subalterns, collectors, and so forth, were not capable. It is very curious in view of this, but at the same time it is quite understandable in the light of our knowledge of German inclina- tion, that of the 25,000 Germans who were scattered over the million square miles of Germany's colonial empire at the time the war broke out, at least one-half were civil servants, soldiers, police, and other officials representing the Fatherland. The fact is that the German colonies as a whole were not well situated for permanent agricultural and industrial settlement by Europeans. During this period of colonial expansion some attempt was made at a settlement of Germany's colonial principles, but as each political party in the Empire had colonial principles of its own, it is not to be wondered at that colonial expansion in Germany turned out to be of little practical value.
It was not until the year 1906 that even the office of Colonial Secretary was established for the first time. When Herr Dern- burg was then appointed Secretary, he found the colonies in a condition of bad repute, commercial confusion, and bank- ruptcy, suffering very severely from both lack of capital and lack of enterprise. He at once took measures to save colonial enterprise by putting more money into it. By this means he checked panic, revived confidence, and shamed the pessimists. One can imagine his difficulties. The Conservatives adhered strongly to a policy of colonial expansion, but disbelieved in the acquisition of territory in dark continents; the Centre claimed that colonisation was only justified as a means of spreading civilisation among lower peoples; the Radical saw a justification for overseas expansion only in the financial and commercial profit rising therefrom; the Socialist did not believe at all in colonies, but accepting them as an established fact would give them and their native populations self-government on even republican lines; and, finally, Pan-Germanism seemed to include and sum up all these varying ideas except that one of the Socialist. Herr Dernburg, before accepting office at the Kaiser's special request, was a leading and most successful banker, earning £10,000 a year as the managing director of one great bank, and much besides for other directorships. He gave all this up for the sake of patriotism and a salary of £1,250 a year, but in four years' time was forced to resign. He could make no headway against the bureaucracy and aristocracy who, as summed up in the Kaiser, ruled everything in the Empire.
The objects of colonisation, as finally stated by the Pan- Germanists, may be set out as follows: (1) to provide raw materials for home industries; (2) to provide new markets for
