y productive, but their people
will suffer for food unless they can export manufactures. The crying
need for new markets, for new sources of raw material, drove these
states into Africa. And we should be glad, for Africa's sake, that they
have gone there, even though the desire to make money is one of the most
powerful incentives.

It is under the protective aegis of these governments that explorers are
settling down in smaller areas to see what may be found between the
explored water-courses, to study the continent in detail, to give to our
knowledge of Africa the scientific quality now required. The greatest
geographical work there in recent years is the extension of a line of
stations across tropical Africa by Commander Lemaire, each position
astronomically fixed by the most careful methods, constituting a
base-line east and west through Africa to which the scientific mapping
of a very large area will be referred.

The day of the minuter study of the whole continent has now dawned, and
we are witnessing a most notable work. All the colonial powers, and the
Germans most conspicuously, are studying the economic questions relating
to their African possessions. The suitability of climates for
colonists, the essential rules of hygiene, the development of
agriculture, labor supplies, transportation and commercial facilities,
and many other problems are receiving the most careful attention.
Experiment stations are maintained in the colonies and colonial schools
at home, to fit young men for service in the field. The Germans have
already proved that cotton and tobacco are certain to become profitable
export crops.

The mine-owners of the Witwatersrand, on which Johannesburg stands, have
begun a movement which they hope will result in the immigration of
100,000 white laborers to the mining field. We may look for remarkable
development in South Africa, whose promise is larger than that of any
other part of the continent. Whatever may be said of some of the methods
by which the British have enlarged their empire, their rule has blessed
the barbarous peoples whose countries they have absorbed. The task of
improving the few millions of blacks in South Africa, and of developing
the large and in some respects wonderful resources of that region, will
be greatly assisted by the incoming of hundreds of thousands of
Europeans, bringing with them the arts and other blessings of
civilization. The future of none of the newer parts of t