modities of the same type,
was comparatively weak; and the European settlements in these areas,
which we have come to regard as the most important products of the
imperialist movement, must in their origin and early settlement be
mainly attributed to other than commercial motives. But Europe has
always depended for most of her luxuries upon the tropics: gold and
ivory and gems, spices and sugar and fine woven stuffs, from a very
early age found their way into Europe from India and the East, coming
by slow and devious caravan routes to the shores of the Black Sea and
the Mediterranean. Until the end of the fifteenth century the European
trader had no direct contact with the sources of these precious
commodities; the supply of them was scanty and the price high. The
desire to gain a more direct access to the sources of this traffic, and
to obtain control of the supply, formed the principal motive for the
great explorations. But these, in their turn, disclosed fresh tropical
areas worth exploiting, and introduced new luxuries, such as tobacco
and tea, which soon took rank as necessities. They also brought a
colossal increment of wealth to the countries which had undertaken
them. Hence the acquisition of a share in, or a monopoly of, these
lucrative lines of trade became a primary object of ambition to all the
great states. In the nineteenth century Europe began to be unable to
supply her own needs in regard to the products of the temperate zone,
and therefore to desire control over other areas of this type; but
until then it was mainly in regard to the tropical or sub-tropical
areas that the commercial motive formed the predominant element in the
imperial rivalries of the nation-states. And even to-day it is over
these areas that their conflicts are most acute.

A third motive for imperial expansion, which must not be overlooked, is
the zeal for propaganda: the eagerness of virile peoples to propagate
the religious and political ideas which they have adopted. But this is
only another way of saying that nations are impelled upon the imperial
career by the desire to extend the influence of their conception of
civilisation, their Kultur. In one form or another this motive has
always been present. At first it took the form of religious zeal. The
spirit of the Crusaders was inherited by the Portuguese and the
Spaniards, whose whole history had been one long crusade against the
Moors. When the Portuguese started upon the explora