slopes were conducted in ca.n.a.ls and distributed from terrace to terrace, to irrigate and fertilize. These terraces therefore yielded the best crops of potatoes, maize and pulse. The cultivable area was further extended by floating gardens, consisting of rafts covered with earth, which floated on the surface of lakes.[1278] They existed in ancient Mexico also,[1279] and are used to-day in the lakes and streams of Tibet and Kashmir[1280] and the rivers of overcrowded China.

[Sidenote: Terrace agriculture in mountainous islands.]

Mountainous islands, born of volcanic forces or the partial submergence of coastal ranges, have steep surfaces and scant lowlands. Their inhabitants command limited area at best. Driven to agriculture by their isolation, drawn to it by the favorable oceanic climate, such islands develop terrace tillage in its most p.r.o.nounced form. On the precipitous pitch of Teneriffe, every particle of alluvial soil is collected to make gardens. Long lines of camels, laden with boxes of earth, may be seen coming almost daily into the town of Santa Cruz, bringing soil for the terraces.[1281] This is desperate agriculture. Irrigated terraces scar the steep slopes of many Polynesian islands.[1282] They are highly developed among the Malay Battaks of Sumatra, especially for rice culture.[1283] In Java, Bali and Lombok they reach a perfection hardly equalled elsewhere in the world. In Java they begin at an alt.i.tude of 1000 feet, cutting main and branch valleys into amphitheaters, and covering hundreds of square miles.[1284] On the volcanic slopes of Lombok the terrace plots vary from many acres to a few square yards, according to the grade, while a complete system of irrigation uses every brook to water the terraces. Here as in Java the work began at a very early period, when it was probably introduced among the native Malays by Brahmans from India.[1285] j.a.pan, two-thirds of whose area is mountainous, has terraced its steep valley walls often up to 2000 feet or more, and utilized every patch of ground susceptible of tillage.[1286]

[Sidenote: Among mountain savages.]

A mountain environment often occasions a forced development in the form of agriculture among peoples who otherwise still linger in a low stage of barbarism or savagery. The wild, head-hunting Igorots, inhabiting the Cordilleras of north central Luzon, have levelled the face of their mountains into a series of platforms, held by retaining walls from twenty to thirty feet high. On these they cultivate upland rice at an alt.i.tude of 5000 feet. The Igorot province of Bontoc contains valleys in which every available foot of land is terraced for rice, and which present artificial landscapes vividly recalling j.a.pan. Labor is the heritage of each inhabitant. Every man, woman and child down to ten years of age shares in the work of providing food.[1287] Africa shows parallel cases. The Angoss people, a savage negro tribe who occupy part of the Murchison Range in northern Nigeria, have mapped out all their sloping land into little terraces, sometimes only a foot or two wide.

One of their peaks, 4135 feet high, has its plateau top covered with populous villages, owing to the protection of the site, and every inch of its slope cut into terraces planted with millet and guinea corn.[1288]

A more primitive form of this tillage is found in the country of the Marunga negroes, who occupy the steep western face of the rift valley filled by Lake Tanganyika. Here Cameron found the surface not regularly terraced, but retaining walls of loose stones disposed at intervals, which served to hold the soil in place, without greatly altering the natural slope. The scene recalled the terraced heights of Switzerland, and the people working there looked like flies on a wall.[1289] In the semi-arid country of Sudanese Darfur, where only the mountain districts are well watered and thickly populated, small terraces for grain and melons cover all the slopes.[1290]

[Sidenote: Fertilizing]

Mountain agriculture is necessarily laborious. The paucity of arable land precludes the possibility of letting fields lie fallow. These, to prevent exhaustion, must be constantly and abundantly fertilized, all the more as conditions of excessive subaerial denudation found in the steep slope and usual heavy rainfall of mountains, as well as possible glacial scouring of the land in the past, have greatly attenuated the layer of soil called upon to support plant life. The Swiss or Tyrolese farmer cherishes his manure pile as at once source and badge of his wealth. After harvest it is carted or carried in baskets not only to the terraces, but also to the wide alluvial fan that grows his oats and rye, to his meadows and hay fields. Both in Mexico and Peru the soil received a dressing of poudrette. Manuring was most extensive where population was densest, as in the isolated mountain valleys opening out upon the desert coast of Peru. Every kind of organic refuse was utilized, and fish was buried with the kernels of maize as a fertilizer.

The deposits of guano found on the headlands and off-sh.o.r.e islands were used from the remotest times. Different guano beds were a.s.signed to the several provinces, and the breeding places of the birds were protected by law.[1291] Ashes and decayed wood were employed for the same purpose, or plants were dug into the soil, while human manure was in Mexico a marketable commodity as in China.[1292]

[Sidenote: Economy of level land for houses and villages.]

