Such progress in expansion as has been described ought, one would think, to have satisfied colonial partisans and given them faith in the government as represented by Bismarck. Perhaps their appetites had been whetted too long; at any rate they grumbled still. The Chancellor was too conservative for them; they chafed under his guidance and were unable to forgive him his lack of warmth and energy. They hailed his retirement with undisguised joy and welcomed the advent of the young emperor into sole power with high hopes. They greeted the perpetrators of unspeakable horrors in the new possessions as heroes, and knew no measure in their loves and hatreds.1 Nevertheless, the Reichstag refused to be fired by their excitement. The proposals of Prince Bismarck looking to the direct management of the protectorates by the imperial government were rejected. The public purse was not to be opened, and of necessity recourse was had to the old expedient of monopolistic companies of trade and exploitation. These companies undertook severally the management of East and Southwest Africa, the New Guinea region (including Bismarck Archipelago and the Solomon Islands) and the Marshall Islands, under the protection of and under responsibility to the German Chancellor.2

These sudden and successful moves of Germany initiated a wild scramble for what was left of Africa, and, indeed, of the world at large a contest ended for Africa with the Berlin Conference of 1884-5, in which the respective spheres of influence of the powers were delimited and the opportunity for further exploits and adventures in land-grabbing reduced practically to nil.3 With the seizure of New Guinea and adjacent islands, the occupation of "unoccupied" lands has virtually come to an end on earth.

authorities did much to arouse the wrath of Prince Bismarck and the German people and to strengthen the resolve of the former to throw himself heart and soul into the Colonial movement." Bismarck thought that if the dog wouldn't get out of the manger, he must be pelted out. Lowe, ii, 219.

1 William II. in his youth is said to have been fired with zeal for colonial expansion by the example of his distant predecessor, the Elector of Brandenburg. Cf. Spectator, 81; 481; Perry, Traditions, etc.

Togo and Kamerun were taken directly under imperial rule. On the Companies, see the next paper. The Marshall Islands were occupied in 1886. Von Stengel, 17.

Von Stengel, 10 ff.; Keltie, 205 ff.

Germany, after centuries of indifference, has completed the race among the very first; in extent her colonial empire is inferior only to those of England and France. Unfortunately, its quality is that which usually marks the portion of the late-comer.

Preceding their official occupation, all of these colonies1 except East Africa had been more or less familiar to the German missionary and trader. Substantial commercial interests existed in Kamerun and Togo; the missionaries of Southwest Africa were predominately Germans; and beginnings of both trade and missions had been made in the South Sea possessions. Upon the continent of Africa, Germans had been famous for many years as explorers and pioneers, while German missionaries had dared and suffered in the very centers of savagery. The extension of protection to German interests was real in West Africa and plausible in Southwest Africa and New Guinea; asserted in regard to East Africa, it was a mere pretence.

The major possessions of the German Empire may be roughly divided according to latitude into two classes, the tropical and the sub-tropical. All belong to the first class except Southwest Africa. Of the conditions of these colonies dependent on latitude, climate2 is the most decisive and the most unfortunate. The climate of all the colonies in low latitudes is typically tropical with the exception of alleged sanitaria in the mountains of Kamerun and New Guinea, and of the Kilima Njaro slope in East Africa, where altitude corrects latitude to some extent.3 All these tropical colonies are abodes of fever and malaria; Kamerun and Togo have an especially evil reputation for the

1 Strictly speaking, the German possessions are neither colonies nor protectorates. They have as yet too few settlers to deserve the name of colonies; and, in reality, there were no reasonably stable native governments to protect. Von Stengel, 3; 20.

For climatic conditions, flora and fauna of the German colonies, see Schmidt, passim; Meinecke, passim; A. H. Keane, Africa (in Stanford's Compendium of Geography and Travel, 2 vols. London, 1895), ii, passim ; Keltie, chs. xii, xiii, xv, xvii, xxii. The following treat separate colonies more in detail: Blum, 84 ff.; 104; Boshart, 161 ff.; 225 ff.; Büttner, 10 ff.; Hagen, 13 ff.; E. Hermann, Vichzucht und Bodenkultur in Südwestafrika (Berlin 1900), 66; 94; Globus, lxxix, 3 (Jan. 17, 1901).

3 Schmidt (i, 148) says that heights of 1000 meters protect in no way.

worst forms of African fever. Dysentery abounds throughout the tropical possessions. Acclimatization is an illusion—all suffer from the tropical diseases, even natives and animals.1 Aside from the fever, the moist heat, the inevitable hardships and coarse food, not to mention loneliness and homesickness, induce nervous disorders, melancholia and insanity. In short, the regular characteristics and influences of the genuine tropical climate are everywhere in evidence, and we shall see that the Germans have been as little able as any other people to treat their physical environment with indifference.

The soil of the tropical possessions, excepting East Africa, likewise presents slight variation from the type. Rainfall is heavy and vegetation luxuriant, especially in Togo and Kamerun. Valuable woods are common. Palms, rubber trees, bananas, yams, taro, etc., are everywhere at hand, and coffee, tea, tobacco and cotton will, as a rule, flourish and yield abundantly.2 East Africa is much less favored in matter of soil and rainfall. Wissmann said that four-fifths of the country was barren waste, and of the remaining fifth not all was available for plantations. Dry seasons occur and are severe. The steppe-formation is characteristic. In the German tropical colonies, as in all others, genuine agriculture after the fashion of the temperate zone is impossible, but the plantation system is said to promise much with good management and persistence.

