Adams J.T. Empire on the Seven Seas. The British Empire 1784-1939
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THE
PARTITION
OF
AFRICA
The
newly
explored
and
enormously
rich
continent
of
Africa
was
the first
to
feel
the
impact
of the
new
forces
and
ideals
moti-
vating
the
imperialist
nations.
The
Egyptian
question
we
shall
consider
later,
as
the
British
occupation
was
not
intended
to
be
permanent,
and
in
fact has
not
been,
and
it falls
in a
different
category
from
the
partition
of the
rest
of
the continent.
Moreover,
the
north
coast of
Africa
from
the earliest
days, including
the his-
tory
of the
Roman
Empire,
has
been
within the
normal
sphere
of
European
relations
and
policy though
a
cause of
strife between
nations.
Southward
from
this
Mediterranean
coastal
region
lies
the
great
barrier
of
the
Sahara
desert,
but between that
and
the
settlements
of
British
and
Boers at
the
extreme
southern
tip
of
the
continent
was
the
huge
interior
unclaimed
in
the
early
1
870*8
save
by
its
savage
occupants.
There
were,
indeed,
some
ports
claimed
by
various
countries,
and
the
vague
and
unsubstantial
claim of
Portu-
gal
to
much
of
the
whole
continent
when
the scramble
began.
Twice
there
was
a
chance
of
orderly
settlement
of the
prob-
lem,
which,
like
the
opening
of
Pandora's
box,
had
let
loose
all
sorts
of
ills,
even
though
the
legend
tells
that
the
lid
was
covered
in
time
not to
let
Hope escape.
In 1
876
the
Belgian King,
Leopold,
called
a conference
to
discuss
the
partition
of
Africa,
but
the ambi-
tions
of the
various nations
involved
prevented
any
equitable
set-
tlement
by
international
co-operation.
France,
Italy
and
Germany
were
all
active
in
making
"treaties" with
native
chiefs
and
staking
out their
claims
to
vast
territories.
Belgium
itself
had
founded the
Congo
Free
State,
so
calledj
Italy
had
placed
a
small
colony
on
what
became
Eritrea
on
the
coast
of
the
Red
Sea$
France was
try-
ing
to
establish her
claim to
a
possible
empire
extending
across the
entire
continent;
Germany
was
claiming
a
protectorate
over
lands
close
to the
Cape
Colony
on the
southwest
coast,
and
to save
Brit-
ish
trad^
Great Britain
proclaimed
a
protectorate
over
Nigeria
in
1886}
A
general
European
war
seemed
possible
over
a
non-European
question.
In
1884,
for
the
second
time,
a
conference was
called,
this time at
Berlin and
participated
in
by
fourteen
nations.
It
did
succeed
in
avoiding
war
at the
time
but otherwise
did
little
except
207
EMPIRE
ON
THE
SEVEN
SEAS
lay
down
the
rules for
the
game
of
grab.
By
decreeing
that
occupa-
tion
of
a
"protectorate"
to
be
valid
must
be
effective,
it
not
only
voided
the
vague
Portuguese
claims
but,
what
was more
impor-
tant,
started
a
period
of
anxious haste
in
staking
out
claims
by
effectively
occupying
the
territories
chosen.
The
continent
was
on
a
great
scale
and
the
portion
now
open
to the
greatest
international
land rush
the
world
has
known
con-
tained
enormous riches
for
trade
and
also
teeming
millions
of
blacks
with
all the horrors
of local
slave
trade,
constant
wars,
human
sacrifice
and
cannibalism.
The Berlin
Conference
had
ignored
the
native
question.
In
spite
of
the
changed
attitude
toward
imperialism
in
Britain,
the
British had
always
preferred
settle-
ment
in
a
<c
white man's
country"
to
assuming
tropical
possessions
and
the
responsibility
of
governing
alien
and
lower
races. Even
after
the scramble for
territory
was
obviously
begun,
Britain
showed little haste
at
first.
As
we
have
pointed
out
her
people
and
statesmen
did
not
grasp
the
meaning
of
the new Bismarckian
Germany,
and
Britain
was
perhaps
more
friendly
to
that nation and
trustful of
her than
of
any
other.
