New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-08-04

and with the establishment of slavery
for the negro as great ruling prin-
ciple in East Africa. They were organ
izing q huge slave state. Into the fray
that great-minded German Won Wiss-
mann flung himself with all the en-
thusiasm OF a Livingstone combined
with the genius Of great military
commander He had Neviously seen
enough OF Livingstone's africa to be
as Mortified at the slave trade and slave
raids as ever Livingstone had been, and
he conceived il 20 be the great pur-
pose of Germany 10 finish Livingstone's
work.
Therefore he smote the Arabs hip
and thigh, he marched incredible dis
tances in an incredibly short space of
time. We were comrades side by side
fighting this evil simultaneously. So
completely did he enlist the German
government on his side that when il
was my turn TO attack the Arabs I
used German steamers and German
guns, and even at one time a small
German contingent of British Sudanese
under German officers. All Of this help
was lent me by the German govern
ment, so that the common enemy might
be quickly and thoroughly crushed.
Won Wissmann was succeeded by
several German governors inclining TO
like purpose of complete freedom for
the negro. But at the opening of the
twentieth century Germany. like France,
and to a certain extent like colonial
Britain. became infected with the
Leopoldian virus. German rulers in
East Africa appreciated the better side
of the Arab, for the Arab with all his
faults is a white man. They realized
that he had done a vast deal TO edu-
cate savage and intractable negroes, to
improve agriculture and what not else.
He became useful TO them in that eli
mate as a middleman, as an overseer,
as a director of labor, and gradually
they slid into a position Numerically
opposed to that of Won Wlssmann. The
negro was TO be educated to be well
trained serf and nothing more.
But in the course of pursuing this
new policy they won over the Arabs Of
East Central Africa as their friends,
and not only the Arabs, but several
tribes of congeries of Mahometanized
negroes who had previously been the
allies of the Arabs in their slave raids.
And it is this force mainly which still
fights under the German flag, still
hopes to see a German East Africa re-
stored TO the rule Of the Teuton ana
the Arab conjoined.
Of course, there are inconsistencies
and deviations from this policy. In
some directions the Germans have
feared the Arabs or have thought that
Zanzibar and Indian influence made
them too pro-British. They have also
been scared at times by the spread OF
Mahometanism as likely eventually TO
wrest all Central Africa from any Eu-
ropean domination at all.
Still. | have given the true explain
alton of why Germay still holds out IN
the east-central part of German East
Africa. Shall we give in and allow her
to resume possession everywhere wnere
she has been before? Again say NO,
no matter how long America and west
ern Europe have to fight TO secure
peace on other terms.
Natives Hate German Rule
And I say this "No" with the greater
vehemence in that | am convinced from
the correspondence that has passed be-
tween educated spokesman OF the ma
tive races and myself that | am voicing
the feelings, the deep seated feelings,
of something like fifteen millions OF Al
ricans who have had every reason to
loathe German rule.
But in abstracting all Africa from
coming again under the German flag
would not go TO the opposite extreme,
after peace is made, of shutting out
German commerce from what had
hitherto been German Africa Cor. for
the matter of that, German Asia or
Oceania). | think some arrangement
should be made by which in what were
her former colonial possessions Ger
many should be allowed to trade on the
same footing as all other nations.
Do agree with the internationali7a-
ton Of Central Africa? Emphatically
not, for reasons have no room to give
here. | believe in the. eventual creation
under the protection Of European flags
of a number of self-dependent and in
dependent negro nationalities ruling
themselves on civilized principles. l
believe in nationality as l believe in
.ba o,raot value nf Individuality.