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OUTLINES OF
BRITISH COLONISATION
BY THE U t
REV. WILLIAM PARR GRESWELL * '»
AUTHOR OF 'OUR SOUTH AFRICAN EMPIRE* *A HISTORY OF THE DOMINION OF CANADA, ETC.
WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY THE
RIGHT HON. LORD BRASSEY, K.C.B.
HonDon
PERCIVAL AND CO.
1893
All rights reserved
H««Y MOUSE STEPHENS
TO
THE RIGHT HONOURABLE LORD BRASSEY, K. C. B.
THE TRUE FRIEND OF OUR COLONIES, AND THE ABLE EXPONENT OF IMPERIAL UNITY
THIS VOLUME
IS RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED BY
THE AUTHOR
514501
INTRODUCTION
MR. GRESWELL'S volume on Colonisation is a record of achievements of which the British nation may justly be proud. We read in these pages of maritime dis- coveries in every ocean, and of still more arduous inland explorations. The brilliant story of our coloni- sation carries us forward from the solitary struggles of the pioneer in unknown countries to the combined efforts made by great communities to develop commerce and promote civilisation. We see the first administrators of our distant dependencies at their work, in days when communication was slow and infrequent, and when little aid could be given and little interference was to be apprehended on the part of the authorities at home. In a later stage we have before us encouraging and splendid examples of the prosperity and contentment which have followed upon the bold and ungrudging acceptance of the policy of the devolution of local affairs upon a responsible con- stitutional government.
In any history of our colonies the West Indies must have a large place. Those lovely islands, gems of surpassing beauty set in the silver sea, have been the
vi British Colonisation
scenes of many struggles, and have witnessed some of the most brilliant victories of the British navy. Since the close of the Great War the progress of these islands has never been interrupted by international conflicts. The difficulties of the planters have been due to other causes. The manumission of the slaves, and later the unfair and unequal struggle with foreign competitors lavishly subsidised by bounties, have entirely changed the conditions under which the cultivation of sugar must be carried on. It is gratify- ing to know that by reductions in the cost of produc- tion, and the opening of new markets, chiefly in the United States, the position of the sugar industry has been much improved. Owing to their tropical climate the West Indies cannot be regarded as a suitable field for European colonisation on an extensive scale. For the negro population these islands may be made an earthly paradise. It is to the development of peasant proprietorship that the governors are at this moment chiefly directing their attention. The fruit trade with the United States, which has been rapidly growing of recent years, seems specially adapted to the limited resources and aptitudes of a negro peasantry.
The history of Canada contains many episodes of surpassing interest. Heroism and self-denying zeal in the cause of religion have never been exhibited more conspicuously than by the Jesuit fathers whom France
Introduction vii
sent forth in the seventeenth century to found missions in North America. The wars of the eighteenth century led to many hard-fought encounters between the British and French forces. The long list of brave and capable commanders on both sides culminates in the memorable names of Wolfe and Montcalm. In the siege and capture of Quebec both these illustrious heroes laid down their lives with unmurmuring devotion in the cause of their respective countries. There are episodes in war in which all the highest virtues of the human character are displayed. History has no more moving story than that which gathers round the crumbling battlements of Quebec. At a later stage Canada was the scene of another display of patriotism. Thousands of British settlers, rather than live under an independent flag, migrated, at great sacrifices, from their homes in the United States, and came to reside in a country where all the hard labours of the pioneer had to be en- countered, but where the flag of the mother country still waved above their heads. The subsequent history of Canada is chiefly interesting for the success which has attended the concession of responsible government. All traces of rancour and disloyalty have disappeared. The latest constitutional incident was the federation of all the provinces into one dominion.
Canada possesses many sources of prosperity. Its fisheries give employment to a numerous and hardy
viii British Colonisation
maritime population. Lower Canada possesses noble forests : Ontario has a thriving agriculture and rich pastures : the Canadian North West is rapidly becom- ing one of the most abundant granaries of the world.
The West African settlements are especially interest- ing in connection with many perilous efforts to explore the recesses of the Dark Continent. Off their surf- bound shores our squadrons for many years kept watch and ward for the suppression of the slave trade. Under British protection the slaves whom we set free have formed a settlement at Sierra Leone. The port is advantageously situated, both as a place of trade and as a coaling-station for the fleet.
As a Colonial p"bwer the French are exhibiting re- markable energy in West Africa. Englishmen will watch with a generous approval the efforts of a friendly power in the cause of civilisation. There would be less of reserve in our good wishes to French colonisation if her settlements were administered under a less exclusive fiscal policy.
At the Cape of Good Hope we have gradually over- come difficulties which in times past seemed almost insurmountable. By the concession of responsible government we have conciliated the Dutch, who form a strong majority of the white population. After a series of wars, as inglorious as all conflicts must be which are waged between a civilised power and savage tribes, we
Introduction ix
have found in the Caffres willing and sturdy labourers, who are lending invaluable services in opening up the resources of their country. Under the direction of Mr. Rhodes, the premier, the railway system of the Cape is being rapidly pushed forward, and British capital is being freely applied to the opening up of the mineral re- sources and the general settlement of the vast sphere over which the British Protectorate in South Africa extends.
Let us pass on to Australasia. With those distant shores must for ever be associated the names of the great navigators by whom they were first explored. Dampier, Tasman, Flinders, Baudin, and, most re- nowned of all, Captain Cook, deserve special mention for the part they took in the extended explorations which made the civilised world first acquainted with the vast territories of Australia. The newly-discovered lands were used in the first instance as a convict settle- ment. That miserable stage in their history was fortunately brief. A population of stalwart settlers has found in the antipodes a rich field for enterprise. It was soon ascertained that the vast plains of the continent, though subject to long periods of drought, were capable of affording adequate subsistence to sheep selected from breeds especially rich in the pro- duction of wool.
In 1851 the first great discoveries of gold were made in Australia. Attracted by the reports of many
x British Colonisation
fortunate finds, emigrants arrived in extraordinary numbers. In four years the population of Victoria was increased from less than 100,000 to more than 400,000. From this epoch onwards the prosperity of the Austral- asian colonies was assured. It now rests on a broader and more enduring basis than that of the gold-diggings. So boundless and varied are the resources, and so energetic the population, that it is now computed that, within a period but little exceeding the reign of our gracious Queen, less than five millions of people have accumulated a total private wealth of some twelve hundred millions sterling. Well may the people who have achieved such dazzling success inscribe upon their flag the motto, ' Advance, Australia ! '
It only remains to add a few concluding observations upon the problem of Imperial Federation. Not many years have elapsed since leading statesmen regarded with complacency the prospect of a severance of the ties, in those days deemed an incumbrance, which bound the mother country to distant dependencies to which it seemed difficult, if not impossible, to afford adequate protection. At the present time we have broader and worthier views of the advantages and possibilities of maintaining the unity of the British Empire. The true basis of that union is to be found, not in the parchments of lawyers or the despatches of ministers, but in the feelings of the people of the colonies
Introduction xi
towards that old but not exhausted land which it delights them to regard as the common home of the race.
On the day before these lines were written, the subject was treated with a master-hand by Lord Rose- bery in presiding at the twenty -fifth anniversary banquet of the foundation of the Colonial Institute. In his speech delivered on that occasion, with the humorous touches so much to be desired in a post- prandial oration, there were conveyed lessons of states- manlike wisdom. 'It is a part/ he said, * of our responsibility and heritage to take care that the world, so far as it can be moulded by us, shall receive the Anglo-Saxon, and not another character.' While not recommending the immediate summoning of another Colonial Conference, Lord Rosebery gave evidence that sympathy and affection for the colonies was the govern- ing principle of his conduct as the minister in charge of the foreign affairs of the Empire. The same senti- ments were expressed, with not less warmth of feeling, by Lord Knutsford. There are no divergent views in reference to our colonial policy. It is held by states- men on both sides to be of the last importance to the future of our race to prevent our noble Empire from falling asunder.
BRASSEV.
March 7, 1893.
AUTHOR'S PREFACE
IN the following Outlines of British Colonisation I can claim to have followed no exact system or method. Some Colonies are treated more fully than others, and all of them less than they deserve ; but it is hard to compress the annals of our Colonies into a single volume. I have endeavoured to lay stress upon what may be of little more than passing interest in the story of conquest, exploration, or first acquisition. The great Dominion of Canada, the Colony of Newfoundland, and Africa, south of the Zambesi, I have treated more fully and exhaustively elsewhere in a recent series (1890-92) issued by the Clarendon Press. Our Second Colonial Empire is a vast subject, and demands variety of treatment, diversity of illustration, and many books adapted to the wants of the individual reader or student By a list of books and references given at the end of each chapter, I have invited my readers to pursue the subject further ; but I know that it is presumptuous to pretend to give anything approaching to a complete
AutJiors Preface xiii
bibliography. One striking characteristic of our Colonial Empire is that it has been mainly acquired, not in con- sequence of any set or formal State plan, but as mer- chants, sailors, adventurers, patentees, Companies, and Associations have led the way. The State has often cried ' Back ! ' but the individual has cried ' Forward ! ' The whole story is varied, rugged, and picturesque, being deeply interwoven with the proudest traditions of our race. Colonial History is English History writ large upon the face of the world. I have devoted especial attention to France and to French colonial policy. France has been our rival in the past, and she may be our rival in the future, and it is well to throw a little light upon her methods of colonisation. For my ' Facts and Figures ' contained in the Appendices, which follow the arrangement of the subject-matter in the text, and furnish a striking commentary upon it, I can claim more system and arrangement. These may be found useful by those who wish to study the statistics of the census year of 1891 — a convenient resting-place whence to take a survey. These figures, if carefully studied, constitute a very eloquent proof of the magnifi- cent material results achieved by the energy of our race. Not the least surprising revelation is the value of British trade in Hong Kong and Further India. Upon close examination it will he found, also, how largely Africa trades with us. The policy of extending our influence
xiv Author 's Preface
in this continent is abundantly justified by the enormous proportion of direct export and import trade with our home ports. Moreover, England's policy is the wise and enlightened one of declaring all ports, navigable rivers, and highways free to the commerce of the world I have also been able to quote from Sir R. W. Rawson's most useful statistics, showing the proportion of the trade of our Colonies with the mother country for a period of years extending from 1872-86. I have sup- plemented this by a statement of the proportion as it existed in the census year of 1891.
WILLIAM GRESWELL.
APRIL 1893.
CONTENTS
PAGE
INTRODUCTION BY LORD BRASSEY, .... v
AUTHOR'S PREFACE, ...... xii
CHAPTER I.
THE WEST INDIES. — Jamaica— Barbados— Trinidad — Tobago —
British Guiana— British Honduras, . . . . 1-19
CHAPTER II.
THE WEST INDIES (continued). — The Leeward Islands, including Dominica, Montserrat, Antigua, St. Kitts, Nevis, Anguilla, The Virgin Islands — The Windward Islands including Grenada, the Grenadines, St. Lucia, St. Vincent— The Bahamas — The Bermudas, ..... 20-44
CHAPTER III. NEWFOUNDLAND, ...... 45-61
CHAPTER IV. THE DOMINION OF CANADA, ..... 62-85
CHAPTER V.
THE WEST AFRICAN SETTLEMENTS, including the Gambia, Sierra Leone, The Gold Coast, Lagos, The Niger Protectorate, ....... 86-107
CHAPTER VI. THE SOUTH AFRICAN COLONIES, .... 108-131
XVI
Contents
CHAPTER VII.
THE AUSTRALIAN COLONIES : — New South Wales, .
CHAPTER VIII. Tasmania — Victoria — Western Australia ,
CHAPTER IX.
South Australia— Queensland, * , ;
132-159
. 160-180
. 181-199
CHAPTER X.
NEW ZEALAND, .
CHAPTER XII. CEYLON AND THE MALDIVE ARCHIPELAGO,
. 200-217
CHAPTER XL THE ISLANDS OF THE SOUTH PACIFIC— THE FIJI GROUP, . 218-227
228-239
CHAPTER XIII.
MAURITIUS,
CHAPTER XIV.
HONG KONG — THE STRAITS SETTLEMENTS — BRITISH NORTH
BORNEO — LABUAN, ...... 246-262
APPENDICES, INDEX, .
. 263-348 • 349-358
CHAPTER I
THE WEST INDIES
GENERALLY speaking, there may be said to be five distinct periods in the history of the West Indies common to all the settlements, more or less. First, the period of Spanish occu- pation following upon Spanish discovery, and dating from 1492, the year of the first voyage of Columbus ; next, the age of the buccaneers, marking a kind of rough transition stage, and leading up to the direct interference of England and France in the affairs of the West Indies. The occupation of Jamaica in 1655 by Venables and Penn was a deadly blow aimed at the Spanish dominion, and led ultimately to its utter downfall. Thirdly, in the midst of national rivalries, un- licensed acts, and piratical attacks, the gradual growth of the sugar industry, fostered by slave labour, can be traced. This industry grew and flourished, especially during the eighteenth century, and then received two mortal blows from the abolition of the slave trade in 1807, and the Emancipation Act of 1834. Before they fell beneath legislation, the West Indian planters were regarded as some of the richest merchants and capitalists in Europe. The fourth age is remarkable for the depression of this great tropical industry, and in Jamaica itself, the most typical and important possession of all of them, culminates in the disastrous ' servile war,' during Governor Eyre's regime (1865-1866). The fifth period, i.e. from this date to the present time, is one of greater hope. The folly of trusting to
2 British Colonisation
one industry alone, is well as the immorality of slave labour, have both been exposed by time, and teaching ; and the West Indian planter, although suffering from the blows dealt upon him unsparingly from all quarters, is learning wisdom through adversity. To the student of British colonial history no group of colonies can present so varied or so diversified a record.
Speaking more particularly, each settlement offers us a dis- tinct and separate story of development — a story within a story, a history within a history. Island histories are always interesting from the fact that the communities living on them work out, in each case, their social and political fortunes in vacuo. A change of governing power and a transference of sea dominion does not involve, as it would in the case of continental possessions, the universal and unquestioned supremacy of one European Power only. In the framing of treaties and the adjustment of international contracts, an island which has been virtually at the complete disposal of the conqueror is left — as indeed the French island of Martinique was left in 1814 — as a naval post or as a foothold upon the highways of commerce. Thus there still remain many frag- ments of former empires in the West Indies. Spain, France, England, Holland, Denmark, Venezuela, all hold possessions in the West Indies ; whilst the Black Republic of Hayti offers a most singular and, in a certain sense, a most instructive study of an island community.
From another point of view it is impossible to speak of the West Indian islands en bloc. Extending as they do over twenty degrees of latitude from the Gulf of Florida to the Spanish Main and the mouth of the Orinoco, they offer great variations of climate and temperature, although, of course, they are all tropical settlements, and lie between the Equator and the Tropic of Cancer. It has been the custom, also, to include the continental colonies of French, Dutch, and British Guiana as well as Honduras in the West Indian group — sometimes to the perplexity of the casual reader, who often speaks of Demerara as a West Indian island ; so that these
The West Indies 3
lateral and continental extensions of the general geographical expression, 'the West Indies,' provide us with another varia- tion. Far to the north, the remote Bermudas have been included under the term, in spite of the very loose links that exist between them and the larger and better known Sporades of Caribbean waters.
