I. INTRODUCTION.

THE GERMAN COLONIES.

Circumstances of acquisition.-The colonial empire of Germany, like the empires of Great Britain and France, was of late and comaratively sudden acquisition. Germany first assumed the authority nd responsibility of a colony-holding power on April 24, 1884; on at day Bismarck announced officially that a section of the southwest >ast of Africa was under German protection. Within less than two ears thereafter the German flag was flying in East Africa, Kamerun, nd Togo, and in New Guinea and adjacent islands. The territories us suddenly acquired, when they had been explored and their land boundaries had been fixed-a process far along by 1900ere found to have a total area of a million square miles. The subseuent acquisitions were relatively small in area, and, except for the rategic position of Kiaochow in the commerce of China, unimportant. 'he Caroline Islands were purchased from Spain in 1899, and German amoa was obtained in 1900 by a division of the Samoan Islands mong the interested powers. In 1911-12, Germany forced France o cede 100,000 square miles of French Équatorial Africa, which ncreased the area of Kamerun by that amount.

For some decades before Germany's entry into the colonial field geographers and explorers had been taking increasing interest in the Dark Continent. The British had been spasmodically and relucantly advancing inland from some of their old establishments on the coast and the French had been leisurely enlarging their sphere of control in West Africa. Interest in Africa increased more rapidly after Henry M. Stanley revealed the course and extent of the Congo River in 1877. In the early eighties there was competition between France and the International African Association 2 for the control of the western outlets of the Congo Basin. In 1881 France had assumed a protectorate over Tunis, and in the following year the British entered Egypt. But the French refused to participate in the intervention in Egypt and the British intended only a short stay. The anti-colonialism of the middle of the nineteenth century died but slowly.

In Germany there had long been an academic interest in colonies. The subject had been discussed in the Congress of Frankfurt in 1848. Germany furnished at least her fair share of the explorers and scientists who were making Africa known. But it was not until 1879, when Frederick Fabri published his book "Does Germany Need Colonies?" that public opinion began to develop rapidly in favor of German colonies. In December of 1882 the German Colonial Association [Deutsches Kolonialverein] was founded, and from that time a colonial party may be said to have existed. Several currents of opinion united to give force to the colonial movement in Germany. The two most important of these flowed from a consideration of the state of the population. In the 50 years preceding 1880 some 4,000,000 emigrants had left Germany, and in the years 1880-1885 the number was 880,000. Many publicists lamented this loss to the

Germany, Great Britain, and the United States.

King Leopold's organization which developed into the Congo Free State.
Bedarf Deutschland der Kolonien?

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nation, a loss which directly strengthened commercial rivals ter possible enemies. They desired colonies to which this stream emigration could be directed so that it would remain under the ma man flag. Other publicists fixed their attention on the Germ T who stayed at home. They found that the population of Germs was increasing by upward of half a million annually in spite of O emigration. Their estimates were that Germany's population 1900 would be from 65 to 80 millions and they believed that t meant general pauperism.

Among the means which they suggested to enable Germany support so vast a population, the acquisition of colonies was gr a prominent place. Colonies were to furnish raw materials and p vide outlets for manufactured goods. Merchants complained because of the growing protectionism of foreign countries r markets were decreased from day to day. Other factors aided: colonial movement. The supporters of a policy of naval deve ment pointed out the need of distant ports as bases and col stations. The glamor of empire appealed to some, and cert chauvinists regretted that Cochin China had not been taken fr France in 1871. German commercial interests in various sol Pacific Islands were comparatively large, in some cases predoming These interests had had difficulties with Great Britain in regard property titles after the establishment of British authority in I in 1874. They advocated German annexation of the territories which they were interested. On the whole, however, the colon, movement in Germany was an evolution of feeling, a mania ratt than a reasoned national policy." In this discussion of color enterprise the subject of colonial tariffs as distinct from nation systems of protection received little attention. The greatest colon power, Great Britain, was unshaken in its adherence to free trad Holland had recently removed the discriminatory features of colonial tariffs, and only very minor discriminations had as yet be introduced in the French colonial tariffs. Both in Tunis and Egypt treaties guaranteed the continuance of equality of treatment Bismarck was, by his own affirmation, "no colony man." H agreed with the admission of Fabri that colonies were, politically, weakness rather than a strength. He wished France to inve herself in such undertakings, but not Germany. He believed that the industrialization of Germany would enable her to sustain a population relatively as dense as that of England [say 90 millions and he refused to aid emigration. At length, however, he yielded t public opinion in the matter of colonial policy and the sudden acqu sition of large areas was the result. Bismarck's idea was that it colonies should be commercial and exploiting centers, by private initiative, and protected but not controlled by Ge many. In June, 1884, he told the Reichstag that he contemplated only a single representative of imperial authority in each colony and no garrison. Bismarck's view of colonies as suppliers of raw BI

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• Dawson, William H.: The Evolution of Modern Germany, New York and London, 1908, p. 361. Giordani, Paolo: The German Colonial Empire, Its Beginning and Ending, translated by Mrs. Gus Hamilton, London, 1916, p. 19; Patzig, C. A.: Deutsche Kolonial-Unternehmungen und Post damper Subventionen, Hanover, 1884, p. 18. For the general subject see Westphal, Alexandre: Les Origine de Colonisation Allemande, Montpelier, 1887; Demay, Charles: Histoire de la Colonisation Allemand Paris, 1889; and Dawson, op. cit., Chapter on Colonies.

