The morning call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1878-1895, 1893-12-27
THE LATEST THING IN ANNEXA-
TON.

The uprising in Madagascar is another
illustration of the dangers which attend
predatory enterprises in foreign countries.
Those who NEEDLE in other peoples affairs
are apt sooner or later TO come to grief.
Madagascar is about the size of Texas,
with some four or five millions of people,
mos thy of the Malay olynesian races.
The country being rich, with long list of
trOpical products and some gold mines.
Eu ropeans have more than once attempted
to establish colonies there. The French
have repeated these attempts for couple
of centuries, each enterprise in its turn
ending in failure. Still, there is a French
settlement at Diego Juarez. and, by a
pleasing fiction of intern ational law. the
island is supposed to be a French pro-
tectorate. By treaty concluded in 1885
the European powers agreed to consider
the island French.
Meanwhile, the natives, who are called
HOvas, have a government of their own
under queen with polysyllabc name,
and capital city with a population of
100000, more or less. The Hovas now in
wife the French to retire to some more con-
genial sphere. The step is said to be insti-
gated by the Protestant missionaries. who
have been competing with the French
priests for Malagasy souls. II is said to
be quite popular. These Malagasys are
not particular about their religion, but
they hate the French, with whom their
ancestors have been fighting for a couple
of centuries, and a t the present time the
colony of Diego Juarez stands in some
| peril.
Madagascar costs the French some 1000,
600 francs year. for which she gets moth
| ing. The total foreign trade of the island,
which is conducted al Tamatave and is
| divided between the English, French, Ger.
| mans and Americans, amounts to about
| $780, 600 year, the chief exports being
rice. hides. palm cloths, gum coral and
| indlarubber, and the chief imports manu-
| featured goods. Madagascar would grow
almost unlimited quantities of cotton, cot
! fee, tobacco. spices and other tropical
products, but the natives are idle, there
has never been any foreign immigration
and there are no roads. Ii France should
see fiji to make the, present native uprising
an excuse for a war of conquest the island
might perhaps become as valuable and
productive a colony as Java. But the
Hovas would make hard fight for their
independence.
The French. however, have not hereto
fore made a success of colonization. With
the single exception of Algeria all the
French colonies are a source of expense.
and serve no useful purpose except as a
training-school for the French armies.
Pc ndicherry. Tonquin and Senegam bia are
only retained because their abandonment
would involve sacrifice of French pride
y 10
than those outlying possessions, and the
former has been repeepled from France.
1t is al exceptional case.
The English are spending considerable
sums in extending their South African
domtnions northward. They are already
on the border Of the Limpopo, and pres
emily we shall hear of them on the Fam
best. They have reduced colonization and
conquest to a science, after the manner of
The old Romans, and as South Africa con-
tains much fine land with a healthy eli
mate, they Will probably in course of time
create an empire there which will vie with
Australasia or British India. Labor is
abundant, and after a course of instruc-
ton with the aid of machine guns. the
native African will probably become
docile subject of the Queen. or it NAV be
the King of England. Not so the French.
They deal with conquered countries as
Cortes did with Mexico. and the Pizarros
with Peru. Hence they are reduced to the
alternative OF extermina ting and super
seding the native races, or of occupying
isolated stations On the coast under suf-
ferance. 10 all the years they have been
warning in Tonquin they have not made
the first step toward frenchifying the peo-
pie. What territory they hold they hold
by the hayonet. They have made no
progress in India since the days of Duplex.
Their settlements In Senegal merely serve
as bases for predatory expeditions into
the Western Soudan and the countries on
the Gold Coast. Perhaps coming events In
Madagascar may show that they are mend
ing their ways.