With regard to size, some of the islands are very small, and lie like green specks amidst the waste of waters ; while others are large, and rise, as in the case of Cuba, to the posi- tion of a rich and stately national heritage. Some, again, are low-lying on the ocean, mere groups of coral islands, like the Bahamas, which were called cayos or flats by the Spaniards, and the abode of wreckers, who made much profit from the stranding of vessels on their hidden shoals and reefs. Other islands tower aloft, like Dominica and St. Vincent, to magnifi- cent heights — tall monuments of some mighty volcanic erup- tion, which has added marvellously to their beauty, and left strange lakes, hot springs, and chasms everywhere. In Trini- dad the Pitch Lake, so well known to travellers, and described by Charles Kingsley and Lady Brassey, is a strange, pungent Stygian picture, reminding us of Gustave Dore's pictures and the old-world description of Tartarus, in the midst of tropical verdure and scenes of surpassing loveliness — a vision of death, as it were, in the midst of beauty. Again, some of the West Indies are unhealthy, others healthy • and in the latter, at a suitable elevation, Europeans can find pleasant abodes and bracing sanatoria.
From a political point of view, some of the West Indies have led a comparatively quiet life for generations ; others, like Jamaica and St. Lucia, have been torn by conflicts and swept by the scourge of war. In times of depression, when the burdens of government have been hard to bear, there has been a tendency on the part of the island governments to form themselves into groups, and thus economise the task of administration ; in times of prosperity, when each island has been well able to pay its way, there has been a wish to live
4 British Colonisation
apart. Perhaps the latest movement has been towards a general West Indian confederacy and some form of federal government. But this development is in the womb of time, and it is scarcely clear whether a Caribbean confederacy will arise or not.
To enumerate more particularly our West Indian posses- sions, they consist of the following islands and continental possessions : —
1. Jamaica.
2. Barbados.
3. Trinidad.
4. Tobago.
5. British Guiana.
6. British Honduras.
7. The Leeward Islands, including Dominica, Montserrat,
Antigua, St. Kitts, Nevis (with Anguilla), The Virgin Islands.
8. The Windward Islands, including Grenada, St. Lucia,
St. Vincent.
9. The Bahamas. 10. The Bermudas.
Of these Jamaica, taken from Spain by Cromwell and used as a buccaneers' perch, is the most important.
The very geographical divisions, as well as the nomencla- ture, of this island are copied from the Mother-country : in Jamaica there are the counties of Cornwall, Middlesex, and Surrey, divided into various parishes. Cornwall, governed once by a Trelawny, boasts of a town of Trelawny, also a Falmouth. It is the pride of the Jamaica Cornwall that it produces the best rum in the world. The various parishes are distinguished by their peculiar products, and the parish of St. Ann, in the central county of Middlesex — the first part of the island where Europeans landed — is termed the ' Garden of Jamaica.' The parish of Manchester, in the same county — so called after a Duke of Manchester — boasts of fine uplands, rich fruit and coffee plantations. Clarendon parish — so named
The West Indies 5
after the well-known English Lord Chancellor — has an historical interest as the place where, in 1694, at Carlisle Bay the French were beaten off by the colonial militia. On this occasion the French took advantage of the terrible ruin and devastation caused by the great earthquake of 1692, which completely destroyed Port Royal, to invade the island at Port Morant, coming from Hispaniola, and instigated, so it has been said, by disloyal Irish and Jacobites.
Historical associations cluster around Jamaica, and especially Port Royal. Penn arid Venables, disgracefully repulsed from the French colony of Hispaniola, which they were sent to conquer, partially redeemed their fame by the capture of the fortress of S. lago de la Vega (Spanish town). Benbow, after gallantly fighting du Casse (1702), lies buried in Kingston Parish Church, where his tomb with the following inscription can be seen : * Here lyeth interred the body of John Benbow, Esq., Admiral of the White, a true pattern of English courage, who lost hys life in defence of hys Queene and country. November ye 4th, 1702, in the 52nd year of hys age, by a wound in hys leg received in an engagement with Mons. du Casse, being much lamented.' Spanish Town boasts of a marble statue erected in honour of Lord Rodney, who, in company with Sir Samuel Hood, defeated the French admiral,' de Grasse, on that ever memorable April day, 1782, when the fortunes of the West Indies and the dominion of this part of the world seemed to be hanging in the balance. It is said that home politics were divided upon the subject of Rodney's expedition, and that a message was sent to him to strike his flag and come home; but, fortunately for England, Rodney never got this message, and won for his country that glorious victory.
In later times Port Royal has been the scene of many a notable rendezvous. During the American war and the French occupation of Mexico the British war-ships constantly called at Port Royal for coal and provisions; and in 1864, when Archduke Maximilian undertook the great and perilous task of ruling as Emperor of Mexico over a country so long distracted
6 British Colonisation
by war and tumult, he was met at Port Royal by eleven ships of war, and speeded on that errand destined to prove dis- astrous to him.
It is interesting to note how Jamaica has been rilled up with inhabitants from time to time. In 1662, less than ten years after the hoisting of the British flag at S. lago de la Vega, no fewer than 4000 colonists were planted there, the policy of Cromwell being to force Scotch and Irish immigration. In 1666, Sir Thomas Modyford brought over 1000 settlers from Barbados. Nevis, St. Kitts, and the Bermudas all sent their contingents.
In 1682, an aided immigration of some importance took place, and this was of French Protestants who had to fly from their country in consequence of religious persecution. An Order in Council is extant by which a passage was provided to Jamaica for forty-two French Protestants, ' whose names are to be certifyed unto them by the Right Rev. Father in God, the Lord Bishop of London, to be transplanted to His Majesty's Island of Jamaica, with the first conveniency they can.' These refugees were commended to Sir Thomas Lynch, the Governor of Jamaica, by Sir Leoline Jenkins, a Welshman, who had taken up arms on behalf of the Royalist cause, and was a well-known Jesus College man. He was a friend of Fell and Sheldon, to the latter of whom he rendered great services in the establish- ment of the Sheldonian Theatre and Printing Press at Oxford. Sir Leoline Jenkins subsequently urged the King to found and endow two additional Fellowships at Jesus College, according to the terms of which the holders were to go to sea and exercise clerical functions, either in the fleet or the plantations. This idea, although held in abeyance for a long time, was eventually carried out.1
In 1669, the remnants of a Scotch colony that had been planted on the Isthmus of Darien came over to Jamaica ; later on, and especially after 1713, the date of the Assiento, Port Royal became a great depot of the slave trade. As the sugar
1 Anderson's History of the Colonial Church^ vol. ii. 362.
The West Indies 7
industry developed, white immigration ceased to flow. The day of small holdings was over. A statement of the component parts of the population at various times confirms this view. In 1658 the colony contained 4500 whites and 1500 negroes ; in 1673, 8564 whites and 9504 negroes; in 1828, Mr Montgomery Martin estimated that a population of 500,000, or a proportion of about 78 persons to the square mile, was a low estimate. Of these only 35,000 were Europeans. At present the population is 639,491, of whom only 14,000 are Europeans — a great diminution contrasted with the estimate of fifty years ago.
Meanwhile, in addition to the African population, which shows signs of increase, must be reckoned the newly imported Indian and Chinese coolies. It is worth recording that no fewer than 20,000 Jamaican blacks have emigrated to Panama, attracted by the high wages on the Canal works. In Jamaica there are 60,000 peasant proprietors, who keep the industry of fruit-culture on a small scale almost entirely in their hands. The Central American States, such as Venezuela, Guatemala, and the Colombian States, offer to the Jamaican negro a good opening as a labourer, where his services are highly prized.
Together with Jamaica must be considered (i) the Cayman Islands. The largest of these, the Grand Cayman, lies about 178 miles north-west of Jamaica. Little Cayman is 70 miles north-east of Grand Cayman, and Cayman Brae lies close to Little Cayman. (2) The Turks and Caicos Islands, formerly part of the Bahamas, and separated from them by the Caicos Channel. The whole area of this group is 169 square miles, being nine in number. The Turks Islands are so called from a cactus which grows there of a shape resembling a Turk's head. The products of these islands are salt, cave earth, sponges, and the pink pearl. The oldest industry was salt-raking. (3) The Morant Cays and Islands are 36 miles from Morant Point to the south-east.1
1 For facts and figures see Appendix I. Section A.
8 British Colonisation
BARBADOS.
Barbados, situated in lat. 13° 4' N. and long. 59° 37' W., is the most easterly of all the Caribbean islands, the island of St. Vincent lying 78 miles to the west. In shape it resembles a shoulder of mutton. Its size is about that of the Isle of Wight, being 21 miles long and 14 J miles broad. It has been, and still is, the most thickly populated of the West Indian islands, emigration from its shores being almost a necessity. In 1674 the population was reckoned at 150,000, of whom 50,000 were white; in 1786 the white population numbered 16,167, and the blacks 62,953 ; in 1832 the slave population was 81,500, the white under 13,000; in 1891 the population was 182,322, being 1098 to the square mile. It is easy to understand, therefore, that Barbados has been a centre whence emigration has taken place to other islands on a large scale. It has already been noticed that Barbadian colonists crossed over to Jamaica. The name of the island was one of ill omen to those many victims of Cromwell's high-handed Trans- portation Acts. To be transported to the plantations, and especially to Barbados, for offences against the law or the Government, was a very common process. The wretched prisoners who were seized at Exeter and Silchester on pretence of the Salisbury rising were hurried away to Plymouth, thence shipped to Barbados, and sold as the goods and chattels of their masters. Their sufferings were plaintively described in a pamphlet called England's Slavery ; or, Barbadoz Merchan- dise^ published in 1659.
The island is said to have been so named from the bearded vines growing on its shores, which hang down and strike root in the earth. It was discovered by the Portuguese, and nomi- nally taken possession of by the captain of the English ship Olive Blossom, who raised a cross in honour of the occasion, and left in 1605 the following inscription: 'James, King of England and of this Island.' With Newfoundland Barbados has sometimes disputed the title of being the oldest of all
The West Indies g
British colonies. From the date of occupation it has main- tained its title, without a single interruption, of being a British colony, although just before Rodney's crowning victory an invasion of the French seemed imminent, and colonial levies mustered in haste from all quarters. It was at this island that the immortal Nelson arrived in June 1805 during his search for the fleets of France and Spain, four months before the victory at Trafalgar ; and a statue to his honour stands in Trafalgar Square, at Bridgetown, as 'the preserver of the British West Indies in a moment of unexampled peril.'
After the discovery of the island by the British, King James granted a charter to the Earl of Marlborough, then Lord Leigh, giving him the proprietorship of the island; and under this charter Sir W. Courteen, a British subject of Dutch extraction, sent out a venture in 1625. The following year the William and John brought out thirty emigrants — the first of those numerous bands of British colonists who seemed resolved to colonise and cultivate Barbados and make it a bond fide settlement. It was here that the sugar-cane was first grown and cultivated, and Barbados sugar became well known. In one of the numbers of the Spectator it is observed that * the fruits of Portugal are corrected by the products of Barbados, and the infusion of a China plant is sweetened by the pith of an Indian cane.' It may be remarked here that tea and sugar, associated in our minds with most peaceful recreation and most homely entertainment — that of the cup that cheers but does not inebriate — have been the cause of most disastrous events and most calamitous policies in the annals of the British colonial empire. A tea-chest was at the bottom of the Ameri- can revolt, and sugar was the proximate cause of slavery, cruelty, and a vast monopoly — to be undone, truly enough, by national repentance, but bringing extraordinary consequences in its wake. Free Trade seemed to turn upon sugar questions, and sugar bounties are still a bone of contention between nations.
In the seventeenth century, and indeed at all times,
io British Colonisation
Barbados was noted for its loyalty, and became the refuge of many Loyalists, who defended themselves against Cromwell. After the Commonwealth, Charles n. conferred the dignity of knighthood upon thirteen gentlemen of Barbados as a reward for their attachment to the Royalist cause. Prince Rupert had made the West Indies a refuge, and Prince Rupert's Bay in Dominica still indicates this fact. It was with the double object of punishing the Loyalists in Barbados and also of crippling the power of Holland that the well-known Navigation Laws of 1650 were passed by the Long Parliament, by which the ships of any foreign nation were prohibited from trading with any of the English plantations without a licence from the Council of State. Against these laws the Barbadians issued a manifesto, and secretly evaded the provisions, whilst they were obliged openly to recognise them. After the restoration of Charles IL, however, they were revised, amplified, and enforced with a stringency which precluded the colonies effectually from all intercourse with foreign nations. The Barbadians were naturally surprised and hurt at this somewhat unexpected con- firmation by Charles n. of the Protector's policy. They com- plained that they would be ruined by the double monopoly of import and export claimed by the Mother-country.1
The prosperity of Barbados was also affected by an Act passed in September 1663, which gave an export duty of 4^ per cent, of all dead commodities of the island to the King and his heirs and successors for ever. This tax continued until 1838, when it was repealed and an end put to a long-standing grievance. It was calculated that in the period during which the duty was leviable no less than six millions had been paid by the planters — a sum three times the fee-simple value of theii lands.
Barbados is famed for the Codrington College, founded by General Christopher Codrington, who bequeathed two estates, Consetts and Codrington, consisting of 763 acres, three wind- mills, sugar-buildings, 315 negroes, and 100 head of cattle, to 1 See Foyer's History of the Barbados, 1808.
The West Indies 11
the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel. General Cod- rington was descended from an ancient family which had fought on the King's side in the Civil War, and had afterwards settled at Barbados. He was born at Barbados, and was sent to Oxford to be educated, where he became a Fellow of All Souls. He entered the army, and served both in the West Indies and at the siege of Namur. He died at Barbados in 1710, and his remains were disinterred and carried to England, finding a resting-place in the Chapel of All Souls. Codring- ton College is still an active power for good, being affiliated to the Durham University, and sending from time to time many students of divinity. The first Principal of Codrington College was the Rev. T. H. Pinder, who, previous to slave emancipation, had done his best to make the life of the West Indian negro more endurable. He was appointed to the post by Bishop Coleridge, the first Bishop of Barbados (1824), a prelate who may be said to have occupied in the West Indies a somewhat similar position, as missionary Bishop, to that of Bishop Gray in South Africa and of Bishop Patteson in the Pacific. Mr. Pinder was well-known afterwards for his work in the diocese of Bath and Wells.
Throughout its history Barbados has been able to point to martial exploits, and to timely assistance given often against the enemies of England. When Jamaica was taken in 1655 the island sent an auxiliary force of 3500 volunteers ; in 1689 Barbadian troops assisted to recover St. Kitts from France, and in 1603 helped to foil French designs upon Martinique. In 1762 they raised a regiment for the British expedition which captured Martinique. Just as in Canada, along the valley of the St. Lawrence, off the coasts of Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, and Newfoundland, England was assisted in her mortal struggle with France by her New England and Canadian colonists, so in the Caribbean Seas she received great help from the stalwart and loyal Englishmen who made their homes and settlements there.1
1 For facts and figures see Appendix I. Section B.
12 British Colonisation
TRINIDAD.
Trinidad has been often described from the day of its first discovery to the present. Columbus, who approached the eastern extremity of the island, and gave it the name of Punta de la Galera from its resemblance to a galley under sail, wrote with enthusiasm of the ' softness and purity of the climate, the verdure, sweetness, and freshness of the country equalling the delights of early spring in the province of Valentia in Spain.' He named the narrow strait on the south-west, between Point Icacos and the mainland, the ' Serpent's Mouth,' which seemed to flow ' with as much fury as the Guadalquivir swoln by floods ' ; and to the strait that separates the north-west corner of Trinidad from the long promontory of Venezuela he gave the name of the 'Dragon's Mouth.' This long promontory Columbus, thinking it was an island, called Isla da Gracia.