In all mountain regions where population has begun to press upon the meager limits of subsistence, level land and soil are at a premium. In ancient Peru s.p.a.ce was begrudged for the dead.[1293] Cities covered considerable s.p.a.ce on the roomy intermontane plateaus; but in the narrow lateral valleys, houses and temples were built on rocks, in order to reserve every fertile spot for agriculture.[1294] The traveler notices the same thing throughout the Alps. Compact villages cling to the mountain sides, leaving the alluvial hem of the stream or level glacial terrace free for the much needed fields. Only in broad longitudinal valleys, like that of Andermatt, do the settlements complacently spread out their skirts, or on wide alluvial fans where transverse valleys debouch upon the plains. The mountaineers of the Crimea construct their houses against the precipices, excavating into their face and building up the front, with stones, and thus reserve the gentler slopes for vineyards and gardens.[1295] In the Kangra, k.u.maon, and Garhwal districts of the British Himalayas, the large Indian villages of the plains give place to small hamlets or detached homesteads, scattered here and there wherever occasional patches of soil on a hillside or in a narrow valley offer hope of sustenance. These hamlets or dwellings are located on the sides of the mountains, because level spots which can be irrigated must be reserved for rice fields.[1296] The high site is also freer from malaria.

[Sidenote: Perpendicular villages]

In the high Himalayan province of Ladak or Western Tibet, this principle of land economy reaches a climax. All settlement is on the perpendicular. The abrupt mountain sides are honey-combed with tombs, villages and Buddhist lamaseries in the detached localities where population occurs. A pleasure walk through one of these Tibetan towns means a climb by steep flights of steps hewn out of the rock, varied by a saunter up ladders, where the sheer face of a cliff must be surmounted to reach the houses on a ledge above.[1297] Pictures of these recall forcibly the cliff-dwellings of the Pueblo Indians. Even the important market city of Leh covers the lower slope of the mountain at an alt.i.tude of 11,500 feet, and from its height overlooks the cultivated fields in the sandy valley bed below, made fertile by irrigating streams from debouching canons.[1298] The Ladak villages always shun the plains. The desire to economize level arable land does not alone dictate this choice of sites, however; the motive of protection against inundation, when the snows melt and the streams swell, and also, to some degree, against hostile attack, is an additional factor. In the mountainous parts of overcrowded China, again, the food problem is the dominant motive. In the rugged highland province of Shensi, a village of several hundred people covers only a few acres, and rises in closely packed tiers of houses against the mountain side.[1299] In the wilder, half-conquered parts of Sze Chuan the villages crown the lower peaks, cling to the base of the mountains, or are perched on ledges of rock overlooking the gorges. Among the steep cliffs bordering the upper Yangtze, occupied chiefly by the timid, displaced Mantze aborigines, at an alt.i.tude of 10,000 feet, small platforms resting on beams projecting from the sheer mountain face support minute houses, whose backs burrow into the cliff behind. The small children are tied to the door post, to keep them from falling into the millet field below. The house is accessible only by bolts driven into the cliff. Above and below is the farm--small patches of tilled soil, often not larger than a bath towel, to which the cultivator lowers himself by a rope.[1300] Here life hovers on the brink of death and despair.

[Sidenote: Mountain pastures and stock-raising.]

Paucity of arable land in mountain regions leads to the utilization of the untillable slopes for stock grazing. This industry is always a valuable ally to mountain agriculture on account of the manure which it yields; but in high alt.i.tudes, where the steepness or rockiness of the soil, cold and the brevity of the growing season restrict or eliminate cereal crops, it becomes the dominant occupation of the inhabitants, while agriculture takes a subordinate place, limited to the production of hay and fodder for the winter feeding of the stock. Above the line of tree growth flourish the natural summer pastures up to the border of perpetual snow; and just below lies a zone which, if cleared of its forests, supports a thick carpet of gra.s.s and herbage, though too cold to ripen grain.

The high pastures are particularly nourishing. Cows feeding here in the Alps give better milk than the "home" or valley cows, though a smaller quant.i.ty. Sheep and goats do equally well, but swine are profitable only as a by-product, to utilize the refuse of the cheese and b.u.t.ter industry. The area of these pastures far exceeds that of arable land in mountain regions. In Switzerland they comprise about 27 per cent. of the total productive area; hay meadows 24 per cent., but fields and gardens only 20 per cent.[1301] In the Austrian province of Salzburg, pastures make up 13.3 per cent., hay meadows 34.5 per cent., and tilled fields only 11.7 per cent. of the total productive area. In the Tyrol the figures are much the same.[1302] Since Norway has over 67 per cent. of its total area in bare mountains, snow fields, bogs and lakes, it is not surprising to find only 7.6 per cent. in pastures, 2.2 per cent. in meadows, and 0.7 per cent. in grain fields; but here the pastures are ten times the arable area.[1303] The season of the summer feeding on the gra.s.s lands is short. In the so-called High Alps it frequently lasts only six or seven weeks, in the Grisons at most thirteen weeks[1304] and in Norway from two to three months.[1305]

High mountain regions, practically restricted to this _Graswirthschaft_, soon reach their maximum of prosperity and population. The amount of hay secured for the winter feeding limits the number of cattle, and the number of the cattle, through their manure, fixes the valley hay supply.