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rials rather than as markets for German goods and his desire to oid colonial complications either in domestic or in foreign politics. ade the policy of the open door a natural one for him to follow. he draft of the Anglo-Portuguese treaty of February, 1884, by hich Great Britain would have recognized Portuguese sovereignty ver the mouth of the Congo, would have imposed the open-door olicy in this territory, and Leopold was promising free trade in the hole basin of the Congo as an inducement for the recognition of his aims there. At the conference of Berlin, November, 1884-Febary, 1885, free trade was adopted as the rule for central Africa. he circumstances of the time thus explain not only the sudden entry f Germany into the list of colonial powers but also the early adoption f the open-door policy.

The colonies have not always been popular in Germany. With hanging circumstances, e. g., the virtual disappearance of German migration, the defenders of the colonies later supported their cause ith new arguments. More stress was put upon the investment of ational capital in railway, mining, and other concessions, the occuation of strategic commercial points, and the use of colonial markets ither as national reserves or as means of obtaining concessions from other countries. As Herr Dernburg expressed it

A country's own colonies become an instrument of commercial policy, since a nation ecures rights and privileges in foreign colonies only when it can offer corresponding ights and privileges in its own colonies.8

groups, as

Location, area, population. According to geographical location, the German colonies were of three follows: (1) In_Africa: Togo, Kamerun, German Southwest Africa, and German East Africa.

(2) In the Pacific Ocean: German New Guinea (a general designation for the northeastern part of the island of New Guinea called Kaiser Wilhelm's Land, the Bismarck Archipelago, the Caroline, Pelew, Marianna, Solomon, and Marshall Islands) and a portion of the Samoan Islands, notably Savaii and Upolu.

(3) In Asia: The German Leased Territory of Kiaochow, including the Bay of Kiaochow, on the coast of the Chinese Province of Shantung.

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With the exception of Kiaochow and the southern portion of Southwest Africa, all of these regions were located in the Tropics and were therefore not suitable for settlement by Europeans in large numbers. Kiaochow is a small area with considerable Chinese population, and much of Southwest Africa was scarcely habitable. It was not reasonable, therefore, to expect a large diversion of German emigration to the German colonies. By 1913 the white population in all the German colonies had reached a total of only 28,846, i. e. one European to every 425 natives and to every 40 square miles. The area and population of the former German colonies is shown

in Table 1.

On the fate of this draft see p. 82.

7 See pp. 82, 84.

Zielpunkte des Deutschen Kolonialwesens, 1907, p. 48.

Herr Dernburg, the colonial minister, writing in 1907, divided the German possessions into two classessettlement colonies" and "plantation colonies." He included in the settlement colonies Southwest Africa, the high regions of East Africa, and certain of the Pacific islands, somewhat optimistically placing in this group about one-half of the total area. The plantation colonies he frankly admitted were not suitable for permanent settlement by Europeans. Zielpunkte des Deutschen Kolonialwesens, p. 33.

TABLE 1.-Area and population of the German colonies, 1913.1

1 Based on figures in Statistisches Jahrbuch für das Deutsche Reich, 1915, p. 457, and Statesmans Book, 1914. For somewhat different figures and more details, see the Peace Handbooks of the B Foreign Office, Nos. 110-113, and 146.

Some of these figures include the German garrisons.

Chiefly East Indians, who controlled the retail trade.

Not determined.

The smaller islands have only about 1 per cent of the area of Kaiser Wilhelm's Land and the Bisa Ki Archipelago. Their white population, however, was nearly half as great. Exclusive of the bay.

The figures for the white population, it should be noted, inch German military forces as well as the civil administrative offici also engineers and others whose local residence was tempora Hence the number of actual settlers and business men of Europe origin was considerably less than 28,846. In Southwest Africa ale; the white troops numbered 2,171 in 1912.10

The native population in the African colonies was not large proportion to the area inhabited, consequently serious difficulti were encountered in gathering a sufficient labor force for the exploit tion of colonial resources. In some of the African colonies, notab Southwest Africa, the number of natives diminished under Germa rule. In East Africa, on the other hand, the native population probably doubled in the 30 years preceding the World War."

COMMERCIAL IMPORTANCE OF THE COLONIES.

The German colonies exported such tropical products as rubber, sisal hemp, palm and other vegetable oils and butters, coffee, cocoa, cotton, and ivory. Diamonds were the most important mineral export; 12 there were also small amounts of copper, tin, and lead The important imports were textiles, principally cottons, and various iron and steel wares, such as agricultural tools and machinery and mining and railway equipment, for the use of white settlers; als considerable quantities of alcoholic liquors, tobacco, and firearms Some of the colonies, notably Southwest Africa, depended to a large extent upon the import of foreign foodstuffs, mainly rice and other cereals, frozen meat, and dried fish. The total foreign trade was, in comparison with that of the colonies of some other countries, insig nificant in volume, but it was increasing rapidly.

10 Deutsches Kolonial-Handbuch, 13th ed., Berlin, 1913.

"Johnston, Sir H. H.: The German Colonies, Edinburgh Review, 1914, vol. 220, p. 310. 12 The life of the fields is said to be limited.