Trinidad was also visited by Sir Walter Ralegh in 1595 on his first Guiana expedition, who found the Spaniards cultivat- ing the tobacco-plant and sugar-cane. Hearing of the cruelties of the Spaniards, he attacked and took the town of St. Joseph, where he found five Indian caciques or chiefs bound to one chain and subjected to terrible torture. Ralegh took captive the Spanish Governor, de Berreo by name, from whom he heard many rumours of the fabled El Dorado on the continent. More than twenty years afterwards (1617-18) Sir Walter was again at Tierra de Brea in Trinidad, on that last and well- known search for the Guiana El Dorado. Captain Lawrence Keymis, in company with Sir Walter's young and gallant son, was sent up the Orinoco, whilst the Admiral himself remained on the island. The sequel of this expedition is well known. Sir Walter's son was killed fighting against the Spaniards, 'dying as a soldier of England ought to die,' to use the words of his grief-stricken parent, written to Lady Ralegh ; and Keymis, failing to discover the Guiana mine, destroyed himself after rejoining Sir W. Ralegh at Trinidad.
Young Ralegh was a friend of Ben Jonson, and a humorous
The West Indies 1 3
story is told of his wheeling 'rare Ben' into his father's presence in a wheelbarrow after the sage had partaken too freely of a good vintage of Canary wine. In his Every Man in his Humour Ben Jonson eulogises Trinidad tobacco as ' your right Trinidado,' and it is possible that the sage had the opportunity of knowing the good qualities of this tobacco through the Raleghs.
The island has been alluded to by the celebrated Alexander von Humboldt, and described by Canon Kingsley, and more recently by Lady Brassey. In the well-known cruise of the Royal Princes in the Bacchante, which entered the Gulf of Paria through one of the Dragon's Mouths, mention is made of the green hills of Trinidad. The Princes left their name to Princes' Town in the island. For poetical description of Trinidad climate and scenery there is nothing to equal the writings of Canon Kingsley in his At Last. Kingsley passed the Christmas of 1869 in Port of Spain, and lived in 'The Cottage,' close to the Botanical Gardens. Until recently the room in which the great novelist wrote and the gallery where he smoked his pipe were shown to visitors. Kingsley 's cane- brake and the ' great arches of the bamboo clumps ' are also show-places.
The whole island is full of tropical marvels, both indigenous and imported. The bread-fruit, the jujube, the mango, cinnamon, cloves, nutmegs, the loquat tree, the eucalyptus, cinchona, rubber-trees, and even sugar and coffee, are all strangers, but they thrive wonderfully in Trinidad. The climate is described as intertropical tempered by insular influences, and according to Dr. de Verteuil, the best-known authority on Trinidad, healthy for Europeans. In the midst of so much that is beautiful and strange there are three objects of surpassing interest : — ( i ) the cascade of Maraccas, which has a fall of 340 feet; (2) the forest trees and the wonderful trailing parasites and orchids ; (3) the Pitch Lake, 99 acres in extent, the greatest curiosity of all.
When Trinidad was first discovered by the Spaniards it was
14 British Colonisation
thickly peopled by West Indian aborigines; but with their usual cruelty the Spaniards depopulated the island either by murdering them or transporting them to the Hispaniola mines. In 1783 the population was only 2763, and the ground was thus clear for imported slave labour. In 1831 there were 41,675 souls, of whom 21,302 were slaves. There were also a few Chinese labourers, who were first introduced in I8I6.1 In 1888 the population of the island was calculated to be 189,566, giving 1 08 to the square mile. The East Indian population is a remarkable feature in this island, there being in 1 88 1 no fewer than 49,000. They are imported at the rate of 2000 a year. The character of the population is very mixed ; the white inhabitants, of whom there are more than is usual in a West Indian settlement, comprising descendants of French and Corsican families, English and Scotch settlers, and many immigrants from the neighbouring territory of Venezuela.
In point of size Trinidad comes next to Jamaica ; but its historical record is far less interesting to us, although, perhaps, more simple. In 1802, the date of the formal acquisition, the new regime was about to commence in the West Indies, and the question of free labour was faced under less embarrassing circumstances than in Jamaica, where slave traditions were strong. Perhaps the most pressing problem in Trinidad is its development in all branches by means of Asiatic coolies, who in Natal and elsewhere are gradually supplanting the less industrious and thrifty African.2
TOBAGO.
Together with Trinidad must be considered Tobago, a small island nineteen miles north-east of Trinidad, and supposed by some to have been the original Robinson Crusoe's island — an honour usually accorded to Juan Fernandez, no leagues off
1 Martin's History of the British Colonies, vol. ii. p. 246.
2 For facts and figures see Appendix I. Section C.
The West Indies 1 5
the coast of Chili. It was first discovered by Columbus in 1498; but the British landed there in 1580, and in 1608 James i. claimed the sovereignty over it. Together with Trinidad, Barbuda, and Fonseca it formed part of a grant to the Earl of Montgomery in 1628. The island was not occu- pied, however, and twice the Dutch endeavoured to colonise it, calling it New Walcheren. It remained for many years a kind of debatable ground for Dutch, French, and English colonists, and was declared neutral in 1748 by the Treaty of Aix-la- Chapelle. In the wars between England and France the island was captured and recaptured more than once, until in 1814 it became part of the British Empire. The trade of this island has dwindled down considerably of late years, and the cotton and indigo industries, for which it was once famed, have disappeared. The island was described a hundred years ago (1792) by Sir W. Young, and from his account the little colony must have presented a more prosperous appearance than of late years.1
BRITISH GUIANA.
The name of Guiana, or ' the Wild Coast,' is given to that part of the South American continent lying between 8° 40' N. latitude and 3° 30' S. latitude, and between the fiftieth and sixty-eighth degrees of W. longitude. It is shared by several nationalities, and is divided into (i) British Guiana, (2) Venezuelan Guiana, (3) Dutch Guiana, (4) French Guiana or Cayenne, (5) Brazilian Guiana. British Guiana is there- fore a tract of the South American continent, and the portion now occupied by England was originally colonised by the Netherlands. Broadly speaking, there are two eras of British colonisation in Guiana, the first beginning with the romantic enterprises of Sir Walter Ralegh in 1595, and ending with an evacuation of that part of it known as Surinam in 1694. The second era, lasting to the present day, begins in 1795, when 1 For facts and figures see Appendix I. Section D.
1 6 British Colonisation
war broke out between England and Holland, then a depen- dency of France, and England gained Essequibo, Demerara, and Berbice.
Sir W. Ralegh took up the task of Guiana colonisation in 1595, and Sir ^Robert Cecil participated in the enterprise by contributing to the outfit. Somewhere in this part of South America it was believed that a people and city existed of fabulous wealth. ' The very boxes and troughs were of gold and silver, and billets of gold lay about as if they were logs of wood laid out to burn.' This fabled city was called El Dorado, although the Spaniards applied the term not to a city but a king, of whom the Indians had said that he was wont on certain solemn occasions to anoint his body with turpentine and then roll himself in gold dust.1 In this state El Dorado entered a canoe and proceeded to bathe in a lake. This strange story had a fascination for European adventurers of those days, who constantly went in search of the king and the lake. As early as 1530 a body of 200 Spaniards, setting out from Coro, on the coast of Venezuela, went in search of the city. Between 1530 and 1560 seven or eight distinct expeditions had been despatched from the neighbouring Spanish settlements, one of which was commanded by Gonzalo Pizarro, a brother of the conqueror of Peru.
Sir Walter Ralegh has left descriptions of the navigation of the Orinoco, that 'labyrinth of rivers' — noticed afterwards by the great Humboldt — and the multitude of islands, each island ' so bordered with high trees as no man could see any further than the breadth of the river or length of the branch.' Pre- sently they caught a glimpse of the inland champaign country, ' where the plains were twenty miles in length, the grass soft, short, and green,' and where the deer came down feeding to the water's edge, 'as if they had been used to a keeper's call.' They explored the Orinoco for a distance of 400 miles from the Gulf of Paria, and still the golden vision of El Dorado, or the 'great city of Manoa,' seemed ever to recede from before 1 Edwards's Life of Ralegh, vol. i. p. 164.
The West Indies 17
them. The ships' crews toiled incredibly hard — the officers and gentlemen labouring at the oars equally with the seamen — living how they could on edible birds and the store of fruit. The variety of trees and flowers was such, we are told, as to make ten volumes of herbals.
Ralegh reached a point on the Orinoco near the junction with the Cayuni River, placed by Humboldt at latitude 8° 8' N. The Orinoco is a vast river, with a drainage of 270,000 square miles. It receives into its waters 436 rivers and more than 2000 smaller streams. Sir Walter Scott, speaking of the conflict of Marston Moor, writes : —
' The battle's rage
Was like the strife which currents wage, Where Orinoco, in his pride, Rolls to the main no tribute tide, But 'gainst broad ocean urges far A rival sea of roaring war ; While, in ten thousand eddies driven, The billows fling their foam to heaven, And the pale pilot seeks in vain, Where rolls the river, where the main.'
The scenery of British Guiana has been described since the days of Sir Walter Ralegh by many able writers. Humboldt has spoken of its wonderful river system. Schomburgk, who visited the country in 1837-1840, has described its gigantic trees, strange parasitic lianas, clusters of palm-trees, magnifi- cent flora, its brilliant foliage, rare birds, and thousands of phosphorescent insects, and all the wonders of a tropical night. Mr. im Thurn has told of the famous Kaieteur Falls on the Potaro River and the glories of the lonely Roraima Mountain, with its ' sheer wall of red rock,' deemed to be inaccessible until he scaled it. Dr. Hancock, the Rev. W. H. Brett, and Mr. Trollope have all recorded their impressions of this tropical colony and its inhabitants, linked so inseparably in the past with the first projects of British colonisation.
Of British Guiana Mr. Washington Eves has written : —
B
1 8 British Colonisation
' British Guiana, therefore, in its history so much mixed up with the Dutch ; in its one dominant industry ; in the coolie immigration by which alone it has resuscitated and maintained that industry ; in its constant endeavour to keep out the sea ; in its human relics of the old Caribbean Indians (formerly, perhaps, kings, but now hewers of wood and drawers of water, and small customers of shops) ; in its large unknown interior as contrasted with the cultivated land behind its sea-wall ; in its artificial dykes and dams and trenches ; ... in all these things it makes up a very varied and interesting whole.'1
BRITISH HONDURAS.
Honduras, so named from a Spanish term meaning depth, and the only continental possession of Great Britain in Central America, lies to the east of Guatemala and to the south of Mexico. Adventurers from Jamaica came here to cut wood in 1638, amongst them the well-known Dampier ; and for many years the colony was considered as a kind of dependency of Jamaica. Not until 1862 did the country become a separate British colony. The Honduras settlers were called 'Bay men,' and upheld their occupancy of the country against the attacks of the Spaniards, whose last attack upon them was made in 1798. Sometimes the settlers turned the tables upon the Spaniards, and in 1678 took possession of the town of Cam- peche, on the west coast of Yucatan. To the present day there is some part of the country still unexplored toward the Guatemala boundary and westward of the Cockscomb Peak, which has an elevation of 4000 feet. For many years mahogany and logwood have been the products of the colony, the mahogany-tree growing in vast forests along the mountain sides ; but the greater part of the colony is scarcely utilised by Great Britain. The colony lies between 16° and 18° N., with a hot and moist climate, averaging 80° to 82° Fahr.
The Mosquito Shore is a tract of country described by 1 -For facts and figures see Appendix I. Section E.
The West Indies 1 9
Martin x as extending from Cape Gracios a Dios southerly to Punta Gorda and St. Juan's River. The Mosquito Indians have always been celebrated for their successful opposition to the Spaniards and their friendship with the British. In 1847 Lord Palmerston laid down that the King of the Mosquito Indians was under the protection of the British Crown. In the early accounts of colonisation and adventure in Central America the Bay of Honduras and the Mosquito Shore figure somewhat prominently.
In later years the interest taken in them has somewhat waned, so many other and more attractive portions of the world having been thrown open to British and European enterprise. Montgomery Martin maintained in 1830 that England had never realised the value of the colony, both in respect to its timber supplies, cotton, and all the variety of tropical products.2
1 British Colonies, vol. ii. p. 399.
2 For facts and figures see Appendix I. Section F.
CHAPTER II
THE LEEWARD ISLANDS
THE Leeward Islands belong partly to France, as Mar- tinique, Guadeloupe, and St. Bartholomew ; partly to Holland, as St. Eustatius, Saba, and a portion of St. Martin's Bay ; partly to Denmark, as Santa Cruz and St. Thomas. The rest belong to Great Britain, and are Antigua, Barbuda, St. Kitts, Nevis, Anguilla, Dominica, Montserrat, and the Virgin Islands. Politically the Leeward Islands form a confederacy with five presidencies : (i) Antigua with Barbuda and Redonda, (2) Dominica, (3) Montserrat, (4) St. Kitts with Nevis and Anguilla, (5) the Virgin Islands. These islands are small and dotted at intervals on the surface of the sea, extending in a circular line from Porto Rico to Trinidad ; the detached settlement of Barbados, as already mentioned, lying about fifty miles out of the line to the eastward. They are known as the Lesser Antilles.
The more southerly of this long chain of islands are de- scribed as the Windward Islands, whilst the more northerly are known as the Leeward Islands — a description not exactly correct from a geographer's point of view. The trade-wind of these latitudes blows from the north-east, and consequently the more northerly of the islands are more to the windward than the southern islands. The old geographers maintained that the true Leeward Islands were the Greater Antilles, viz. Porto Rico, Hayti, Cuba, and Jamaica. But as the present nomenclature has stood for so many years, it must be accepted. It was in 1671 that the colony of the Leeward Islands was separated
20
The West Indies 21
from Barbados, the seat of government up to that time, and from the Windward Islands. Nevis first of all, and then Antigua, became the administrative centre of the Leewards.
Nearly all the Leewards were discovered by the Spaniards, and Columbus gave a name to Dominica, because it was first seen on a Sunday ; to Montserrat, after a mountain in Spain ; to Redonda, from its round shape ; to Antigua, in comme- moration of the Church of Santa Maria la Antigua in Seville ; to Anguilla, from its resemblance to a snake ; to the numerous Virgin Islands, after the legend of St. Ursula and the 11,000 virgins ; to Nevis, from the mountain of Nieves in Spain ; St. Kitts, contracted from St. Christopher, took its name from the great Christopher Columbus himself. The honours of discovery, therefore, lie very clearly with the Spaniards ; but, attracted probably by the prospects of the Greater Antilles, they left the Lesser Antilles unoccupied.
