[9] "Germany's greatness makes it impossible for her to do without the ocean--but the ocean also proves that even in the distance, and on its farther side, without Germany and the German Emperor no great decision dare henceforth be taken." (July 3, 1900.) A dispassionate consideration of Prussia's treatment of her dependencies must convince any except the most partisan that her efforts here have been far less successful than those of most other nations, if they are not to be qualified as utter and absolute failures. Chancellor Caprivi had said quite justly that the worst blow an enemy could give him would be to force more territories in Africa upon him. Nevertheless, Germany has since Caprivi's time and at imminent risk of war acquired further African possessions. The attempt to colonize Africa, begun, as we have seen, by the Great Elector, was Germany's first venture in this field. Yet at no time did the Germans seem to get on well with the blacks. In the Emperor's speeches to the Reichstag he has spoken of his desire to introduce Christian customs and Christian morality among the negroes. Yet his attempts here were hardly successful. The Herreros in Southwest Africa revolted and massacred German colonists, sparing the Boers and English who had come before the German occupation. Doctor Gibbons tells us that the suppression of this rebellion took more than a year and cost Germany an appalling sum of money and many lives. But it cost the natives more. Two thirds of the nation of the Herreros were massacred, and, while only six or seven thousand were in arms, the German official report states that forty thousand were killed. The Germans confiscated all the lands of the natives. In 1906, after twenty-one years of German rule, there were in Southwest Africa sixteen thousand prisoners of war out of a total native population of thirty-one thousand. All the natives lived in concentration camps and were forced to work for the government. It may be conceded that Germany's problem here was a difficult one; it must also be recognized that her policy had been neither of advantage to the natives nor to Germany herself.