The
Director of Emigration at St. Petersburg in 1907 characterized these
people as "hardy and industrious," and "though illiterate they are
intelligent and unbigoted."[39]
So much in brief for the North Slavs. Of the South Slavs, the
Bulgarians possess racial characteristics which point to an
intermixture in the remote past with some Asiatic strain, perhaps a
Magyar blend. Very few Bulgarian immigrants, who come largely from
Macedonia, arrived before the revolution of 1904, when many villages
in Monastir were destroyed. For some years they made Granite City,
near St. Louis, the center of their activities but, like the Serbians,
they are now well scattered throughout the country. In Seattle, Butte,
Chicago, and Indianapolis they form considerable colonies. Many of
them return yearly to their native hills, and it is too early to
determine how fully they desire to adapt themselves to American ways.
Montenegro, Serbia, and Bulgaria, countries that have been thrust
forcibly into the world's vision by the Great War, have sent several
hundred thousand of their hardy peasantry to the United States. The
Montenegrins and Serbians, who comprise three-fourths of this
migration, are virtually one in speech and descent. They are to be
found in New England towns and in nearly every State from New York to
Alaska, where they work in the mills and mines and in construction
gangs.
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