The Leeward Islands lie somewhat out of the line of the main ocean routes, and are consequently not so often visited and described as other West Indian islands. Canon Kingsley passed them by altogether, and Mr. Froude visited only one of them, viz. Dominica. A more recent traveller, Mr. Morris, has thus spoken of them : * They are literally " green islands of glittering seas," bathed in continuous sunlight, and fanned by cooling breezes. . . . There are the forest-clad mountains and valleys of Dominica ; the highly cultivated slopes of St. Kitts ; the more sober, but not less interesting, undulating sugar-cane fields of Antigua ; and the lime and orange groves of Montserrat. All these constitute a picture of tropical wealth and beauty almost unknown to the people of this country.' 1
Some of these islands are volcanic, viz. Dominica, Mont- serrat, St. Kitts, and Nevis, and from their centres cone- shaped mountains rise sometimes to the height of 3000 to 5000 feet above the level of the sea, their sides being deeply scored out into rugged channels and ravines, whilst their 1 Proceedings of the Royal Colonial Institute, vol. xxii. p. 227.
22 British Colonisation
crowns are hidden, day and night, by soft, fleecy masses of clouds. Such is the wealth and profusion of the tropics, that down to the very edge of the sea the shores are covered with a mass of vegetation. The non-volcanic islands are low, and, with the exception of Antigua and Tortola, devoid of hills.
DOMINICA.
Of all the Leeward Islands Dominica is the most beautiful, and, if we take the Leewards from south to north, it is the first to be described. In this island the native Caribs were more numerous than in any other island excepting St. Vincent. In 1640 Aubert, the French Governor of Guadeloupe, con- ciliated the Caribs by kindness, and in 1660 'a peace was signed at Guadeloupe between English, French, and Caribs, by which the natives were secured from European interference in St. Vincent and Dominica.' Subsequently the French appear to have taken a great interest in the island, and in 1778 a French force from Martinique attacked and captured the island ; but after Rodney's great victory Dominica was restored to England.
It was off Dominica that Rodney, known afterwards as Baron Rodney of Stoke, Somersetshire, in company with Sir Samuel Hood, another Somersetshire celebrity, defeated the French admiral de Grasse on that memorable April day in 1782. It has been said that on this occasion the salvation of the West Indies and Jamaica, with the whole hope and fortune of the war, depended upon the ability of the English admirals to prevent the junction of de Grasse's fleet with the French and Spanish fleets at Hispaniola. The scene of action lay in the large basin between the islands of Guadeloupe, Dominica, Saintes, and Mariegalante, bounded on the leeward and westward by dangerous shores. The battle began at seven o'clock, and lasted the whole of April 12. Just as the sun was sinking, Sir Samuel Hood ranged along- side of the celebrated Ville de Paris, the French admiral's ship,
The West Indies 23
and poured in a volley that killed sixty men outright. This was repeated, and at last the French admiral, with only three men left unhurt — himself being one of the three — surrendered his sword to Sir Samuel Hood. This was one of the most decisive as well as one of the bloodiest sea-fights ever fought between French and British. It came at a most opportune time, and was a splendid victory to set against the surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown, in October 1791, the year before.
MONTSERRAT.
The island of Montserrat is small, being only eleven miles in length and seven in breadth, and lies north of the French colony of Guadeloupe — a proximity from which it has some- what suffered in former days — and is 1 2 7 miles from Antigua. This Presidency does not present so diversified a record as some of the others, although it has experienced a change of masters more than once. Colonised in the first instance by Sir Thomas Warner in 1632, it had to surrender to the French in 1664, who levied heavy imposts on the islanders. It was restored to England in 1668, and continued in her possession for more than a hundred years. In 1782 it had again to surrender to the French, but Rodney's crowning victory here, as elsewhere, turned the scale permanently in favour of England, so that since 1783, by the Peace of Versailles, Montserrat has continued to be an English colony.
It should be remarked that in the beginning Montserrat was settled largely by Irish Roman Catholics, and England's enemies found in these malcontents sympathy and assistance on more than one occasion ; just as in the Bahamas, in 1661, the Irish were found leagued with the negroes in a contemplated rising. Indeed, on many of the West Indian Islands the Irish element, consisting originally of political prisoners and convicts, was found to be a source of danger to English rule.
In Montserrat it is said that to this day the negroes have inherited the Irish brogue ; and a story is told of a Connaught
24 British Colonisation
emigrant who, on arriving at the island, was hailed in broad Connaught brogue by a negro from one of the boats that came alongside. * Thunder and turf ! ' exclaimed the new-comer, ' how long have you been here ? J * Three months,' the black man answered. ' Three months ! ' ejaculated the Irishman ; ' and so black already ! By the powers ! I'll not stay among ye ! ' and so the visitor returned, it is said, to his native land.
In the eighteenth century Montserrat rilled up quickly, so that by 1729 there were said to be 7000 inhabitants, of whom 5600 were negroes. Like the rest of the West Indies, it has felt the usual depression of trade, and as far as wealth is concerned has sunk from its high estate. Still, most of the ground there cultivated is devoted even now to the sugar-cane. The limes, however, have given an impulse to Montserrat trade.
The lime-plantations cover about 1000 acres, and great skill has been employed in bringing this industry to its perfection. There are exported both fresh and pickled limes, raw lime- juice, concentrated lime-juice, essence of limes (prepared by a process known as ecuelling, from the rind of the lime), and oil of limes, prepared by distillation.1 This industry has been promoted by the Montserrat Company.
The island is noted for its negro peasantry, who are small freeholders and gardeners, living in cottages that are well kept and surrounded by fertile garden-lots. These small freeholders number 1200, and constitute a most orderly element in the island society who, under the benign influences of British rule, have risen from the status of labourers to that of owners and cultivators on a small scale.
ANTIGUA.
Antigua, like Dominica, was long a disputed possession between England and France, and its growth was somewhat later than that of St. Kitts or Nevis. In 1640, when the population of St. Kitts was 12,000 or 13,000, that of Antigua was only
1 Proceedings of the Royal Colonial Institute, vol. xxii. p. 242.
The West Indies 25
thirty families. In 1663 Charles n. made a grant of the island to Lord Willoughby, who sent out a large number of colonists, the town of Parham denoting this immigration period. In 1666 the French took possession of it, but the following year Lord Willoughby retook it, and the report he gave of the island, troubled as it was by wars and disasters, was very favourable. It was described as 'the most proper island in the Indies for cattle, horses, and sheep,7 with harbours ' incom- parably safe.'
Amongst his followers was Major Willian Byam, a well-known Royalist, and of Somersetshire extraction, whose uncle was chaplain to Charles IL, and his intimate friend in adversity. Major Byam had been chosen Lieutenant-Governor by the Council and Assembly of the settlement at Paramaribo, in Surinam, for many years ; and a nominee of Cromwell, being sent out to supersede him, withdrew when he discovered that the colonists were determined to obey Major Byam and no other.
The sugar-cane was introduced into Antigua by Colonel Codrington, who settled on the island from Barbados in 1674. Barbuda, the appanage of Antigua, was the property of the Codrington family. The inhabitants of Antigua were the first who, by means of legislation, endeavoured to ameliorate the evils of slavery. Owing to the elevation of the land and the absence of deep woods, the climate of Antigua, unlike Jamaica and Dominica, is dry. The scenery of this island has been described by Dr. Coleridge : —
'Antigua/ he writes, 'on a larger scale, is formed like Anguilla — that is, without any central eminences, but for the most part ramparted around by very magnificent cliffs.' The whole island, which is of a rough circular shape, lies in sight. The shores are indented in every direction with creeks and bays and coves.
26 British Colonisation
ST. CHRISTOPHER (ST. KITTS) AND NEVIS.
Together with St. Kitts and Nevis must be included the island of Anguilla, so named from its snake-like shape, which is about sixty miles distant. In St. Kitts the English made their first settlement in the West Indies, the first emigrants being fourteen Londoners under Sir Thomas Warner ; and on this island it would appear that the French and English lived amicably together, the upper portion, called Capisterre, being allocated to the French, and the lower portion, called Basse- terre, falling to the English. Quarrels, however, soon arose, and the island passed through the ordeals of internal discord and invasion from without. The mastery of the island lay with the French in 1689, who were aided by the Irish rebels ; but in 1690 the island was retaken by Codrington with the aid of troops from Barbados, and the tables were turned upon the French settlers, many of whom were banished, until, in 1697, the French regained their share of the island by the terms of the Peace of Ryswick. More discord followed upon this, until 1713, when, by the Treaty of Utrecht, an end was finally put to the dual partnership, and England reigned supreme in St. Kitts.
The French inhabitants migrated to St. Domingo, and the Government received a large sum of money by the sale of Crown lands, of which ^40,000 went as a dowry to a daughter of George u. In 1722 a terrible hurricane swept over the island and destroyed ^500,000 of property. In 1729 the population had grown to more than 18,000, of whom 14,000 were negroes. In 1782 the French, under the Marquis de Bouille and Count de Grasse, took the island ; but by the Treaty of Versailles it was restored to England.
St. Kitts was the birth-place of Christophe, first a slave, and ultimately the Emperor of Hayti. In earlier times it was the residence of Dr. Grainger, an army surgeon, who became a friend of Dr. Johnson. He was the author of a kind of Georgic on the sugar industry of the island, called The Sugar-
The West Indies 27
Cane. Dr. Johnson, according to Boswell, approved of Dr. Grainger, and thought he was a man who would do any good in his power ; but his Sugar-Cane did not please him ; for what, he exclaimed, could he make of a sugar-cane ? He might as well write The Parsley Bed: a Poem. It must be confessed that Grainger's paragraph beginning 'Now, Muse, let's sing of rats/ which was afterwards paraphrased :
' Nor with less waste the whisker'd vermin race, A countless clan, despoil the lowland cane,'
was sufficient to excite ridicule. However, Dr. Grainger, when he wrote this couplet on the black labourers —
' Servants, not slaves : of choice and not compelled The blacks should cultivate the cane-land isles ' —
proved that at this date (1764) he was living before his time.
NEVIS.
The first colonisation of Nevis was English (1628), and, together with the rest of the Leeward Islands, it was included in the Carlisle grant. It lies to the south-east of St. Kitts, and is separated from it by a narrow strait about two miles wide. Like the rest of the Caribbee islands, it was subject to French in- vasion, and in 1666 defended itself successfully against a French fleet. It became a place of refuge and of considerable import- ance. In 1671 it is described as the most considerable of the Leeward Islands, and the centre of the sugar trade in the group.
Nevis was known as ' the mother of the English Charibbee islands,' and the Governor of Nevis held a dormant commission as Governor- in-Chief of the Leeward Islands, and 'pirates were tried at Nevis only, as being deemed the mother-island.' It was also a slave-mart, like Kingston in Jamaica.1
The island is described as almost circular in outline, and, like many of the West Indian volcanic islands, consisting of a
1 Proceedings of the Royal Colonial Institute, vol. xxii. p. 247.
28 British Colonisation
platform more or less wide leading up to the slopes of a crater peak whose head is in the clouds.
Nevis is celebrated as the birth-place of Alexander Hamilton, who became famous in the annals of the United States as a writer to The Federalist and a framer in company with others of the American Constitution. He was an orphan and poor, but, fretting at the condition of a clerk, came to New York in 1773. In the American War Hamilton's opinions were first on the side of the British, but he soon changed to the other side.1 It may be noticed, also, that it was at Nevis that the great Nelson married ' the widow Nisbet,' a widow of a doctor ; and in one of the parish churches may be seen the entry of the marriage, at which William, Duke of Clarence, afterwards King William the Fourth, was best man.
ANGUILLA.
Anguilla, the third constituency of St. Kitts-Nevis, lies about fifty or sixty miles to the north-west of St. Kitts. It was dis- covered and appropriated by the English in 1650, who found it uninhabited. In 1668 it was reported by Lord Willoughby to be of little value, with a population of 200 to 300, mainly refugees. It was subject to occasional attacks from the French, and its peace was disturbed in 1796 by Victor Hugues, a partisan of Robespierre, who crossed over to the West Indies and endeavoured to spread in these islands the doctrines of the French Republic. Of the Anguilla colonists Mr. Eves has written : ' The islanders have always displayed the true insular qualities of bravery and independence. If they were only 100 strong they would meet 1000 of their foes with light hearts and good courage. The colonists were men as well as tillers of the soil. They had their virtues, passions, ambitions, fears and hopes ; and, living on this little island, they tried to conduct their affairs with propriety and success, remained steadfast to the British flag, and behaved 1 Bancroft's History of the United States, vol. iv.
The West Indies 29
themselves generally as good citizens. For all these things they lived and died unnoticed, their deeds unsung by poets.'
THE VIRGIN ISLANDS.
The last and most northerly of the Leeward Islands are the Virgin Islands, which consist of thirty to forty small scattered islands due east of Porto Rico. Some of the Virgin Islands belong to Spain, and one of them, viz. St. Thomas, to Denmark. The principal members of the English group are (i) Anegada, the inundated island; (2) Virgin Gorda ; (3) Tortola. Anegada is ' merely a low reef elevated a few feet above the level of the sea.' Tortola, so named from the sea-tortoise, is composed of hills, the highest of which rises to nearly 1600 feet. ' The surface is much broken up into ravines, and nearly the whole of it has been under cultivation in former years, chiefly in sugar. Virgin Gorda is also hilly — Virgin Gorda peak being 1370 feet high — but apparently less fertile than Tortola. Copper mines have been worked here, but at present they are not productive. The inhabitants of these islands are hardy and skilful seamen. The climate is cool and healthy. The great drawback to cultivation is the destruc- tive hurricanes that occasionally sweep over these islands.'1
To these must be added the little islands of Jost van Dyke discovered by the Dutch ; and Sombrero, so named by the Spaniards from its resemblance to a hat, and little more than a bare rock, forty feet high, valuable for phosphates.2
THE WINDWARD ISLANDS. GRENADA.
The islands of Grenada, the Grenadines, St. Vincent, and St. Lucia form officially the Windward Islands, the headquarters of government being at Grenada. The island was discovered
1 Proceedings of Royal Colonial Institute, vol. xxii. p. 248.
2 For facts and figures see Appendix I. Section G.
30 British Colonisation
by Columbus in 1498. It lies in the route of the trade- winds, which makes its climate pleasanter than that of the Gulf of Paria. The island of Carriacou is one of the Grena- dines and a dependency of Grenada. It is about nineteen miles in circumference, lying to the north of Grenada. Some of the other islets in the neighbourhood are included under the Grenadines, and are cultivated.
Grenada was inhabited originally by warlike Caribs, and was not occupied by Europeans until 1650, when the French Governor of Martinique, du Parquet, resolved to seize the island. The island was officially annexed to France in 1674. It remained in the possession of the French for nearly 100 years, when in 1762 it was taken by a British force, and finally ceded to Great Britain in 1763. This island, in common with many others, was. subject to the imposition of a 4^ per cent, duty upon its produce, payable to the King ; but the colonists objected to the impost, and in a well-known case before the King's Bench a decision was given in their favour by Lord Mansfield. As a sequel to this decision the duty had to be abandoned in Dominica, St. Vincent, and Grenada. In 1779 Grenada was retaken by the French, but in 1783, by the Versailles Treaty, was restored to England.
Grenada is an island where the sugar industry, has been almost entirely blighted of recent years. In the earlier years of this century (from 1821-1831) the sugar produced an amount ranging annually from 12,000 to 20,000 tons. In 1873 tm's nad dropped 10-3600 tons, in 1883 to 1840 tons, and in 1887 to less than 200 tons.1 In 1776 the exports of the island consisted of sugar, rum, coffee, cocoa, cotton, and indigo, amounting to the value of ^"600,000. The sugar was the produce of 106 plantations, worked by 18,293 slaves — a return said to be unequalled by any other island in the West Indies excepting St. Kitts.2
i The West Indies, by C. W. Eves, p. 208. - Martin's British Colonies, vol. ii. p. 283.