The climate of the sub-tropical colony, Southwest Africa, is reported to be very wholesome and invigorating, especially in the southern part. In spite of the extreme dryness, however, it is acknowledged that fever in a milder form is very common. To neutralize this relative advantage of climate, there is an almost. entire absence of rainfall, especially near the coast, and the soil is of such porous quality as to rapidly absorb the water from

1 A. Boshart, Zehn Jahre afrikanischen Lebens (Leipsig, 1898), 229 ff. This author is convinced by long experience that animal's deaths are more often caused by malaria than by the dreaded tsetse fly. His treatment of tropical diseases and hygiene is quite full and satisfactory. It should be supplemented with the very valuable treatise of B. Hagen, an experienced physician of the tropics (Unter den Papuas, Wiesbaden, 1899).

* Schmidt (ii, 328) and Blum (93) think that northern New Guinea bids fair to rival Java in the raising of tropical products.

occasional cloudbursts and showers. In consequence, the country is largely desert, in many places more arid and desolate than the Sahara itself, and for miles inland no water or vegetation of any kind appears.1 At best the flora is limited to sparse grass-tufts and dwarfed trees except in a few more favored localities. Anything approaching a systematic development of agriculture would demand stupendous expense and labor in irrigation, etc. Cattleraising, however, is said to flourish in the inner districts; it is necessarily of a nomadic order. Unfortunately pulmonary disease is rife and as yet unyielding to treatment or inoculation with germ-cultures.2

In the matter of fauna, the African possessions may be considered together. The most important beast, the elephant, is being rapidly exterminated wherever it is found. The ostrich, too, has been ruthlessly hunted down in Southwest Africa, so that it has withdrawn to relatively inaccessible retreats and even there often refuses to brood. Dangerous and predatory animals are being rapidly done away with. Other species whose influence on man's life is of any significance are common enough, though on the decline before civilization. New Guinea shares the unimportant fauna of its part of the world. Fish are plentiful in Kamerun, Southwest Africa and New Guinea.3

From the standpoint of commercial geography, the line of distinction is between African possessions and others. The African continent, with its unindented coastline and tableland formation, offers few harbors and still fewer rivers with uninterrupted course. Other factors enter to make the case still more unfortunate. In Kamerun large estuaries offer harborage, but

1 Büttner (12 ff.), a veteran missionary, describes the southern part of the coast of Southwest Africa as practically bereft of rain; at a distance of 50 km. from the coast it may rain once a year, at 100 km. twice or three times; at 200 km, seven or eight times. He says the eastern slope of the country sheds rain like a tile roof. There is no water-supply at Walfisch Bay nor within a considerable distance of it. According to Schmidt (ii, 213), the first grass for cattle appears 50 km. from the coast in Damaraland. In view of such conditions, difficulties in the way of opening up the country are self-evident.

Hermann, 25 ff.; Büttner, 45. Parts of East and Southwest Africa also come within the habitat of the tsetse fly. Oberländer, 155; J. Graf Pfeil, Vorschläge zur praktischen Kolonisation in Ost-Afrika (Berlin, 1888), 15.

Reichenow, Die Deutsche Kolonie Kamerun (Berlin, 1884), 6; Büttner, 10; Schmidt, ii, 332; Boshart, 176.

the surf runs so high along the whole of the gulf coast that ships are exposed to great danger in landing. Off Togo they are frequently forced to anchor in open sea and depend on native skill to land the cargoes piece-meal. Southwest Africa has one good harbor, Walfisch Bay, but it is in British hands; Swakopmund is said, however, to offer good prospects with skillful engineering.1 East African harbors are not suitable for large commerce; Dar-es-Salaam, for instance, though it possesses a deep basin, is reached only through a narrow tortuous channel. Other "harbors" are largely beaching-places for Arab dhows.2

The rivers of the African protectorates are almost all broken by falls not far from their mouths. In Togo the best rivercourses are under French or British supervision; in Southwest Africa there are no rivers-the courses of occasional torrents, after rain in the back-country, are marked by dry beds of sand. The rivers of East Africa and Kamerun are comparatively insignificant. In Africa there are no natural communications with the interior, no arteries of trade; the native caravan roads are mere paths a few feet wide.

In the South Sea region, chances for trade-development are a little better. Good harbors are to be found, and one or two large streams are navigable far into the interior.3 Penetration by land is unfortunately most difficult throughout New Guinea and the other larger islands; the mountain ranges are much broken, and deep chasms impede advance. Reefs and soundings along the coast have been insufficiently marked as yet; when reliable charts have been made, New Guinea will hold a respectable chance in the trade of its region; but extreme remoteness from Europe and from established Oriental trade-routes will interfere seriously with its commercial development for years and decades to come.*

1 Schmidt (ii, 201) says that Swakopmund will succeed Walfisch Bay as the chief harbor of the district, as the latter is filling rapidly with sand.

* On Dar-es-Salaam, see R. H. Davis, Along the East Coast of Africa, in Scribner's Magazine, Mch. 1901 (xxix, 3, 259); Pfeil, Vorschläge, 50.

The Kaiserin Augusta stream is navigable to a point distant about 180 miles (as the bird flies) from the coast. Schmidt, ii, 316.

• On the commercial geography of the German colonies, see Schmidt, i, 134 ff. ; ii, 2 ff.; 156. ff.; 198 ff.; 302 ff.; Keltie, ch. xxii; Keane, ii, 3 ff.; 189 ff.; 522; Blum, 102; 186 ff.; Pfeil, Studien, 3 ff.; Vorschläge, 6-7; O. Finsch, Samoafahrten; Reisen in Kaiser-Wilhelmsland und Englisch-Neu-Guinea in den Jahren 1884 und 1885 (Leipzig, 1888), 132.