FRANCE
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FRANCE
bolic significance of tlie fisli and the anagram Ix^os,
it cannot- be necessary to insist. Both the inscription
of Aberciiis (q. v.) of the close of the second century
and that of Autun a little later, as well as a large num-
ber of allusions in early Christian literature, make it
clear that our Saviour Jesus Christ was indicated by
this symbol (see e. g. Mowat in the "Atti del Con-
gresso Internaz. d'Archeol. Crist.", Rome, 1902, pp.
2-4). Moreover, the Abercius inscription clearly con-
veys that this "great fish" was to be the permanent
food of the soul. We may also note that the one
female figure among the guests depicted in the Fractio
Panis fresco is veiled, which is not the case with the
female figures represented in those other banqueting
scenes foiuid in the catacombs and usually interpreted
as symbolic of the joys of heaven. The fresco of which
we speak is not, as will be readily understood, either
entirely realistic or entirely symbolical. That the
president (Trpoea-riis) of the synaxis (assembly) should
break the bread seated, is probably not to be under-
stood as implying that the bishops in the primitive
church were m fact seated when they otTered the
liturgy, any more than the attitude of the guests im-
plies that the early Christians reclined on couches
when they assisted at the Holy Sacrifice. On the
other hand, the action of the breaking of the bread is
clearly realistic. A further indication of the Eucha-
ristic significance of the fresco here under discussion is
aff'orded by the fact that in the fresco next to it in the
same chamber is depicted the sacrifice of Abraham.
On the other side is a representation of Daniel in the
lions' den, to which Mgr. Wilpert also attaches a
Eucharistic significance on account of the supernatural
feeding of Daniel through the intervention of the
prophet Habacuc (Dan., xiv, 36).
Wilpert, in 1895, published a monograph giving a full account of this discovery under the title Fractio PaniSy die alteste Dar- stellung der eitcharistischen Opfers (Freiburg im Br.). This was translated into French the next year. It contains a coltection of very carefully executed photogravures of the frescoes in the Capella Greca, but the dimness of the tones in the original fresco malces it impossible to distinguish the details clearly in any photographic copy. For this reason the coloured reproduction mcluded by Mgr. Wilpert in his later vrork Die Malereien der Katakomhcn Roms, two folio volumes (Freiburg, 1903), also published at Rome in Italian, is much to be preferred. The Fractio Panis is shown upon plate xv, vol. I. Compare also Marucchi, Elements d' Archcologie Chretienne (Paris, 1899— 1902), I, pp. 284-299; Leclercq in Diet, d' Archeologie, I, 3159- 3162.
Herbert Thurston.
France, the fifth in size (usually reckoned the fourth) of the great divisions of Europe.
Dksciuptive Geography. — The area of France is 207,107 square miles; it has a coast line 1560 miles and a land frontier 1525 miles in length. In shape it resembles a hexagon of which the sides are: (1) From Dunkirk to Point St-Matthieu (sands and dunes from Dunkirk to the mouth of the Somme; cliffs, called falaises, extending from the Somme to the Orne, except where their wall is broken by the estuary of the Seine ; granite boulders intersected by deep inlets from the Orne to Point St-Matthieu). (2) From Point St- Matthieu to the mouth of the Bidassoa (alternate granite cliffs and inlets as far as the River Loire; sandy stretches and arid moors from the Loire to the Garonne; sands, lagoons, and dunes from the Ciaronne to the Pyrenees), (.'i) From the Bidassoa to Point Cerbere (a formation known as Pyrenean chalk). (4) From Point Cerbere to the mouth of the Roya (a steep, rocky frontier from the Pyrenees to the Tech; sands and lagoons between the Tech and the Rhone, and an unbroken wall of pointed rocks stretching from the Rhone to the Roya). (5) From the Roya to Mount Donon (running along the Maritime, the Cot- tian, and the Graian Alps, as well as the mountains of Jura and the Vosges). (0) From Mount Donon to Dunkirk (an artificial frontier differentiated by few marked physical peculiarities).
France is the only country in Europe having a
coast line both on the Atlantic and on the Mediterra-
nean ; moreover the passes of Belfort, Cote d'Or, and
Naurouse open up ready channels of communication
between the Rhine, the English Channel, the Atlantic,
and the Mediterranean. Furthermore it is note-
worthy that wherever the French frontier is defended
by lofty mountains (as, for instance, the Alps, the
Pyrenees) the border peoples are akin to the French
either in race, speech, or customs (the Latin races),
while on the other hand the Teutonic races, differing so
widely from the French in ideas and sentiment, are
physically divided from them only by the low-lying
hills and plains of the North- East. Hence it follows
that France has always lent itself with peculiar facility
to the spread of any great intellectual movement,
coming from the shores of the Mediterranean, as was
the case with Christianity. France was the natural
highroad between Italy and England, between Ger-
many and the Iberian Peninsula. On French soil the
races of the North mingled with those of the South ; and
the very geographical configuration of the country
accounts in a certain sense for the instinct of expan-
sion, the gift of assimilation and of diffusion, thanks to
which France has been able to play the part of general
distributor of ideas. In fact, two widely different
worlds meet in France. A journey from North to
South leads through three distinct zones: the grain
country reaching from the northern coast to a line
drawn from Mezieres to Nantes; the vine country and
the region of berries, southward from this to the lati-
tude of Grenoble and Perpignan; the land of olive-
garths antl orange-groves, extending to the southern
boundary of the country. Its climate ranges from the
foggy promontories of Brittany to the sunny shores of
Provence ; from the even temperature of the Atlantic
to the suclden changes which are characteristic of the
Mediterranean. Its people vary from the fair-haired
races of Flanders and Lorraine, with a mixture of
German blood in their veins, to the olive-skinned
dwellers of the south, who are essentially Latin and
Mediterranean in their extraction. Again Nature has
formed, in the physiography of this country, a multi-
tude of regions, each with its own characteristics — its
own personality, so to speak — which, in former times,
popular instinct called separate countries. The tend-
ency to abstraction, however, which carried away the
leaders of the Revolution, is responsible for the present
purely arbitrary divisions of the soil, known as " de-
partments". Contemporary geography is glad to
avail itself of the old names and of the old divisions
into "countries" and "provinces" which more nearly
correspond with the geological formations as well as
with the natural peculiarities of the various regions.
There is a great contrast between a region such as the
"Massif Central" (the Central Plateau), a rugged land
inhabited by a stubborn race that is often glad to
leave its fastnesses, and those lands of comfort that
lie along the great Northern Plain, the valley of the
Loire, and the fertile basin in which Paris stands.
But in spite of this variety France is a unit. These
regions, so unlike and so diversified, balance and com-
plete each other like the limbs of a living body. As
Michelet puts it, " France is a person."
Statistics.— In 1901 France had 39,031,000 inhabi- tants. The census no longer inquires as to the religion of French citizens, and it is only by way of approxiina- tion that we can compute the number of Catholics at 3S millions; Protestants, 600,000; Jews, 6S,000. The iiopul.ition of tlie I'rcnch colonies amounts to 47,680,000 inhabitants, and in consequence France stands second to England as a colonizing power; but the difference between them is very great, the colonies of England having more than 350 millions of inhabi- tants.
There are two points to be noted in the stutly of French statistics. The annual mean excess of births over deaths for each 10,000 inhabitants during the