Britain
allowed her
to
seize
all of what
became German
Southwest
Africa,
although
she
might
easily
have taken it
in
advance herself. She also allowed
the Germans
to
establish a
pro-
tectorate over the whole
of
the
lands of the
Sultan
of Zanzibar
in
spite
of
the
facts
that
the entire
trade of the
area had been
in
the hands of
British merchants and
that
the
Sultan had
asked
to
be taken
under
British
protection
as
he
strongly
objected
to
the
Germans.
When
Germany
enforced
her claims
by
sending
a fleet
to
the coast Britain
not
only
made no
objection
but
commended
the action.
British
merchants, however,
became
restive,
and
fearing
that
they
might
be
shut off from
the
trade
they
had
established
began
making
treaties
with
the
chiefs
farther
north in
Kenya.
Even then
the
government
refused
to
lend
its
backing
to
them
until
Ger-
many
agreed
to
what had been
done.
At
this
stage
it
certainly
can-
not be
said
that
Germany
was not
allowed
a
completely
free hand
in
securing
her
"place
in
the
sun,"
for
by
the
agreement
of
1886
208
THE
PARTITION OF AFRICA
Britain
fully
consented
that
Germany
should
have
the
four
great
districts
of East
Africa,
the
Cameroons,
Southwest
Africa
and
Togoland, though
British
trade had
first
opened
them
up
and
was
dominant
in all
of
them. The later
and more
aggressive
stage
of
British
activity,
after the
advent
of
the
Salisbury
ministry,
be-
longs
to the
next
chaptery
Looking
ahead for a
moment,
we
may
note
that
in the
twenty-
five
years
between
1875
and
1900
Germany
was
to confine
herself
for the most
part
to
acquiring
colonies in
Africa
only,
where
she
brought
under
her
sway
approximately
1,000,000
square
miles
and
17,000,000
subjects.
The enormous
expansion
of
imperial pos-
sessions,
however,
was to be
felt
in all
quarters
of
the
world,
with
Britain
leading by adding
to
her
territory
and
population
nearly
5,000,000
square
miles
and
90,000,000
people.
How
vast the
changes
were
to
be in
this
period
is
indicated also
by
what other
nations
were
doing.
France
grabbed
about
3,500,000
square
miles
with
40,000,000
inhabitants
without
counting
the
huge
Sahara
j
Belgium
1,000,000
square
miles
and
30,000,000
inhabitants}
Portugal
800,000
square
miles
and
9,000,000
new
subjects
j
while
Russia
opened up
the enormous
resources of Siberia
and
conquered
various minor Asiatic states.
Just
as
the
energies
let loose
by
the
Renaissance and
Reforma-
tion
in
earlier
centuries
had
resulted in
the
outburst
of
exploration
and
the
subjugation
of the
American
continents,
so the extraordi-
nary
increase
in
population
and the industrial revolution of the
nineteenth
century
had resulted
in a
second sudden
manifestation
of
forces which called for
expansion
or
explosion.
On
both
earlier
occasions
empty
spaces
or those
occupied
by
natives who
were
no
match
for
Europeans
with their
superior
weapons
offered the
safety
valve
demanded.
Today,
with the
whole
world
claimed and
occupied,
there
is
no
safety
valve save
possibly
in
man's
intelli-
gence
alone. Pandora's
box
may
or
may
not still
contain
Hope.
As we
watch,
however,
the
complete
division
of the
non-European
and
American
worlds,
the
closing
of
opportunity
for
expansion,
the
increasing
of
population,
the
innumerable new
points
and
occasions for
friction,
and the
temporary overwhelming
of
the
209
EMPIRE
ON
THE
SEVEN
SEAS
rest
of
the
world
by
Europe,
although
the
United States
also
took
a
hand,
we
can
trace,
as in
a Greek
drama,
the
weaving
of the
threads
o
Fate,
III.
BRITAIN
FALLS
BEHIND
Meanwhile
we
may
turn
to
what
in
our
period
was
happening
in
Britain.
