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The influence of the topography of the country on the history of its inhabitants has been all important. How powerfully the configuration affects the climate is shown in the remarkable difference between the rainfall of the mountainous west and of the lowland east. This difference has necessarily modified the character and employment of the people, leading to the cultivation of the soil on the one side and the raising of sheep and cattle on the other. The fertile low grounds on the east have offered facilities for the invasions of Romans, Norsemen and English, while the mountain fastnesses of the interior and the west have served as secure retreats for the older Celtic population. While, therefore, Teutonic people have spread over the one area the earlier race has to this day maintained its ground in the other. Not only external configuration but geological structure also has profoundly influenced the pogress of the inhabitants. In the Highlands no mineral wealth has been discovered to stimulate the industry of the natives or to attract labour and capital. The tracts remain still as of old sparsely inhabited and given over to the breeding of stock and the pursuit of game. In the Lowlands, on the other hand rich stores of coal, iron lime and other minerals have been found The coal-fields have gradually drawn to them an ever-increasing share of the population Villages and towns have suddenly developed and rapidly increased in size. Manufactures and shipbuilding have grown and commerce has advanced with accelerated pace. Other influences have of course contributed largely to the development of the country but among them all the chief place must be assigned to that fortunate geological structure which amid the revolutions of the past has preserved in the centre of Scotland those fields of coal and ironstone which are the foundations of the national industry. |