The West Indies 31
ST. LUCIA.
The island of St. Lucia, first discovered by the Spaniards on St. Lucia's Day, June 15, 1502, and first colonised by the French in 1635, ls tne m°st beautiful of the Windward Islands. No island, however, has felt the scourge of war and din of civil tumult more than this one. Seven times at least the English have placed their feet upon the land as conquerors or colonists. Twice it yielded to Admiral Rodney — once in 1762 and again in 1782 ; yet neither the Treaty of Paris nor the Peace of Versailles, following respectively upon these conquests, settled the question of dominion. Not until 1803 did the island finally pass into permanent British occupation by its capitulation to General Greenfield. No less than thrice has the island been given back to France ; and so when England gained it at last she gained a colony, to use Mr. Martin's words, 'with French population, language, and feelings.'
In 1789 St. Lucia was the scene of wild republican revolt. The tricolour was hoisted on Morne Fortune, the celebrated stronghold of the island; estates were abandoned by the negroes, who, stirred up by the appeals of the well-known incendiary Citoyen Victor Hugues, fought for the rights of man. At this time matters looked serious in the West Indies, and Sir John Moore, the hero of Corunna, had to cope with most crafty and implacable enemies, who concealed themselves in the fastnesses of the island and carried on bush-fighting until 1797. Sir John Moore was nearly cap- tured on one occasion as he was being rowed along the coast, and the arduous work impaired his health seriously.
It may be mentioned that during this island war the Duke of Kent, the father of Queen Victoria, succeeded in planting the English colours in 1794 upon Morne Fortune, although this act did not result then in permanent occupation.
But this guerilla warfare carried on during 1790-97, san- guinary as it was, does not equal in importance the great fight
32 British Colonisation
between Rodney and de Grasse in 1782. ' It was from a rock on Pigeon Island (an island on the extreme north of St. Lucia) that Rodney watched, through his glass, the move- ments of de Grasse's fleet as the stately ships came out of the harbour of Martinique. De Grasse was full of the anticipa- tions of victory. It was not for the possession of an island or two, but for a dominating influence in Europe, that the struggle was intended.'
St. Lucia is within 24 miles of Martinique, of which at one time it was a dependency, and 2 1 miles of St. Vincent. From a strategic point of view the island has many advantages, the harbour of Castries, the value of which attracted the eye of Rodney and many other British officers, being the best in the whole West Indies. Recently it has been chosen as the chief coaling-station for the fleet, and is being strongly fortified. It is the second naval station in these waters.
The island is noted for two remarkable rocks called Pitons, which guard the entrance to the Bay of Souffriere. One of them is said to be 3000 feet and the other 3300 feet high, both rising from the sea and tapering like church spires. A souffriere and boiling fountains are also amongst the sights of the island. Morne Fortune, the hill-fortress, 800 feet high, is perhaps the most interesting as it is the most historical spot in the island.
ST. VINCENT.
The island of St. Vincent, discovered by Columbus on the 22nd of January 1498, lies about 20 miles to the south-west of St. Lucia and 100 miles west of Barbados. Although the history of this settlement is not so diversified as that of St. Lucia, it has the unenviable distinction of having been swept (1780) by the fiercest hurricane ever known in the West Indies; also, of having been devastated by a most destructive volcanic eruption (1812). In the beginning it was found to be inhabited by the fiercest race of Caribs in the West Indies, who were a
The West Indies 3 3
great obstacle to European rule. St. Vincent was peculiar in having a native question quite as embarrassing in its small way as that of New Zealand, and only solved thoroughly when Sir Ralph Abercromby transported, in 1797, no less than 5000 Caribs to the island of Ruatan, in the Bay of Honduras, and peace followed upon solitude.
As if to make some small compensation for these vagaries of primitive man and these terrible inroads of Nature, the island of St. Vincent produces the best arrowroot in the West Indies.
The Souffriere is the natural wonder of the island, and is said to present the grandest sight in the West Indies. The crater is three miles in circumference and 500 feet in depth, and contains within it a conical hill beautifully streaked with sulphur and covered with shrubs and flowers. The approach towards !t passes through a richly covered country until the summit is reached, when the bleak signs of volcanic action are visible. 'A mighty cloud of vapour fills the crater to the brim, gradually clears off, and then the awful majesty of the scene is unfolded. The eastern top of the crater is about 3500 feet above the level of the sea; a cold mist commonly rests upon the surface of the green, slimy, and unfathomable water at the bottom.' l
THE BAHAMAS.
The Bahamas are a scattered group of islands and reefs extending from the northern coast of St. Domingo to the east coast of Florida, divided almost equally by the Tropic of Cancer. They lie in a crescent-shape over 600 miles of ocean from south-east to north-west. On the west is the remarkable Great Bahama Bank and the Straits of Florida. They are said to number 29 islands, 661 'cays' or flats, and 2387 rocks. The Turks and Caicos would seem to form part of this island group, but politically they belong to Jamaica, as already
1 For facts and figures see Appendix I. Section H. C
34 British Colonisation
shown. It was at one of the Bahamas, San Salvador or Watling Island, that Columbus made his landfall on that memorable day in October 1492, the scene of which is now being painted for the Chicago Exhibition by a well-known artist, Mr. Bierstadt. These islands were included in Sir H. Gilbert's charter, but no effective occupation took place. The island of New Providence became, at an early period of religious troubles in England, a refuge for many of the Non- conformists.1
Later on the Bahamas, together with the provinces of North and South Carolina, were entrusted to the same Anglican Bishop, and the connection between the islands and the main- land was always very close. In 1612 they were regarded as part of Virginia. It was not, however, until 1666 that any real attempt was made to colonise the group, and settlers arrived from the Bermudas. New Providence became in time a mere nest of pirates and wreckers, of whom Edward Teach, a Bristol man, was the most notorious in those days. These were finally suppressed by Captain Woodes Rogers, noted for his voyage round the world (1708-11), during which he rescued Alexander Selkirk from his desert Island. Rogers became Governor of the Bahamas.
At the time of the American War (1776) the islands were attacked and taken by Commodore Hopkins. The islands had become a refuge again for a different class of colonists, viz. fugitive Royalists from the States, who introduced cotton cultivation. Still later the group became the headquarters of many blockade-runners in the American Civil War, and many a daring deed of seamanship was done by British officers who ran the gauntlet from southern ports with their precious cargoes. Marryat has made the Bahamas figure largely in his romances of the sea, and no islands could be better adapted for his purpose.
First the precarious abode of Puritan exiles, then the narrow perch of wreckers and pirates, then the asylum of Royalist 1 Anderson's Hist, of the Colonial Church, vol, ii, p. 295,
The West Indies 35
refugees, then the headquarters of blockade-runners, the Bahamas have a thrilling record. More peaceful times appear to be in store for them. They are the market-gardens of the United States, sending thither cargoes of pineapples, oranges, and bananas ; and their sunny slopes afford a sanatorium for broken-down Americans, who find in the climate of the Bahamas those advantages which Europeans experience in Madeira and Tenerife.
With regard to the occupation of the inhabitants, fishing is carried on largely by a fleet of 100 boats employing 500 sailors. Sponge-fishing is a flourishing sea industry, no less than ^60,000 worth being exported annually. The latest development, however, is the cultivation of the sisal fibre plant, which is attracting a large number of capitalists and giving a new turn to the industries of the Bahamas.1
THE BERMUDAS.
With the West Indies it is customary to associate the Bermudas, although they lie far to the north. It was thirty years after the first discoveries of Columbus that these distant islands, lying 600 miles off the American continent, were sighted by Europeans. A Spanish captain, Bermudaz by name, chanced across them in mid-ocean and was wrecked. English ships strove to avoid them, as they were considered dangerous and inhospitable places. * The islands were reported to be the habitation of furies and monsters, whose enchant- ments evoked fierce hurricanes, and rolling thunders, and visions of most hideous aspect. Shakspeare, accordingly, did but avail himself of the prevalent belief in these wild stories, and make this department, as indeed every other, of the world of fiction or of reality tributary to his own genius, when in the play of The Tempest he introduces Ariel as able
"... to fly,
To swim, to dive into the fire, to ride
On the curl'd clouds,"
1 For facts and figures see Appendix I, Section I.
36 British Colonisation
and makes Ariel answer the question of Prospero by saying :
"... Safely in harbour
Is the king's ship, in the deep nook where once Thou call'dst me up at midnight to fetch dew From the still vext Bermoothes, there she 's hid." ' *
It was upon these islands that the vessel containing Gates, Somers, and Newport, the leaders of the Virginia expedition in 1609, was wrecked. These colonists were surprised to see that these islands were so fair, but, notwithstanding, they were in a terrible plight. First they fitted out the long-boat and sent her with six sailors and the master's mate to Virginia ; but nothing more was heard of them. They resolved, however, to build a ship out of the oak-beams and planks belonging to the wrecked vessel and of the cedar-trees which grew on the island — a task they effected with great labour.
With regard to the discipline preserved amongst the crew during their sojourn on the island, it is interesting to read that ' wee had daily euery Sunday two Sermons preached by our Minister, besides euery Morning and Evening at the ringing of a bell wee repayred all to publique Prayer, at what time the names of our whole Company were called by Bill, and such as were wanting were duly punished.' 2
The shipwrecked crew managed to escape to Virginia, leaving tokens behind them. * Before we quitted our" old quarter and dislodged to the fresh water with our pinnass, our Governor set up in Sir George Summers' garden a fair Mne- mosynon in figure of a Crosse, made of some of the timber of our ruined shippe, which was scrued in with strong and great trunnels to a mightie Cedar. In the midst of the Crosse our Gouernour fastened the picture of his Majestic in a piece of siluer of twelue pence, and on each side of the Crosse he set an inscription grauen in Copper in the Latin and English to this purpose : In memory of our great deliuerance, both from a mightie storm and leake ; we haue set this up in
1 Anderson's Hist* of the Colonial Church, vol i. p. 206.
2 Ibid. p. 209.
The West Indies 37
honour of God. It is the spoyle of our English ship (of three hundred tunne) called the Sea Venture, bound, with seven ships more (from which the storm divided us), to Virginia or Noua Britannia, in America.'
Such was the first landing of the British upon the Bermudas, and the group certainly seemed to deserve its ill name which it had inherited from the Spaniards, and which had been cor- roborated by Sir Walter Ralegh (1595) and Champlain (1600), the great French explorer, who had described it as ' a moun- tainous island which it is difficult to approach on account of the dangers that surround it.'
Somers returned to the Bermudas, and died there in the place which, in honour of his Christian name, is still called Georgetown. The islands were long called Somers Isles, after him. His heart was buried in the Bermudas, and a marble stone above it commemorates the fact that
' In the year 1611 Noble Sir George Summers went hence to heaven.'-
His body was embalmed and buried at Whitechurch in Dorset- shire; Sir George, as well as Gates, his companion, being a west-countryman.
The nephew of Somers was with him when he died, and upon his return to England gave such a flourishing account of the islands that 120 members of the Virginian Company were encouraged to plant a settlement there under the distinct name of 'The Somers Island Company,' and in 1612 Richard More, the first Governor, arrived there. This Governor, it is said, built the first church of timber; and when this was blown down he erected another, in a more sheltered place, of palmeto.1
The chronicles of the little island are quaint reading. In
one year there is a mention of five Irish sailors who, when
permitted to build a boat for fishing purposes, make their
escape to Ireland, having borrowed the minister's ' compasse
1 Anderson's Hist, of the Colonial Church, vol. i. p. 304.
38 British Colonisation
diall': writing to him afterwards that as 'he had oft persuaded them to patience, and that God would pay them, though none did, he must now be contented with the loss of his diall with his own doctrine.' It is said that their boat, when it reached Ireland, was preserved as a monument, * having sailed 3300 miles by a right line thorow the maine sea,' and that the escapees were ' honourably entertained by the Earl of Tomund.'
Another year we read of a plague of rats which had been imported in two ships, and multiplied so quickly that they threatened to destroy everything.
Again, in these fair islands there was the demon of religious discord, and the two clergymen in the islands refuse to subscribe to the Book of Common Prayer ; so the Governor, by way of compromise, ' bethought him of the Liturgy of Gernsey and Jersey, wherein all the particulars they so much stumbled at were omitted.'
As time went on it was thought that something great might come of the Somers Isles, and Lord Chancellor Bacon, enumerating the benefits and acts of King James (1620), observed : — * This kingdom, now first in His Majesty's times, hath gotten a lot or portion in the new world by the Plantation of Virginia and the Summer Islands. And certainly, it is with the kingdoms on earth as it is in the kingdom of heaven ; sometimes a grain of mustard-seed proves a great tree ; who can tell?'
In the time of the Civil Wars the Bermudas became a refuge for Loyalists, and the Long Parliament passed an Act pro- hibiting trade with Barbados, Antigua, and the Bermudas. The inhabitants have proved themselves to be skilful sailors, able to adventure, not only to the American coast, but far afield to the South Seas.
In England they became better appreciated, and the
' . . . isle so long unknown, And yet far kinder than our own, Safe from the storms and prelates' rage,'
appealed to the imagination of many English poets. Waller
The West Indies 39
and Andrew Marvell both conferred distinction upon them. Moore has sung :
' May Spring to eternity hallow the shade Where Ariel has warbled and Waller has strayed.'
At the beginning of the eighteenth century the Bermudas were best known as the contemplated scene of Bishop Berke- ley's missionary enterprises. These islands were to be a centre of light and teaching, and the great idealist seemed wholly carried away by his project ; as if here, indeed, to use Lord Bacon's expression, the mustard-seed of truth was to grow and flourish till it overspread the New World. Swift wrote thus of Berkeley and his scheme (1724) : — 'Berkeley is an absolute philosopher with regard to money, titles, and power, and for three years past has been struck with a notion of founding a University at Bermuda by a charter from the Crown. He has seduced most of the hopefullest young clergy- men and others here, many of them well provided for, and all in the fairest way for preferment ; but in England his conquests are greater, and, I doubt, will spread very far this winter. He most exorbitantly proposes a whole hundred pounds a year for himself, fifty pounds for a fellow, and ten for a student. His heart will break if his Deanery be not taken from him and left at your Excellency's disposal. I discouraged him by the coldness of Courts and Ministers, who will interpret all this as impossible and a vision; but nothing will do.'
We know that the philosopher's scheme was a failure, and that the 'St. Paul's College in Bermuda' never sprang into existence — no more than the city of Bermuda, for which Berkeley had made elegant designs from architectural models seen in Italy. But Berkeley got so far as to obtain George i.'s approval for the grant of ^20,000 from the purchase- money of the island of St. Christopher, ceded to England by the Treaty of Utrecht, as an endowment of the contemplated St. Paul's College ; and the whole scheme proves that at the beginning of the eighteenth century there were not wanting
40 British Colonisation
many Englishmen who were willing to volunteer their services abroad as teachers and pastors of the subject races. For North America was in the eighteenth century what Africa has been in the nineteenth century — the great field of missionary enterprise.1
These little islands, lying in the track of vessels going to and fro, were used as a basis for privateering; and in the American War Washington wished to gain possession of them to make them ' a nest of hornets ' for the annoyance of the British. But the Bermudas, standing in the ocean as the watch- tower of the continent, rose in importance as a strategic point. In 1794 Admiral Murray recommended the construction of a dockyard, and, Ireland Island being selected, the fortifications were begun in 1810. The natural position was strong, as the sunken coral reef, through which access can be gained only by a few narrow channels, would prove a formidable obstacle to an enemy. The Bermudas was the station whither Lord Durham wished to send the disaffected Canadians in 1838. There is little of interest in the history of the island since the commencement of the works which made it a naval depot and arsenal. In 1815 the town of Hamilton became the seat of government, and in 1834 the slave emancipation took effect in the island. Next to Gibraltar the Bermudas form the smallest dependency of Great Britain.2
GENERAL SUMMARY.
