2
GEOGRAPHY
Dlmeno (Dumno) in Herzegovina, well over the eastern side of the Dinaric Alps.
   The facts of its geographical position and structure govern and explain the whole history of Dalmatia. Its dominant feature is a narrow strip of tableland and innumerable islands running parallel to it, with deeply indented fiords and land-locked channels and harbours. These channels and islands are in reality a continuation of the mainland system; they are submerged valleys and the crests of parallel ranges, growing gradually lower and lower till they disappear beneath the surface of the Adriatic. The trend of these channels and islands, in north Dalmatia, is north-west to south-east; in middle Dalmatia it becomes more decidedly east and west. Brazza, Lesina, Lissa and Curzola all have long north and south coasts. This distinction must be borne in mind, and the native indication of the compass is usually “ east ” and “ west Such a seaboard as this, with its sheltered channels, fiords and harbours, “latebrosum et portuosum”, in the phrase of that early Dalmatian historian, the Archdeacon Thomas, made an ideal haunt for pirates and “ sea-sharkers ”, as our Elizabethan ancestors called them; the “ opportunitas locorum ” determined the profession of the inhabitants, and the names of