The
year
1870
marked,
as we
have
said,
the
approxi-
mate
zenith
of
British
supremacy
in
trade,
and the
period
since
the
end
of
the
Napoleonic
wars
had
also
shown
striking changes
in
population.
The
comparative
trade
figures,
in
pound
sterling
millions,
for the two
decades
from
1870
are:
1870
1880
1889
United
Kingdom
547
698
740
France
227 339
311
Germany
212
294 367
United States
165
308
320
Belgium
and
Holland
136
237
310
British
Colonies
128
203
298
Italy
,
68
91 94*
That
the
United
Kingdom
was
losing
rapidly, especially
in rela-
tion
to
Germany,
Belgium,
Holland
and the United
States is
now
clear.
This was
not
appreciated
in
England
at
the time. Various
factors combined to
obscure
the
truth. The
period
up
to
1870
had
been
enormously
profitable
and
the trade
of
Britain
was still
far
ahead
of
any
competitor
even
though
falling
behind
compara-
tively.
In addition
she
had invested
huge
sums
abroad,
estimated
in
1885
at
about
$6,500,000,000.
In
spite
of mis
judgments
and
losses the
Income which
rolled
into
her
coffers from all
over
the
world was
immense
and
gave
a
sense
of
tremendous
wealth.
Thus,
what
is
obvious
to us did
not
disturb
the
Britisher
of
the
period,
who
thought
Britain
would
continue to
forge
ahead
as in
the
past.
The
changes
in
population
figures
are
also
important
as
show-
ing
the
changes
in
one
aspect
of
power
alignment.
They
are
given
in
round
figures,
less
than
a
half
million
not
being
entered and
more
than
a
half
being
counted as
one.
*The
tables
are
MulhalPs,
taken
from R. C.
K,
Ensor,
England
1870-1914.
Oxford
Press,
1936.
210
BRITAIN
FALLS
BEHIND
TABLE
I
France
(1821)
30
millions
Germany (lands
of later
Reich,
1815)
21
millions
United
Kingdom
(1821)
21 millions
United
States
(1820)
ro'millions
TABLE
H
Germany
(1871) 41
millions
United
States
(1870)
38
millions
France
(1872) 36
millions
United
Kingdom (1871)
32
millions
TABLE
HI
United
States
(1880)
50
millions
Germany
(1880)
45
millions
France
(1881)
38
millions
United
Kingdom
(1881)
35
millions
Italy (1881)
28
millionsf
The
United
Kingdom,
of
course,
included
Ireland,
whose disaf-
fected
population
had fallen
to
scarcely
over
5,000,000
at
the
time
of
the
last
table,
and
the
population
of Great
Britain alone was
only
1,500,000
more
than that
of
Italy.
Moreover,
perhaps
owing
to
the
birth-control
movement
started
in
1877
by
Bradlaugh
and
Mrs.
Besant,
the
English
birth
rate
began
to decline
as the
French
had
been
doing
for
a
long
time
in relation
to
the
German.
This
was obscured
for
a
while
by
the
lower
British death rate
but
was
to
have
its
effect.
Although
by
the
various
education
Acts
the
people
in
general
had
far
better
educational
f
acilities
than
in
the
preceding genera-
tion,
higher
education
was
lagging
behind
that
in
other
countries,
particularly
Germany,
and
notably
in
the
field
of science.
Both
Germany
and
the United
States were
running
ahead
of
Britain
in
all
that
pertained
to
success
in
the
new electric-chemical
age
on
which
the
world
was
entering.
In the
early
part
of the
century
England
had
been
the market
for
new ideas
but
this
was
no
longer
e>
R. C. K.
Ensor, England
xSfo-xgz^
Oxford
Press,
1936,
pp.
102
f.
211
EMPIRE
ON
THE
SEVEN
SEAS
true.
Inventors
and
scientists
went
elsewhere.
England
had
lost
her
lead.
This
by
no
means
signifies
that
the
Empire
was
doomed,
either
then
or
now.