The history of the West Indies has been mainly the history of the fortunes of the British sugar-planter. Great and pro- sperous as they were at first, they have been gradually depreci- ated by a succession of legislative measures. From being the favoured protege of British commerce, State-aided and State- supported, the planter has almost become the persecuted
1 See Life of Bishop Berkeley, by Alexander Campbell Fraser, M.A., 1871.
2 For facts and figures see Appendix I. Section K.
The West Indies 41
victim of all nations and all policies. By the abolition of the slave trade in 1807, by the Emancipation Act of 1834, by the hard measure of equalisation — the unkindliest blow of all from the paternal hand — by the bounties of foreign States, violating the first principles of Free Trade, he has been brought low. We cannot but pity the hard estate of this struggling capitalist, who after all inherited, and did not inaugurate, the curse of slavery. A countervailing duty at English ports is the crumb of consolation he asks for in order to fight the foreign sugar producer fairly ; but even this is denied him.
However, the West Indian planter's courage has never forsaken him, even in his direst extremity, and by every avail- able expedient in his power he is striving to rehabilitate him- self. He has recognised that the crux of his position lies in the solution of the labour question. He has turned to the east, and is now busily engaged in redressing the evils of the West Indies by calling in the labour markets of the East Indies. Mr. Nevil Lubbock, a great authority on West Indian affairs, has observed : ' No one who has any knowledge of British Guiana or Trinidad will doubt that their present prosperity is entirely due to the Indian immigration.'1 In British Guiana alone there are 110,000 East Indians.
Another recent feature in the history of the West Indies, and especially Jamaica, is the hold which American capitalists are obtaining upon them, who are taking up unoccupied positions and developing garden produce of every description. These American capitalists are far-sighted men, and rightly imagine that these beautiful and productive islands cannot long lie desolate. The vastly increasing population of the United States afford the best field for the products of the West Indies — a large portion of the sugar produced there being shipped to the States. Canada also is a growing market, and the Dominion Government have recently subsidised a line of steamers thither.
What may still be done in the West Indies by energy and enterprise has been ably pointed out by Mr. Morris, assistant- 1 Proceedings of the Royal Colonial Institute, vol. xxi.
42 British Colonisation
director of the Kew Gardens.1 ' The production of sugar can by no means occupy all the available lands suitable for culti- vation in the West Indies. It is well that it is so : what is wanted is a diversified system of cultural industries, so that there may be no collapse of prosperity, as at present, on account of fluctuation in the price of any single article. The physical configuration of the West Indian islands, where there are all gradations from plains to slopes and mountain sides, points to this conclusion. We cannot do better, therefore, than take them as they are, and endeavour to cultivate them in such a skilful and suitable manner as to render them a source of wealth and prosperity to the community. On lands not already occupied with sugar, and where sugar-growing does not prove remunerative, there are numerous industries that might be successfully established. What has been accomplished in this respect at Jamaica and other West Indian islands is a sufficient proof that a system of diversified industries is in the long-run the best and most lasting.
' Besides sugar, then, we should endeavour to select a number of industries well suited to the soil and climate. Of these, none perhaps are more promising at present than coffee. There are two sorts of coffee — the Liberian coffee, for warm, humid valleys, and the Arabian coffee, for hilly slopes up to two or three thousand feet. The mountains of Dominica could grow as fine a coffee as any in the world : while other people are investigating remote parts of the world for suitable coffee lands, here, within easy range of us, are some of the finest coffee lands to be found in any part of the tropics. There are, besides, the highlands of Montserrat, of St. Kitts, Nevis, and the hills of Tortola and Virgin Gorda.
'Cacao is easy of culture, and thrives in the rich soil of humid valleys. These are to be had in Dominica in abundance, and they are not wanting, also, in Montserrat and St. Kitts. Spices, such as nutmeg and mace, vanilla, black pepper, cubeb pepper, long pepper, cloves, ginger, cinnamon, cardamoms, are 1 Proceedings of the Royal Colonial Institute, 1890-91.
TJte West Indies 43
already introduced to this part of the world. The demand for spices is increasing, and these islands could grow every one of these mentioned.
1 A great factor in the future development of these islands is the growing of fruit. They are geographically the Channel Islands of the Northern Continent, and their manifest destiny is to grow such special products and such fruits and vegetables as the more temperate countries are unable to produce for them- selves. Bananas are in great demand in the United States and Canada. The production of these is large, but evidently the trade is only in its infancy. Jamaica alone exports nearly a quarter of a million sterling worth of bananas every year, but the Northern people want more and more. Bananas yield a crop in a year or so ; the bunches sell for about seven to ten pounds per hundred, for which ready money is paid. The planter can thus clear fifteen to twenty pounds per acre for his fruit, while under the shade of the banana plants he is establishing his land with cacao, coffee, spices, or other permanent growths.
c Besides bananas there are many fruits in great demand, such as oranges, pineapples, shaddocks, forbidden fruit, sapodilla, mango, avocado pear, granadilla, water-lemon, water- melon, tamarind, guava, cocoa-nut, Barbados cherry, star-apple, papaw, sweet sop, sour sop, sugar-apple, mammee-apple, lime, lemon, grapes, figs, cashew-nut, ground-nut, loquat, Malay-apple, rose-apple, pomegranate, almond, genip, damson plum, balata, breadfruit, date, mangosteen, and durian. All these and many more are found on these islands— are found, indeed, in the small island of Dominica ; but some are at present practically unknown to Northern people.
* Then besides fruits there are abundant supplies of vege- tables, which could be shipped to reach Northern markets in the depth of winter, and realise good prices. The finest green peas, the best new potatoes, and the most luscious tomatoes are procurable here a fortnight before Christmas, and the supply is limited only by the means at hand for disposing of them, and getting them quickly and freshly into the proper market.
44 British Colonisation
' The cultivation of the West Indian lime has already been discussed. Of fibres suited for cordage and weaving purposes there are at least a score or two that could easily be grown. Sisal hemp (Agave) is now being largely taken up in the neigh- bouring Bahamas. If more land is required to grow this fibre, there are thousands of acres in Anguilla and the Virgin Islands exactly suited to its requirements. Mauritius hemp could be grown at Anguilla and elsewhere ; there is Egyptian cotton and ordinary cotton to be tried at Antigua, St. Kitts, and Anguilla; tobacco at St. Kitts, where long ago it was a staple industry ; cocoa-nuts for fresh nuts, for oil, for fibre, and for cocoa-nut butter, for all islands possessing sandy beaches. And besides these there are industries in arrow-root, in cola-nut, in fruit syrups, india-rubber, scent plants, and numerous medicinal plants. A promising new industry is that of gambier, used for tanning purposes.'
References : —
The West Indies, by C. Washington Eves, 1889.
Historical Geography of the British Colonies , vol. ii. , by C. P. Lucas.
Martin's British Colonies, 1834.
Gardner's History of Jamaica, 1873.
Schomburgk's History of Barbados, 1848.
De Verteuil's Trinidad, 1884.
Gibb's British Honduras, 1883.
Schomburgk's Description of British Gtiiana, 1840
Among the Indians of Guiana, by im Thurn, 1883.
Voyage in the Sunbeam, 1884.
At Last, by Canon Kingsley, 1871.
CHAPTER III
NEWFOUNDLAND
THE island of Newfoundland enjoys the peculiar honour of being the oldest of Great Britain's numerous colonies and settlements. A Bristol Chronicle of ancient date records that 'in the year 1497, the 24th of June, on St. John's Day, was Newfoundland found by Bristol men in a ship called the Matthew.' This is generally accepted to be the brief state- ment of a great fact, and the leader of the enterprise was a Cabot. Questions have arisen whether it was John Cabot or Sebastian his son, whether the Cabots were of Italian or of English birth, and whether the first landfall was that of the island of Newfoundland or the continent of America. Those who have examined these matters believe that, although John Cabot was the moving spirit of the expedition, it was his son Sebastian, then from twenty-five to thirty years old, who was the navigator in command. There seems no doubt as to the Italian extraction of the Cabots. John Cabot, a Genoese by birth and a Venetian by citizenship, 'came to London to follow the trade of merchandise,' and afterwards settled at Bristowa, or Bristol, where probably Sebastian was born. Here, in the west of England, was the important centre of England's trade and commerce ; here, for generations, trade was carried on with the Baltic, Norway, Holland, Hamburg, and all parts of Europe. The town was placed more favour- ably than London for all Western and Southern ventures, and here there lived some of the hardiest sailors in the world.
45
46 British Colonisation
Down the Bristol Channel and along the coasts of Devon there were never wanting sailors who, whether from Dartmouth, Plymouth, Fowey, Barnstaple, or Bridgwater, were willing to explore the furthest regions of the world, then for the first time thrown open to the enterprise of Europe by the skill and perseverance of the great Columbus.
Bristol was especially noted for its ventures to Iceland and to the northern fisheries, back to those homes of the old Scandinavian sea-kings ; and therefore such an enthusiastic geographer and enterprising merchant as John Cabot would find a very congenial home here. The Cabots were especially anxious to discover the north-west passage and the fabled island of Cipango in the equinoctial region, ' where it was believed there were gems and all the spices of the world.' Such was the temper of the age, and such the enthusiasm inspired by the example of Columbus, that Cabot had no difficulty in obtaining from Henry vn. a charter for himself and his three sons, Lewis, Sebastian, and Sanctus. He gathered men for his expedition from Bristol and Bridgwater, * the sailors of the latter place being renowned for their love of enterprise.'
The tidal river of the Parret, on which Bridgwater is built, extends far up from the Bristol Channel towards the historic regions of Athelney, Glastonbury, and King's Sedgemoor, and has borne on its waters adventurers who have gone forth to fight and trade from the days of King Alfred to those of the great Admiral Blake, who was born close to its tawny flood. Sebastian Cabot, therefore, gathering his west-country crew together, steered his vessel probably along the well-known Iceland tack in the first instance, and then westwards until he sighted a part of the coast of Labrador, winning for British sailors and for himself the honour of being the first to sight the American continent — a feat which Columbus himself, who had been exploring and naming the numerous islands of the Caribbean Seas, did not accomplish till his last voyage. This took place in the course of the following year, when he coasted
Newfoundland 47
along a part of the Isthmus of Darien.1 Steering southwards along the stormy regions of Labrador, Cabot sighted New- foundland, which was first of all called Baccalaos, or the land of cod-fish.
Thus Newfoundland was seized for England by the skill of Cabot ; and Samuel Purchas, in his admiration for this and for subsequent explorations of this notable ' Pilot,' argues that the continent of America should not have been so called from Americus Vesputius, but Cabotiana or Sebastiana from Cabot. As it is, the name of Cabot is not to be found upon the map of America, and has only been recently given by the Newfound- land Legislature, on the occasion of the erection of a light- house, to a group of barren islands on the Newfoundland coast. Cabot's second expedition under Henry vn.'s charter con- sisted of five ships, and he ' directed his course by the tract of Iceland upon the Cape of Labrador at 58°. He then turned to the west, following the coast of Baccalaos to lat. 38°, whence he returned to England.' 2 On this second voyage Cabot got as far as Hudson's Straits, where he was turned back by ice.
In the west country the fame of these discoveries went far and wide, and the desire of making the north-west passage was long present to the minds of the sailors of the western ports. In old Martin Frobisher's days there was an expedition to find the fabled Straits of Anian and the kingdom of the great Khan. Here again the sailors of the Parret are to the fore. There is the Ema of Bridgwater and the Emanuel of Bridgwater, vessels found in Frobisher's third expedition. It may be mentioned that at Meta Incognita, at the entrance of Hudson's Straits, about the limit of Sebastian Cabot's second voyage, Frobisher and his fleet turned aside to what they thought were glittering gold-mines in the Arctic Seas, and so for many weeks ballasted their ships with heaps of stones, glittering with mica, imagining the true El Dorado to be under the Pole, and not in Mexico or Peru. The Bridgwater
1 Campbell's Lives of the Admirals (1779), vol. i. p. 328.
- Proceedings of the Royal Colonial Institute, vol. xvi. p. 225.
48 British Colonisation
captains, one of whom was almost wrecked in the ice-floes of the north, were bitterly disappointed when, in company with the ships of Fowey and Barnstaple, they returned empty- handed.1
Although by right of discovery Newfoundland was the prize of the British crew under Cabot, no official proclamation was made on the island until the 5th of August 1583, when, under commission from Queen Elizabeth, Sir Humphrey Gilbert, the well-known west-country sailor, landed on the island. Sir Walter Ralegh, his half-brother, had started with him on the expedition, but was compelled to return owing to sickness breaking out on board his vessel. The ships commanded by Gilbert which arrived at Newfoundland were the Delight, the Golden Hind, the Swallow, and the Squirrel. When they arrived they found a foreign fishing-fleet there, who offered at first some opposition ; but afterwards, in the presence of the merchants and fishermen of all nations assembled there, Sir Humphrey opened and read his commission, and informed them that by virtue of the Royal grant he assumed possession and government of St. John's and the adjoining territory to the extent of 200 leagues. ' There were delivered to him in token of submission the feudal symbols of turf and twig ; and there he raised the English banner and erected a wooden pillar, to which were attached the arms of England engraved on lead. He granted several parcels of land in consideration of rent and services, and laid a tax upon shipping.' The occupation was complete and final, and from that day of August 1583 to the present England has maintained her sovereignty. It was on his return voyage that Sir Humphrey Gilbert went down in the Squirrel uttering these well-known words : ' Cheer up, lads ; we are as near heaven by sea as by land.'
It will be seen, therefore, that although the occupation of
Newfoundland was complete and formal, the shadows of
disaster fell upon its early career as a colony. Sir Walter
Ralegh was baulked of his intention to be an cekist or leader
1 Frobisher's Voyages, Hakluyt Series.
Newfoundland 49
of the enterprise, and Sir H. Gilbert perished in the stormy waters of the North Atlantic. Had things been otherwise, Sir Walter Ralegh's energies might have been directed to New- foundland and the Gulf of St. Lawrence instead of further south to Virginia. West-countrymen, however, still pursued the enterprise. Mr. John Guy, merchant, and Mayor of Bristol, obtained a grant of a great part of Newfoundland from James i., in company with Lord Bacon and a number of noblemen and gentlemen.
