The whole north of Germany is a flat, barren plain, with the Elbe, the Oder, the Weser flowing west and north. The north of Germany on a raised map looks like a vast sea-shore, and so it is. To the south a great river, the Rhine, pierces its way from Frankfort through a beautiful gorge in the mountains, and has its source near that of the Danube. Barbarossa called this river, "that royal street." This sea-shore is cultivated and populous; this river has been made a great commercial highway. Cologne, one hundred and fifty miles from the sea, is now a seaport; Strasburg, three hundred miles inland, can receive boats of six hundred tons; and the tributary river, the Main, has been deepened so that now Frankfort receives steamers from the Rhine. Three quarters of the through trade of Holland is German water-borne trade. Now the Dortmund-Ems canal, which is one hundred and sixty-eight miles long, and can be used by ships of a thousand tons, gives an outlet, via the Rhine, at Emden. All this is the work of a patient, persistent, and economical people working under great natural disadvantages. As compared with America this is an unfruitful land, and, as I have noted, surrounded on all sides by powerful enemies. In 1902 Traugott Mueller estimated the value of Germany's production of wheat, potatoes, vegetables--the products of the gardens and the fields, in short--at $605,000,000; the production of beef, mutton, pork at $669,500,000; of the dairies at $406,000,000; of cotton, sugar, alcohol, wine, and wood at $322,000,000; or a total of $2,002,000,000. The United States is seventeen times as large, but by no means seventeen times as productive. Germany, again, is divided into a number of states, all, with the exception of Prussia, with its population of 40,000,000 out of the total of 65,000,000, comparatively small. These states are not merely divided by legal and geographical lines, but by traditions, different ruling families, religion, tastes, habits, and manners, and even geologically. Bernhard Cotta, writing of Germany, says: "Geologically there is a Spain, an England, a Sweden, a Russia, a France, but no Germany." They are different individuals, not different members of the same family. They have been cemented together by coercion. Over this whole country for three hundred years have swept all the fighting men of Europe. Until 1870 it was a tournament ground for the Swedes, Russians, French, Dutch, Belgians, Italians, Hungarians, English, and the various German states. It was shot over, till it is a wonder that there are any young birds, not to speak of old cocks and hens left, to begin with over again.