Already in 1807 negro slavery, had been abol ished in England; in 1833 it was abolished in all British colonies; in 1843, 12,000,000 slaves were liberated in India; directly after Great Britain assumed a protectorate over Zanzibar in 1890 slavery died out; in 1895 the practise was abol ished in Egypt, formerly a great African slave market. As the late Professor David Ames Wells wrote in 1896, England has once put down savagery, that . rendered civilization impossible, her treatment of the subjugated and uncivilized has always been merciful.' That by this process of civilizing and subjugating, by administering law and government in ((protec torates," Great Britain eventually became the possessor of those territories, was an automatic and inevitable logical conclusion. She had either to hold them or cast them adrift to wander under the control of some other power.
In East and Central Africa British policy may be described as an The Uganda Railway from Mombasa to Port Florence on the Victoria Nyanza; the Cape to Cairo Railway; the huge bridge over the Vic toria Falls; the construction of roads and trade routes, buildings and wharves; the development of Nyassalarml and, in the West, of Nigeria, are all costly and strenuous undertakings from which not only Africa, but the whole world must derive incalculable advantage in the future. A thousand-mile trip down the Nile or a seven-hundred mile journey from the Indian Ocean inland on British territory can to-day be made with as much ease and comfort as a rail road journey from New York to Chicago.
It now remains to examine briefly the trend of Great Britain's policy in a part of Africa which is not in her possession, namely, Mo rocco. The international controversy over that country is of recent date, and undoubtedly played a prominent part in the overture to the European War of 1914. But Morocco was merely a pawn on the European diplomatic chess board. In March 1905 the German emperor landed at Tangier to aid the sultan in his de mand for a conference of the Powers to check the military dispositions of France, which, by the Anglo-French agreement of 1904, was al lowed a free hand in Morocco in return for the same privilege being accorded to Great Britain in t. Germany complained that she had not been consulted in the matter and de manded certain concessions or, alternatively, compensation elsewhere. (See Morocco). Ger
many's object in raising the dispute was mainly to test the strength of the new-born "Entente Cordiale between France and Great Britain and to separate them if possible while Russia had her hands full with the Japanese War. But both at the Algeciras conference in 1906 and during the Morocco crisis of 1911 Great Britain and France held firmly together, supported even by Italy the ally of Germany and Austria. Up to this time British policy in Africa had not been antagonistic to the acquisition of territory by Germany on that continent; but the unre lenting opposition now offered to German claims in Morocco was based on the strong ground of self-preservation. British statesmen had for some years realized that, with the rapid growth of her navy, Germany had become an implacable and jealous enemy of the British Empire. Al ready in 1902 Germany had entered into nego tiations with France to obtain a harbor on the coast of Morocco; had the attempt proved suc cessful it would have meant a deadly blow at British sea power. A German fleet stationed off Morocco would have controlled not only the route to the Cape, but also the Strait of Gibraltar, thereby cutting off communications with Egypt and India. In addition, it would have rendered at least difficult —if not impossi ble — any co-operation between the British North Sea and Atlantic squadrons and those stationed in Southern and Eastern waters. It was no doubt a similar apprehension that prompted Great Britain to retain possession of Walfish Bay, situated on the coast of German Southwest Africa. The German government had on several occasions endeavored to acquire the harbor, a proposal consistently vetoed by Cape Colony.
British policy in America, in so far as there can be said to be any, is one of passivity. Canada conducts her own affairs without inter ference from the mother country; the West Indian islands have their governors and local parliaments, managing their domestic affairs in a manner suitable to themselves. The same may be said of British Guiana and the Falkland Islands. These outlying posts of the empire are seldom heard of ; they create neither disturb ance nor sensations, keeping the noiseless tenor of their way.*