The great value of the island from the very beginning con- sisted in its fisheries. Raimondo di Soncino, writing to the Duke of Milan (1497) on the subject of Newfoundland, observes that * Englishmen, Cabot's partners, say that they can bring so many fish that this kingdom will have no more business with Islanda (Iceland), and that from that country there will be a very great trade in the fish which they call stock- fish.' The Venetian ambassador at the Court of Portugal, writing in 1501, describes the island and people of New- foundland as having 'plenty of salmon, herring, cod, and other fish.' Three years after Cabot, Caspar Cortereal, a Portuguese gentleman, had sailed to Newfoundland and the north-west, and had been wrecked and lost in those northern waters — a fate which overtook his brother Michael, who had sailed in search of him. The Portuguese, therefore, keen mariners as they were, became alive to the value of the northern fisheries. A place called Portuguese Cove still remains as a proof of their enterprise.
But the Breton and Biscayan fishermen were the most per- sistent fishermen off the banks of Newfoundland. An old writer says that ' the Brytons and French are accustomed to take fyssche on the coast of these lands, where there is found great plenty of Tunnyes'; and in 1527 an English expedition under Captain Rut found at Newfoundland eleven sail of Normans, one Breton, and two Portugal barks engaged in fishing at St. John's harbour. In 1578 the number of vessels employed in the cod fisheries was 400, of whom only 50 were
D
50 British Colonisation
English. The value, however, of the enormous supplies of fish was clear to all Englishmen. Lord Bacon declared that 'the fisheries of Newfoundland were more valuable than all the mines of Peru' ; and from such a source of wealth Englishmen, with their seafaring aptitudes, were not likely to be long debarred. In 1615 there were nearly three hun- dred English ships engaged in the fisheries; and in 1674 it was calculated that no fewer than 11,000 seamen were em- ployed in the industry, and a permanent colony began to be formed.
One of the most interesting incidents in the history of the island during the seventeenth century was the organised settle- ment of Lord Baltimore (Sir George Calvert, 1624). As Under Secretary of State, he obtained a grant of the island from James i. Being converted to the Roman Catholic faith, he had to resign his Ministerial post, and determined to settle on the peninsula of Avalon in Newfoundland, a name given by himself after that spot in England in the valley of the Somersetshire Parret. Here, at a place called Ferryland, Lord Baltimore lived for some time, and here he was exposed to the hostilities of the French, who had obtained a large share of the island under charter from Charles I., to whom at first they paid tribute. Lord Baltimore was compelled to abandon the settlement and Avalon, and, going further south to the mainland of America, he founded the State of Maryland and the city of Baltimore. Sir David Kirke became grantee of the possessions of Lord Baltimore, and, being a staunch Loyalist, he offered Charles i. an asylum in Newfoundland, of which, possibly, he might have availed himself had he been able to escape.
It will easily be understood how this contested dominion with France retarded the peaceful settlement of the island. As perpetual and as unending as the storms around its cliffs has been the rivalry between French and English sailors. The maritime enterprise of the French nation at an early date fully equalled, if it did not excel, that of the British. The
Newfoundland 5 1
French were the first to set aside the restriction of Pope Alexander's bull that divided the New World between Spain and Portugal. It is a well-known fact that the merchant ven- turers of Rouen and the seamen of Normandy sailed to the Gold Coast, and founded factories and settlements at Elmina, Fantin, and Cormontin long before our Bristol venturers had explored these regions. Greatest of all, perhaps, was Jacques Cartier of St. Malo, who hoisted the flag of his nation on the coasts of Newfoundland, sailed up the St. Lawrence, and laid the foundation of New France, that afterwards was destined, under the able guidance and management of generations of Frenchmen, to attain to such goodly proportions. In the island of Newfoundland, therefore, the British sailors found no undisputed heritage, but a colony for which they have been compelled to fight hard, and to expend much toil and labour. Under the rough circumstances of the island, a fixed and stable government was out of the question. According to a well-known statute that was promulgated in the reign of William in., it was provided that the master of any sailing-vessel from England, Wales, or Berwick-upon-Tweed, who, in each year, first entered any harbour or creek in the island should be admiral of the harbour or creek, and have full power to decide all differences between the fishermen and the inhabitants.
During the seventeenth century, and especially at its close, the fortunes of Newfoundland as a colony were at a low ebb. No Englishmen thought of settling and making their homes there, as at New Plymouth and along the Alleghanies. The popular idea was that Newfoundland was simply an 'out- station for fishing and a nursery for sailors,' and the owners and masters of ships were absolutely forbidden to carry emigrants thither. The island was little better off than a remote whaling-station might be in the South Pacific. The profits of the cod fisheries went home and enriched the merchants and capitalists in London and Bristol. With such a migratory population coming and going every year, there could be no settled form of government, no fixed society, no
52 British Colonisation
prosperous and self-supporting colony. In 1697, by the Treaty of Ryswick, the French were left in undisturbed possession of many places, and especially Placentia, which was naturally a very strong vantage-ground.1 By the Treaty of Utrecht, how- ever, England in 1713 had closed once and for all the question of sovereignty. The colonists themselves helped her by many a gallant action to win the day against France, and it was won first of all along the islands and peninsulas.
But the Treaty of Utrecht (1713), whilst it closed one question, opened the door for another which has been a continual source of irritation both to Newfoundland and Great Britain herself from that day to this. At the time of this treaty, and subsequently upon the occasion of the surrender of Quebec in 1763, Great Britain could have swept the French fishermen off the Atlantic waters. This would have been the natural corollary of the con- quest of New France in the eighteenth century. The fisheries of the ocean are of no use to fishermen who cannot procure bait, or count upon a foothold close by to serve either as a harbour of refuge, a drying-shed, or general depot. Great Britain, by de- barring France from such a foothold, could have settled the fisheries question once and for all.
But as the importance, probably, of the fisheries did not appear so large in the eighteenth century as it does now, the French were allowed to retain the adjoining small islands of St. Pierre and Miquelon on the grounds of humanity. This concession dates from the Treaty of Utrecht. Thrice after the Peace of Utrecht these islands became the prize of war : first, when they were captured in 1778 by a squadron under Admiral Montague, in consequence chiefly of the privateering that was carried on from them ; next, when ten years later, in the un- settled times of the Revolution, they were seized by way of precaution; and, lastly, in March 1804, when the tricolour was replaced by the British flag. Great Britain, however, missed her opportunity and restored them to France both by
1 The author's History of Newfoundland and the Dominion of Canada^ pp. 105-106.
Newfoundland 5 3
the Peace of Amiens and also by the Treaty of Paris in 1814. It must be added that Great Britain also conceded France certain shore rights on the coasts of Newfoundland itself which have been the source of the greatest irritation.
The French shore rights have been clearly stated on a recent occasion by Sir William Whiteway, the Premier of Newfound- land x : — ' We go back a period of nearly 200 years, and we find that from 1713 to 1814 treaties were entered into between Great Britain and France, under conditions of facts and cir- cumstances very different from those which exist at the present time. I would remind you, too, that at the periods to which I refer the policy of the British Government and of the French Government also was to send forth from their respective countries fleets of fishing-vessels to fish on the coast and banks of the island, and to bring back to their respective countries the result of their labours. It was at that time, and up to seventy or eighty years ago, prohibited for a master of a British vessel to leave a single man of his crew on the island under a heavy penalty : settlement was discouraged, almost prohibited. . . . The masters of ships had first choice of a locality whereon to cure and dry their fish before a resident dared make such selection in the harbours. It was not until comparatively recent years that grants of land could be made on the island, the whole policy being to treat Newfoundland as a fishing- station. ... It was not surprising that under these circum- stances a concurrent right was given on a certain portion of the coast to Frenchmen to fish in common with British sub- jects, and to land during the fishing season and cure and dry their fish upon the strand. In addition there were conceded to France the islands of St. Pierre and Miquelon, on the south coast of Newfoundland ; but in connection with these treaties declarations were exchanged by the Kings of France and England to the effect that, amongst other things, these islands should be held really as a place of shelter for French fishermen, and not be made an object of jealousy between the two nations. 1 Proceedings of the Royal Colonial Institttte, vol. xxii.
54 British Colonisation
The declaration also provided, on the part of the King of England, the French should not be interrupted by the com- petition of the British fishermen. That is, concisely, the condition of affairs at the present time. How have circum- stances changed ? Newfoundland has become inhabited, and St. Pierre and Miquelon, instead of being only a place of shelter for French fishermen, have become a port from which the fishing-vessels are fitted out to fish on the banks, and have become a place of export for the produce of the fisheries. Instead of these islands of St. Pierre and Miquelon being only a place of shelter . . . they are now a centre from which fisheries are carried on and smuggling is done. We have, on the other hand, one lever by which we can meet the French. There are two bays adjacent to St. Pierre and Miquelon — these bays being on the coast of Newfoundland — which teem with herring in the early part of the fishing-season. From these two bays alone can the French obtain the bait to enable them to prosecute the earlier fisheries. If we, then, can stop their obtaining that bait, we materially interfere with the prosecution of their fishing-voyages. We have been obliged to adopt a course prohibitory to the supply of the bait because the French have, by their enormous bounties, so inflated their fisheries as to compete with us in foreign markets to the extent of almost excluding our products from these markets. We say to them fairly : " We will give you all the bait you require : give as much bounty as you please to the fish consumed within French possessions or in France ; but if you wish to fish on banks which are common fishing-grounds to all the world, we desire to fish with you on even terms. We will give you sufficient bait for your purposes, but withdraw your bounties from your fish exported to foreign countries ; if not, we will use the most strenuous endeavours to prevent your obtaining that bait which enables you to get the article in which you compete with us in foreign markets in a way that drives us out of those markets." ' This is so much of that vexed question that con- cerns baits and bounties, and it is easy to see that under-
Newfoundland 5 5
lying the whole controversy there is a deep and essential difference between the English and French Governments on the first principles of commercial and fiscal policy. The bounty system is no doubt an extravagant violation of Free Trade and common fairness ; and as the French have succeeded in dealing a blow to our West Indian sugar industry by means of bounties, so here in the case of Newfoundland they seek to cripple our colonial fisheries.
With regard to the question of the 700 miles of Newfound- land coast, from Cape St. John to Cape Ray, the question between French and British fishermen is still more complicated. In this case there are territorial difficulties of a particularly irk- some and vexatious character. By the declaration of the King of England, British fishermen were not to interrupt the French in the prosecution of their fisheries, and the French had the right of landing for the purpose of curing and drying their fish. 'Now, the only fish,' Sir William Whiteway observes, 'which can be cured and dried are cod, haddock, and ling. At all events, at the times of the treaties the only fishery carried on was the cod fishery, and I submit that the treaties referred to the cod fisheries alone. ... I must describe how this fish is cured. A small erection on the beach, extending generally a little out of the water, is a place where the fish is split and salted. It is then spread either on the beach or on what are termed flakes, constructed of frames of poles with boughs spread over them, along the shore. About 200 or 300 yards at most would afford ample room for drying or curing the product of the voyage of any one fishing-vessel. Would you, or could you, believe that under these circumstances France demands that " we shall keep one half-mile all round that coast as a belt on which we are not to erect a building of any description because they may any day require to come and dry their fish there " ? This right naturally interferes with any mining or agricultural projects along the coast, and is a great hindrance to the development of the northern half of Newfoundland. It is said that a Newfound- land capitalist, discovering a lead-mine within 300 yards of the
56 British Colonisation
coast, sank a shaft with a view of working it \ but his project formed shortly afterwards the subject of a remonstrance from the French Government. If a factory for the canning of lobsters is erected by a British subject, he can be compelled to remove it, and witness perhaps the substitution of a French factory in its place.
Such are the causes of friction subsisting between English and French on the coasts of Newfoundland, and it cannot be denied that they are of an exceptional character. In our dealings with France the whole question, considering how little there is really at stake, may seem like a surface ripple ; but the cause of friction lies deep down in the general relations elsewhere between France and England. It has perhaps been truly said that it is the British occupation of Egypt that makes the New- foundland difficulties hard to adjust. Moreover, there are two main considerations which induce France to hold on to this shred of Transatlantic empire with a tenacious grip. The fisheries are profitable, and they nurse in a peculiar way the sentiment of patriotism of Northern France. All along the French littoral, we are told, from Dunkerque to St. Jean de Luz, there is not a hamlet which has not sent forth the prime of its youth to court danger and to seek wealth on the dreary coasts of Newfoundland ; whilst the perils of the fisherman's calling are immortalised in the verses of Basque and Breton peasantry, and the gallantry of Newfoundland privateers is still sung in the 'tween-decks of the miserable craft which annually put forth in fleets to the cod fisheries of Newfound- land. It may really be doubted whether there are, in propor- tion, so many hardy sailors along the historic coasts of Devon and Cornwall who know how * to hand, reef, and steer,' and excel in all the arts of seamanship, as there are now along the coasts of France.
The whole population of St. Pierre and Miquelon is about 5000 souls, and has been classified under the following heads : — i. The old residents who were ousted from New- foundland by the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713, sprung from the
Newfoundland 57
Basque and Breton settlers in Acadie or Nova Scotia. 2. The Hivernants or temporary French settlers who make only so- journs upon the islands for the sake of trade. 3. The con- sort es or annual visitors, fishermen by calling, thousands of whom arrive every year. These would form the chief recruit- ing material of the French navy or mercantile marine, and there can be no doubt that they are most able and efficient seamen. The soil of these islands is not cultivated to any extent, only 2500 acres being occupied by the French. The chief and only harvest is the harvest of the sea.
Newfoundland cod is considered superior to that caught off the coasts of Scotland, Norway, around Iceland, and the Faroes. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries the Basque Provinces were made rich by this trade, and at the present moment the trade of Newfoundland with Roman Catholic Europeans, Brazil, and the inhabitants of the West Indies is very large and lucrative. Amongst the best cus- tomers of the Newfoundland fishermen are the Portuguese both in Europe and Brazil, who buy half of the yearly pro- duce ; the Spaniards ; and the Italians. Canadian Roman Catholics catch their own fish, and so do the inhabitants of the United States.
The French fishing-fleet comes over annually, and forms in the early spring a somewhat picturesque procession across the ocean. The larger rig are few in number ; but brigs, brigan- tines, schooners, and even yawls, are to be met with in fifties and sixties. Many of these vessels are unseaworthy, and carry crowds of passengers or consortes, a small craft often stowing away 200 or 300 souls on board.
Prior to starting, each able-bodied seaman obtains an advance of 150 to 200 francs, which is handed over to wife or mother. The produce of the season's fishing at the expiration of the voyage is thus divided : — Four-sevenths goes to the owner and three-sevenths to the crew. The three-sevenths is again subdivided into shares, of which the captain takes three, the mate two, each able seaman one, and a mousse half-a-
58 British Colonisation
share. The passage-money of the consortes, who vary in number from 50 to 150, according to the size of the craft, is from £4 to £6 ; and in addition to this they are required to pay 100 francs as freight for their boats. On their return voyage they are allowed five quintals of dried fish as free luggage. In order to encourage this industry the French Government grant £2 to every man, whether sailor borne on the logs or consortes, embarked on board of the Newfoundland fishing-vessels, and a bounty of 8s. 4d. per cwt. (twenty francs per quintal) on all dry cod or cod's roe imported into France. Sometimes more than ^200,000 has been allotted in the Budget for bounties.1
Historically the island of Newfoundland is to all Englishmen one of the most interesting of our colonial possessions. Ever since the day when in 1583 Sir Humphrey Gilbert hoisted the English flag in the presence of the fishermen there, sailors from Bristol and the coasts of Devon have plied their hardy vocation there ; and all round the coast the very nomenclature of bays and capes and straits shows how they have stepped into the heritage of Breton and Basque and Portuguese fisher- men. Strategically, the island occupies a most commanding position at the mouth of the Gulf of the St. Lawrence. The power that holds Newfoundland has a rare vantage-ground. If England were left entirely without her great continental colonies in North America by mismanagement or misadventure, she might still hope to retain such an insular position as New- foundland— an island not altogether unlike the Mother-country in general physical configuration, lying along the same parallels of latitude, including about the same area of land, and nursed in somewhat similar fashion with the Mother-country amid the tempests and fogs of the northern seas. The strength of Newfoundland lies, like the strength of England, in her insular and at the same time commanding position with reference to an adjoining continent, and also in her hardy brood of sailors.
