and the Kamerun were
rapidly developing into very valuable tropical assets, from which in
time the German Empire would have derived much of the tropical raw
material for its industries. The Germans realized better than most
people that the value of tropical Africa lay not in any openings for
white colonization, such as are being developed next door to their
colonies in British East Africa, but in the plantation system, where
white capital and black labor collaborate to establish an entirely
different order of things. Harsh as the German system undoubtedly is, I
am not prepared to deny that it is perhaps the more scientific one, and
that in the long run it is the more profitable form of exploiting the
tremendous natural resources of the tropics.

With regard to tropical Africa, so vast in area, so great in resources,
the first desideratum for its development is the opening up of
communication. The lakes, the Nile, and the Congo form the principal
natural links in any chains of communication with the seaboard; and the
question is, how far railways have come in or will come in to complete
these chains.

[Sidenote: Railways built in the Congo territory and connective.]

Two railways built during the war in the Congo territory have largely
extended the communications from east to west, and from the center to
the south. These two railways have opened up many routes in Central and
East Africa, and it is now possible to travel from the Indian Ocean at
Dar-es-Salaam by the German Central Railway to Ujiji on Lake Tanganyika;
by steamer across the lake to Albertville; thence by train to Kabalo; by
steamer on to Kongolo; train to Kindu, and on by steamer and rail down
the Congo to the Atlantic Ocean.

[Sidenote: Railways in South Africa.]

Now, as to the communications in the south, one can travel from Cape
Town by rail to Bukama, and thence by steamer and rail either to Boma on
the Atlantic coast, or by rail and steamer to Dar-es-Salaam on the
Indian Ocean. Besides these through lines, there is the Uganda Railway
from Mombasa on the Indian Ocean to the Victoria Nyanza, and there are
in contemplation two other railways from the east coast to Nyasa, one
from Kilwa, and one from Porto Amelia, in Portuguese East Africa. A
railway is also under construction from Lobito Bay on the Atlantic to
the Katanga copper areas, already reached from the south and east by the
railways from Cape Town and Beira.

[Sidenote: Communications to t