In discussing German movements, however, it is impossible, at the
present time, to omit reckoning with the views of the great statesman
who controls her destinies. Prince Bismarck has been variously
represented as reluctantly putting himself at the head of a colonial
agitation which he really deprecates, and as using it merely in order
to discomfit domestic opponents, or to make foreign Governments feel
his weight abroad. No doubt these last two reasons have had some effect
in shaping the Chancellor’s actual policy. But Prince Bismarck appears
to have needed no prompting for appreciating the necessity of colonial
expansion, and to have given it his serious reflection long before
the present Colonization Society met at Eisenach. In the days of the
North German Confederacy, the rising Minister lent all his influence
to the proposals of the firm of Godeffroys Bros. for the annexation
of the Samoa group. A scheme was drawn up, dividing the land among
military settlers, grants of arms were made from the Royal Arsenals,
and the _Hertha_ the first continental iron-clad which steamed through
the Suez Canal, was despatched to give a vigorous support. Before
the last arrangements, however, were completed, the Franco-German
war intervened, with the internal consolidation and the diplomatic
struggles which succeeded it.
But Prince Bismarck had not abandoned his early ideas; he was waiting
till the time was ripe. In 1875 he made a tentative effort, without
success, to wring a guarantee from the Reichstag for a new South Sea
Company. Next year he was pressed to give his support to a proposed
railway from Pretoria to the sea. He refused, but in private made the
following significant statement to the intermediate agent:—
“The colonial question is one I have studied for years. I am
convinced Germany cannot go on for ever without colonies, but as yet
I fail to perceive deep traces of such a movement in the country.”
Those deep traces have now been revealed, and it remains to be
seen whether the Iron Chancellor will not be able, in spite of the
apparently insuperable objects in his way, to give practical effect
to the aspirations of the German nation, and to his own earnest
conviction.—_National Review._