Personally
I most
emphatically
believe the
contrary,
but
the
period
of
ease
and
optimism
was
soon
to be over. In
the
years
covered
by
this
chapter,
1870-1886,
there
were two
severe
financial
crises
and industrial
depressions.
This was
not
unparal-
leled
in
the
past
but conditions
had
altered. We have
already
noted
the new
relation
between
employer
and
employed
which
the
rapid
rise of the
factory
system
had
brought
about,
but
after
the
first severe
dislocation
had occurred
and the
greater
firms
passed
down
through
another
generation
or two
in
the same fam-
ily,
to
some
extent
the
patriarchal
relation of the
age
when
agri-
culture
was
the main
source
of
wealth
was
restored.
Management
and
ownership being
united
in
the same
person
or
family
bred
a
sense in
many
cases
of
personal responsibility
and
personal
interest
with
regard
to the
workers.
In
the
latter
part
of
the
century,
however,
the
rapid
spread
of
the limited
liability
stock
company,
with nominal
ownership
dis-
tributed
among
thousands
of
stockholders who
never
saw
the
plant
or
knew the
workers
personally
yet
demanded
returns
on
their
money,
brought
about
a
new and
worse
relation between
capital
and
labor,
varying
in
different localities
and industries.
The
word
"unemployed,"
first
used as
a noun
in
1882,
took on
a more
sinister
meaning.
Company
development
also
brought
into
being
a
quite
new
class of small
rentiers,
who
did
not
earn
their
income
by
labor
nor had
the
responsibilities
of
landowners
or
of
businessmen
but had
nothing
to do
but
to live
agreeably,
largely
in
suburban
villas
or
in
new towns
built for
them,
such
as
Bournemouth or
Eastbourne,
both
dating
from
about
1870.
To
a considerable
extent,
members
of this
fairly
large
social
group
were
without
ambition other
than
to
conserve their
posi-
tion of
smug
Victorian
respectability.
They
added little
to
either
cultural
or economic
advance
and
served
rather
as
a
drag
than
a
spur
to
England's
progress.
We
may
note
also that the
move-
ment
toward
merging
private
banking
houses
into
large
limited-
BRITAIN
FALLS
BEHIND
liability incorporated
institutions,
while useful in
some
ways,
also
militated
against
the
old
personal relationship
between
the
banker
and
his client
which
had
been
based
on
character
rather
than
on
collateral.
This
made
it more
difficult for
the
sound ambitious
man
o
small
resources to
get
a
start,
much
as in the United
States
today.
While
these
retarding
tendencies,
with
others,
were notable
in
industry, agriculture
was
on
the road
to
ruin,
almost
completely
altering
the
position
of
Britain in
times
of
both
peace
and
war.
In
the earlier centuries
she had
been
practically
self-sufficing
in
the
matter of food.
The
great
increase
in
British
manufacturing
and trade in the
nineteenth
century
had
been
partially
due
to
improvement
in
transportation
and
lowering
of
freight
costs,
but
this
same factor was
to militate
against
the
farmer,
who in the
1870*8
was
buried under
a
flood of
cheap
American
wheat.
In
the
West
of the United States
vast
quantities
of
land
were
opened
to
settlement
and there
was
a
rush
of
population
to
take
it
up
after
the
disbanding
of
the
armies
of
the Civil War
and
during
the
deep depression
after
1
873.
Moreover,
there had been a
great
development
of
agricultural
machinery
which
cheapened
produc-
tion,
of
railway
mileage
which
brought
the
new
supply
to
market,
and a
lowering
of
ocean rates due
to
improvement
in
steam ves-
sels. The
results were
an
enormous
and
sudden
increase in the
world wheat
supply,
which
would
have
lowered
prices
in
any
case,
and
an
unexpected
and
disastrous differential in
favor
of the
American
producer
in
the
decline
in
the
freight
rate
from
Chicago
to
Liverpool
from
3
75.
per
ton in
1873
to
i
4
s- in
1884.
