As Prussia set herself to the repression of Danish nationality in Schleswig-Holstein and of French in Alsace-Lorraine, so Austria adopted a policy of eradicating national traits in Hungary. The national unity aimed at by Bismarck having been established, Germany continued to thrive and grow during the peaceful years following 1871; and the development of the trade of this infant amongst nations is a world's phenomenon. Yet as with Prussia in the past, so with the greater Germany of to-day, history is a tale of one persistent struggle for possessions. As is natural during times of peace, the population of Germany increased at an enormous rate, growing from 35,500,000 in 1850 to 66,000,000 in 1912--an average of about 615,000 per annum--while the present increase is roughly 900,000 per annum. Between the years 1881 and 1890 German emigration amounted to 130,000 annually; but it was only 18,500 in 1913, and this was more than counterbalanced by immigration from Austria, Russia, and Italy. Over-population soon became a pressing question, and the obvious remedy was expansion of frontiers or new territories for the accommodation of the surplus. German policy in a very few years became directed towards extension of territories, for it was apparent that emigration to foreign countries and dependencies only strengthened other nations. An outlet for the surplus population was required; but in view of the need for men to feed the military machine which had founded the German Empire and upon which its strength depended, it was clear that emigration to foreign countries and dependencies was an inexpedient measure of relief, as it would be applied at the expense of the mother country. In the year 1882 the German Colonisation Society was started, with the object of acquiring Colonies oversea and the establishment of a navy and mercantile marine to form the link binding the isolated territories to the motherland. The society was formed by merchants and traders with the end in view of extending trade; but to the militarist section the idea of Imperial expansion presented itself, and to that party the Colonies appealed rather from a strategical than a commercial standpoint. The society received enthusiastic support, and, indeed, all Germany began to look to Colonies which were to be purely German; and with this enlarged horizon, policy settled down to the acquisition of oversea territory, the ambition being naturally accompanied by an aspiration towards a powerful navy, necessary, ostensibly, to keep communications open. The German Emperor held very determined ideas on the subject of expansion, but the Chancellor, Bismarck, altered his views only so far as to approve of the founding of Trade Colonies under Imperial Protection.