Alpine pastures cannot be enlarged, and they may be reduced by accidents of nature, such as landslides, devastating torrents, or advance of ice fields or glaciers. They cannot be improved by capital and labor, and they may deteriorate chemically by exhaustion. The constant export of b.u.t.ter and cheese from Alpine pastures in recent times, without subst.i.tution by any fertilizer beyond the local manure, has caused the diminution of phosphoric acid in the soil and hence impoverishment. Canton Glarus has shown a steady decline since 1630 in the number of cows which its mountain pastures can support.[1306] Many other Alpine districts show the same deterioration.

[Sidenote: Mountain herdsman and shepherds.]

The remoteness of these highland pastures from the permanent villages necessitates _Sennenwirthschaft_, or the maintenance of out-farms and shepherds on the mountains during the grazing season. This involves a semi-nomadic existence for such inhabitants as serve as herdmen. In June, as soon as the high pastures begin to grow green, cattle, sheep and goats ascend step by step in the wake of summer, as she climbs the slope, and they return in autumn to the valleys. There they feed on the stubble of hay and grain fields, till the increasing cold confines them to their low stables. The hut of the _Senner_ or _Saeter_, as the herdsman is variously called in Switzerland and Norway, consists of a living room and a smaller apartment for making b.u.t.ter and cheese, while against the steep slope is a rude stone shelter for the cattle and goats. The predominance of summer pastures has made cattle-raising a conspicuous part of agriculture in the Alps and in Norway. In many parts of Switzerland, cattle are called "wares" and the word cheese is used as a synonym for food, as we use bread. A Swiss peasant who has a reputation for cheese making is popular with the girls.[1307] Here even Cupid turns dairy expert.

[Sidenote: Communal ownership of mountain pastures.]

Since it is scarcely practicable to divide these highland pastures, they have generally remained communal property, whether in Norway,[1308]

Switzerland, the Bavarian Alps, the British Himalayan districts,[1309]

Nepal and Bhutan,[1310] or Kashmir.[1311] In Europe their use is generally regulated. As a rule, a Swiss villager may keep on the _Allmende_ during the summer as many head of cattle as he is able to stall-feed during the winter. Any in excess of this number must be paid for at a fixed rate to the village or commune treasury.[1312] Hay-sheds and herdsmen's huts mark these districts of temporary occupation near the alt.i.tude limits of human life throughout Europe. In Asia, likewise, are to be found small villages, inhabited only in summer by herdsmen tending their flocks. Such is the hamlet of Minemerg, located at an alt.i.tude of about 8000 feet at the southern entrance to the Borzil Pa.s.s over the Western Himalayas, and Sonamerg (alt.i.tude 8650 feet or 2640 meters) just below the Zogi La Pa.s.s, both of them surrounded by rich meadows on the northern rim of the Vale of Kashmir.[1313]

The utilization of mountain pastures for stock raising is almost universal. In the arid highlands of Central Asia, it is the essential supplement to the pastoral nomadism of the steppes and deserts, and to the limited sedentary agriculture found along the irrigated piedmont slopes. Here and elsewhere the animal raised varies widely-the llama and vicuna in Peru, which thrive best at 10,000 to 13,000 feet elevation, and multiply rapidly on the _ichu_ or coa.r.s.e gra.s.s which clothes the slopes of the higher Andes up to snow line; sheep, goats, yaks and herds of dzo, a useful hybrid between yak and cow, in the highland districts of Sze Chuan. Here the Mantze mountaineers lock their houses and leave their villages deserted, while they camp with their herds on the high pastures at 10,000 feet or more.[1314] Only economical, ingenious j.a.pan has failed to develop stock raising, though mountains comprise two-thirds of its area. The explanation has often been sought in Buddhism, which inhibits the use of animal food; but this religious rule probably found ready acceptance in j.a.pan, just because the paucity of animal food made its observance easy, for the fish industry of the Empire never suffered from the inhibition. The reason is probably to be sought elsewhere. The native gra.s.s of j.a.pan, which relentlessly crowds out all imported grazing crops, is a bamboo gra.s.s with sharp, hard, serrated edges, and is said to cut the entrails of horses and sheep.[1315]

[Sidenote: Haymaking in high mountains.]