In
a
decade
the
number of
farm laborers in
England
and Wales
decreased
by
more than
92,000,
and
a million
acres less were
under
cultivation
for
wheat/
In
1830-40
Britain
had
imported
only
2
per
cent
of
all
its
cereals
for
food
5
by
the decade of the
8o's
it
was
forced to
import
45
per
cent,
and
had
become
de-
pendent
on
foreign
sources
for
65
per
cent
of
its wheat.
Naturally
with
the
decline
in
fanning generally
went.
a decline in
the
home
supply
of
meat;
t
The
effects
wtere
far-reaching
in
many
directions.
Obviously
a
213
EMPIRE
ON
THE
SEVEN
SEAS
nation
dependent
for
a
large
part
of
its
necessary
food
supply
on
imports
over
thousands
of miles
of sea
routes from
America,
the
Argentine,
New
Zealand,
Australia,
and
elsewhere,
would
be
in
a
far
more
vulnerable
position
in case
of
war
than
when
the
island
had
been
practically
self-sustaining.
Moreover,
the
shift
in
em-
ployment
and
population,
with
the
drift
from
country
to
city,
completed
the
urbanization
of
England,
although
the
Englishman
remains
still
essentially
a
lover
of
the
country
and of
nature. In
spite
of
the
industrial
revolution
agriculture
had
remained
until
this fatal
period
the
leading
industry
in
the island and
its
fall
entailed
a
genuine
revolution
in
English
life.
Land
had
not
only
been the
main
source of
national
income
but
its
possession
had
spelled
political
power
and
social
prestige.
As
wages
and
employment
fell
and
the more
energetic
and
ambitious
young people
drifted to
the
cities,
rents and
profits
fell
likewise.
For the
rich,
land remained
a
costly
and
ostentatious
luxury,
a
badge
of social
position,
but the
blood had been
drained from
the
life
of
the
old
England
which had
persisted
for
centuries.
A
great
country
estate
became
something
like a
title,
kept
as
a
mark of
distinction
but
reality
had
gone
out of
it and
had
left
only
the
shadow. The
day
of the
great
landed
magnates,
such
as
Trollope's
Duke of
Omnium,
had
gone,
and a
collapse
of their
economic
power
was bound in
time to be
followed
by
that
of
their
political
control.
The
day
of the financiers
and
great
business
magnates
lay
not
long
ahead.
IV.
DISRAELI
AND
THE
CHANGING
ORDER:
The
old order
found
its defender
in
Benjamin
Disraeli,
for
a
generation
or
more
leader
of
the
Conservative
Party,
though
he
had
begun
as a
radical,
and
as
we
saw in
the
previous
chapter
had
aided
in the
passage
of
the
Reform Bill
of
1867.
Descended from
a
family
of
Spanish
Jews
who had
fled
from
Spain
to
Venice
and
in
1748
moved
to
England,
he
seemed
a
most
unlikely
person
to
head
the
party
o the
landed
aristocrats.
It
is difficult
to
conceive
of
a
more
un-English
figure
than
this
Hebrew,
scarcely
rooted
in
214
DISRAELI
AND
THE CHANGING
ORDER
British
soil as the
British count
descent,
with
his
exotic
appear-
ance,
his
clothes,
his
ringlets
of
hair,
his
romantic
imagination
and
Oriental
cast
of
mind.
Heading
the
Conservatives and in
opposition
to
the
Liberals
(the
term
was
first
used in
its modern
meaning
in
1868),
he
had
perforce
to
take a
negative position
on
reform,
and
he
made his
cause
the
enhancement of
the
monarchy
and
the
Empire.
Both
ap-
pealed
to his
Orientalism.
The real
power
of the
Crown,
however,
was
steadily
to
decline
after
1870,
while its
symbolic
value
in-
creased.
One of the
strongest
traits
in Disraeli's
mind
was
irony
and
it
was one
of
the ironies of
his
life
that
by
helping
to
pass
the
Re-
form
Bill he
had
made
the
Crown
politically
less
influential.
Never-
theless it was
largely
due to
his
imagination
and
acts that
by
the
end
of
the
century
Victoria was almost
deified and
imperialism
had
become
rampant.
In
1
868 the
lists were
opened
for the
long
duel between
Disraeli
and
the
Liberal
leader
Gladstone. Lord
Derby
had
resigned
as
Prime Minister and
was succeeded
by
Disraeli,
while at
the same
time
Lord Russell
also
retired and left
the Liberal
leadership
to
Gladstone.
No
contrast
could
be
more
striking
than that
between
the
two men who were
long
to
dominate the
political
scene.
Both
had
enormous
courage
and could
make
the
most
daring
of
political
moves, but,
whereas
Disraeli
was a most
subtle
calculator,
Glad-
stone,
once he
had made
up
his mind as to the
end,
could rush
toward it
as
madly
as
a
bull. The
difference
may
be noted
in the
massive
square-jawed
head of
Gladstone
and
the
long,
lean,
aq-
uiline-nosed
face
of
his
opponent.
Disraeli
accomplished many
brilliant
things
for the
Empire,
but
one
senses
in
him a
strong
strain
of
the
adventurer.
Practically
all
political
leaders are
per-
sonally
ambitious,
and
properly
so,
but in the case
of
Gladstone,
in
spite
of his
many
inconsistencies,
we
sense
a
unity
of
unusual
political
character.
John
Morley
wrote
of
him
that
he
was "not
only
a
political
force
but a moral force."
Throughout
his
life he
saw
things
from the
moral and
religious
standpoint
rather than
through
political
glasses.
That
such
a
man,
even
with
his consum-
mate
abilities
in the
fields of
finance
and
oratory,
held
the
office
215
EMPIRE
ON
THE SEVEN
SEAS
o Prime
Minister
for
a
longer
aggregate
period
than
any
other
in the
long
Victorian
reign
illuminates
the
time.
When
Disraeli
assumed
the
office
in
February,
1868,
it
had be-
come
evident
to
the
Liberals
that
something genuine
would
have
to
be
done to
allay
the
unrest
in
Ireland.
The eternal
Irish
ques-
tion
had
never
been
settled,
and had
been
brought
again
to
the
center of
the
stage
by
a
series of
outrages.
A
secret
society
had been
formed whose
members
were
known
as
Fenians,
and
had
been
largly
recruited
by
Irish
immigrants
to America
who
had
been
serving
in the
army
during
the
Civil
War and on the
disbanding
of
the
forces had
drifted
back to
Ireland
to
use their
military
ex-
perience
in
making
trouble
for the British
authorities.
V.
GLADSTONE
AND IRELAND
Among
many
other
grievances
was the
fact that
the Irish had to
pay
tithes to the
English
Church,
and
during
Disraeli's brief
Min-
istry
Gladstone
introduced
a
bill
for disestablishment
in
Ireland,
though
there
was
no more devoted
member
of
the
Church.
How-
ever,
he
felt
that what
was
just
and
right
in
England
was
unjust
in
overwhelmingly
Catholic Ireland.
Disraeli dissolved
Parlia-
ment,
as he
would
have had
to
do
in
any
fcase
according
to
the
terms of
the
recent
Reform
Bill,
and
in the
general
election
there
proved
to
be
a
large
Liberal
majority,
and/Gladstone,
as Prime
Minister,
who
had formed
his
Cabinet
in
December,
1868,
suc-
ceeded
in
the
session
of
1869
in
wholly
disestablishing
and
more
than half
disendowing
the
Church of
England
in
Ireland^
n
doing
so
he
met
with
little
opposition
even in
the Lords
where
sat
the
Bishops.
The
nation,
including
the new
electorate
of
the
1867
Re-
form
Bill,
had voted
on
the
question,
which
was
a
leading
issue
in
the
election,
and
the
first action
of
the
broadened
democracy
had
been an
act of
justice.
A
generation
earlier
such
a measure
would
have
been doomed
to
certain
rejection.
Gladstone,
now
almost
sixty,
was
at the
height
of
his
ability
though
in
his
amazing
career
he
was
again
to
become
Prime
Minister
at
eighty-four.
If
in
general
the
people
of
England
and
the
vested
interests
of
the
Church
supported
Gladstone in
removing
the
religious
griev-
216