1 See Captain Norman's Colonial France.
Newfou ndland 5 9
The bounty and bait difficulties may possibly be rectified by some new turn in legislation which at present does not appear. In her numerous bays Newfoundland has the immense advantage of possessing an inexhaustible supply of bait, and with this and other natural advantages at hand she can afford to wait. Suggestions have been made that France should receive in exchange for her fisheries rights a portion of West Africa, whither the eyes of her colonial statesmen are at present turned with the hope and ambition of erecting a North African empire ; and, perhaps, with more magnificent ideas of a continental empire at her very doors, France may get tired of subsidising the fishing industry of St. Pierre and Miquelon.
Apart from considerations already adduced, it has, however, been asserted that France clings to this remnant of her Trans- atlantic empire, in St. Pierre and Miquelon, from other and more doubtful motives. In the prosperity of Quebec she reads a new version of her own prosperity, and in the preva- lence along the St. Lawrence of French language, customs, laws, and the old religion she recognises her own peculiar influences and civilisation. She cannot forget that her pioneers, traders, missionaries, and pathfinders of former generations laid the foundations of Canada in the first instance. By the light of this consideration the islands of St. Pierre and Miquelon acquire a new significance and convey a new reading. A foothold in the new world yet remains to them : a narrow perch, certainly, but a vantage-ground of undefined, and perhaps indefinable, possibilities. They lie in the path of commerce, and attract annually hundreds of Frenchmen, and keep alive French sentiments and maritime traditions from year to year along a distinct channel. Whatever the political status of Canada may ultimately prove to be — whether absorption into the great Republic or a closer political incorporation with the British Empire under a great federal system — France may argue that she cannot do wrong in holding to a position the value of which may be
60 British Colonisation
enormously enhanced by some development yet lying hid in the womb of time.
With regard to Newfoundland itself, English public opinion has often been grossly ignorant or marvellously misinformed. The stream of emigrants has passed by it and gone to Ontario or to the provinces of the Far West, and made Canada more familiar to us than Newfoundland. Epigrammatically the island has been spoken of as noted for its fogs and dogs, without any great foundation of truth. The sea-fogs do not extend far inland, and the climate is said to be less trying than that of England. The vegetating season is about six weeks shorter, but the winter is more bright and cheerful than in England. Although the interior of Newfoundland is comparatively un- occupied and even unexplored, there are said to be fully 3,000,000 acres of land adapted for settlement and cultiva- tion. When we consider that St. John's, the chief port of Newfoundland, is only 1640 miles from Ireland, it is clear that we have, in these days of quick steaming, an area of colonisa- tion close at hand.
Newfoundland has not been very fairly treated in the past. At the beginning she suffered from the evils of an unsettled government, differing slightly from the conditions of mob-rule or the rough and-ready administrations of mining communities; then she groaned for a long time under the evils of monopolies, her industries were checked, her native energies curbed, and absentee proprietors grew rich at the expense of the * toilers of the sea.' Sometimes the elements have proved themselves too terrible and too exacting foes to the poor fishermen whose task has always been amongst these storm-swept waters. Quite recently (July 1892) a fire has destroyed a large portion of St. John's, their capital city and centre of government. Yet in spite of all drawbacks and disasters Newfoundland has pre- served her credit and maintained her loyalty. She is less encumbered by debt than most colonies, and is loyal to the backbone. Her able-bodied fishermen number fully 30,000, manning a fleet of 1800 vessels ; and if a Transatlantic wing of
New fou ndland 6 1
the Imperial navy were ever formed, where could better material be found than amongst the rugged and loyal sailors of Newfoundland ? 1
1 For facts and figures see Appendix II.
References : —
Harvey and Ration's Newfoundland, our Oldest Colony, 1883. Captain Norman's Colonial France, 1886. Proceedings of the Royal Colonial Institute, vols. xvi. and xxii. Greswell's History and Geography of Newfoundland and the Canadian
Dominion. Clarendon Press. Oxford, 1891-2. Captain Kennedy's Sport, Travel, and Adventure, 1883. Tocque's Newfoundland as It Was.
CHAPTER IV
THE DOMINION OF CANADA
FACING Newfoundland, and separated from it on the north- west by the narrow strait of Belle Isle, lies part of that vast Dominion of Canada which slopes on the north towards the Polar Basin and the regions of eternal snow, and on the west stretches in ever-rising plateaux to the magnificent Rocky Mountains. Thence it descends in broken terraces to the Pacific Ocean. From east to west — from the Atlantic to the Pacific — is a distance of 3000 miles, and the Dominion is nearly equal in area to Europe. For many generations its resources were unknown, its climate misrepresented, and its valleys unexplored. It was believed to be the home of wandering and marauding Indians, only fit to remain as a gigantic pre- serve for animals such as the beaver, silver fox, marten, and musk-rat, whose skins and furs are an article of luxury in Europe. When it was finally surrendered to England by France, Voltaire asked why need France lament over the loss of * a few acres of snow ' ?
French public opinion should have been better informed, for the first explorers were Frenchmen. In 1524 Verrazano, sailing for the New World at the bidding of Francis i. in the Dauphine, made his landfall on the coast of New Jersey, and sailed northwards for many leagues ; next came Jacques Cartier, the hardy Breton fisherman, born at St. Malo, who made three voyages to Canada, viz. in 1534, 1535, and 1541. In his first voyage Cartier ran up the Gulf of Chaleur, and, ascending the Gaspe headland on the south of the St. Lawrence,
The Dominion of Canada 63
erected a cross thirty feet high in token of possession, on which was fastened a shield with the words, ' Vive le Roy de France,' cut deep into the wood.
In estimating the social and political conditions of Canada of the present day, too little notice is generally taken of the great part taken by Frenchmen in opening up the country in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Supposing that, by some unexpected stroke of fortune, our South African colonies were captured by France, and the colonists there were transferred to the French allegiance. In name and political status they would be French subjects, and if France proved generous they would retain their language, law, and customs. Thus there would be a life within a life. Still, the colonisation of the country in the past would have been mainly British, and its great cekists, explorers, ' trekkers,' and politicians British in every sense. It would be impossible, therefore, to understand the conditions of South Africa under the circum- stances of this hypothetical transference without constant reference to the British explorers and rulers of the country who had lived and worked in past years. Such a hero and explorer as David Livingstone would have left his indelible mark upon the face of the country, and no transference of dominion could mar or blot out his celebrity.
So we cannot understand Canada without constant reference to French history, French customs, French law, and French colonisers. The eye must rest upon certain great French pioneers and colonists who, during the time they worked in the country, left a certain impress upon it. They have bequeathed to the present generation of French-Canadians a natural pride which it would be idle to refuse them : most of the honours of exploration, and the remembrance of many gallant exploits in flood, field, and forest. The fact that these French-Canadians are now conjoined with the British in opening up a vast continent and giving political unity to a great dominion under the British flag does not cause the obliteration of honourable traditions. Both races, the French
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as well as the British, have need of all the spurs and incite- ments that past history can give them, respectively, in order to carry out the great destiny lying before them.
First and foremost amongst French explorers was Samuel Champlain (1567-1635), rightly called 'the Founder of New France. Born in 1567 at Brouage, a seaport to the south of La Rochelle, he was familiar, like our own Devon worthies, with the tales and adventures of the sea. The sailors of the western and north-western coasts of France regarded Canada and North America almost in the light of their peculiar birth- right, the St. Malo people going so far as to claim Canada and Newfoundland as their own by virtue of Cartier's discoveries, thus setting aside Cabot's claims. Samuel Champlain was the son of a naval captain, and, like Sir Walter Ralegh, whom he resembles in many respects, had seen active service as a soldier before he became a sailor, a pioneer, and a colonist, being employed in the army of Henry iv. under Marshal d'Aumont. His ambition was great and his energy unbounded. He threw himself into the work of North American colonisation with the most unflagging zeal. From first to last he undertook twelve voyages to Canada, the first voyage being in 1603 ; and he com- municated his enthusiasm to the French authorities at home.
In 1 6 10 Champlain landed at Tadousac during his fourth voyage, his object being to proceed northwards past Three Rivers to the land around Hudson's Bay, of which he had heard rumours from the Indians. On this expedition he was badly wounded, and did not succeed in exploring the interior to any extent. He may be regarded as the first founder of Montreal. Here he laid out gardens, sowed grain, and took in at a glance the great advantages of the site. He was the first white man to descend the Lachine Rapids.
In 1613 Champlain started on another expedition to reach Hudson's Bay by the Ottawa River. He here met a certain Nicholas de Vignau, who had stated that he had reached the Bay by this route, and that after travelling to the sources of the river he had come to a large lake, and thence by a portage
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had reached the sea. On the shores he stated he had seen a wreck of an English vessel and the heads of eighty of the crew who had been killed by the Indians. All this turned out to be a fabrication ; but Champlain managed to ascend the Ottawa as far as Allumette Island.
The most important voyage undertaken by Champlain was that of 1615-16, when he reached the Huron country. From Allumette Island on the Ottawa he found his way to Lake Nipissing, and thence by French River to Lake Huron. Afterwards he saw Lake Ontario, and was the first white man to stand upon its shores. Thus the key to the great West was obtained at last, and the existence of those vast and mysterious inland seas, of which faint rumours only had filtered down through Indian sources, was proved beyond doubt.
At the same time the Roman Catholic Church was planted in Canada. Many years before the Pilgrim Fathers had landed within Cape Cod, Le Caron, a Franciscan, and the friend and companion of Champlain, ' had passed into the hunting- grounds of the Wyandots, and, bound by vows to the life of a beggar, had, on foot or paddling a bark canoe, gone onward and still onward, taking alms of the savages, till he reached the rivers of Lake Huron.' 1
In 1627 a new era seemed to dawn upon New France when the great Cardinal Richelieu directed his attention thither. The Company of the Hundred Associates was formed with power over a vast country, reaching from Florida to Hudson Bay. It took the place of all previous companies. Three hundred artisans were to be sent at once to Canada, and they were to be provided with food and clothing for three years. Each settler was to have land to cultivate and seed to sow, and the Company undertook to establish 6000 inhabitants in Canada. The French King, Louis xni., reserved his supremacy in matters of faith and the right of homage as Sovereign of New France. A crown of gold weighing eight marks was to be given to each successor to the throne of France. In other 1 Bancroft, History of United States, vol. ii. p. 297, E
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respects the Company was intended to be a vast monopoly, with even the right to create and grant titles of honour. More- over, all the emigrants were to be of the Roman Catholic faith. Champlain was appointed Governor of this new and vast dominion.
Unfortunately for its founders, the projects of the One Hundred Associates were never carried out, and the Company received a heavy blow at the beginning. There was war between England and France, and Sir David Kirke, the grantee of Newfoundland, dealt a decisive blow at Richelieu's great projects for New France (1628-9). He captured eighteen vessels laden with emigrants at the entrance of the St. Lawrence, and, taking the cargoes out of ten of them, burned the empty hulks and took the rest to Newfoundland. Shortly afterwards Champlain himself had to surrender to Kirke. Had there been a decided policy at that time on the part of England, Canada might have become a British colony in its whole length and breadth, and the history of New England might then have read very differently. But by the Treaty of St. Germain-en-Laye (1632) Canada and Nova Scotia were ceded to France. It has been affirmed that Charles i. consented to restore Quebec in order to obtain 400,000 French crowns, which composed half of the marriage portion of Henrietta Maria.
But the fortunes of New France had received a severe check, and afterwards Charlevoix thus mourned over it : 'The Fort of Quebec, surrounded by several wretched houses and a number of barracks; two or three huts on the island of Montreal; also, perhaps, at Tadousac and in some other directions on the River St. Lawrence for the convenience of fishing and trade ; a commencement of settlement at Three Rivers . . . behold ! in what consisted New France and all the fruit of the dis- coveries of Verrazano, of Jacques Cartier, of M. de Roberval, of Champlain, of the great expenditure of Marquis de la Roche and of M. de Monts, and of the industry of a great number of the French ! '
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In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries religion played an important part in French colonisation. Montreal was re-founded in 1642 in the true spirit of apostolic fervour, when upon the site of the old Hochelaga a solemn service of inauguration was celebrated, and in France itself a supplica- tion was offered up that the Queen of Angels would take the island of Montreal under her protection. The Jesuit Fathers, especially, distinguished themselves by their proselytising zeal, and the Jesuit ' Relations ' give us the earliest descriptions of Canada. No hardship was too great for the disciples of Loyola, no task of forest travel too hard to be undertaken. In addition to the hardships of exploration, the Fathers often suffered cruel death. Pere Brebeuf, after labouring in the cause for twenty years, was burned alive by the Indians ; and the Iroquois, noted for their fiendish cruelty, put to death a number of missionary heroes, who deserve to be remem- bered for their zeal and piety, viz. : Daniel, Gamier, Buteaux, La Riborerde, Goupil, Constantin, and Liegeouis. The American poet, Whittier, has commemorated the Jesuit Fathers in his poem, Mogg Megone :
' Well might the traveller start to see The tall dark forms that take their way From the birch canoe, on the river shore, And the forest paths to that chapel door : And marvel to see the naked knees
And the dusky foreheads bending there ; While, in coarse white vesture, over these
In blessing or in pra)'er — Stretching abroad his thin pale hands Like a shrouded ghost, the Jesuit stands.'
In the Huron mission and in the settlements of St. Joseph and St. Ignace in the vicinity of Nottawasaga Bay, along a tract of country explored by the great Champlain, accessible from the lakes on all sides, we can recognise a most remark- able story of French mission enterprise. In some respects this ancient centre of Jesuit Fathers resembles our own lake missions in Equatorial Africa ; and certainly Frenchmen were
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beforehand with us in using the mission centre as an advanced guard of colonisation and exploration. For many years after the death of Champlain the Jesuits virtually controlled the policy of New France, and they had the support of such men as Cardinal Richelieu, who regarded colonisation as essentially an affair of Church and State.
Foremost among the Jesuits was Pere Marquette, who was born at Laon, in the north-east of France, entered the order when only seventeen years of age, and came to Canada at the age of twenty-nine. He lived first at Three Rivers and then at Sault St. Marie, and in 1670 went to the mission station of St. Esprit, amongst the Hurons. When this out- post was attacked by the Sioux — those marauding natives of the Western prairies — Marquette retired with the Hurons to the Great Manitoulin Island. Here the spirit of travel and adventure prompted Marquette to solve one of the great geographical problems of the age. Rumours of the mighty Mississippi, the * father of waters,' had long come to the ears of the pioneers of the West. The first steps of the route south- wards had been made known already as far as some distance up the Fox River, and Father Allouez had been sent to found a mission at Lake Michigan at the head of Green Bay.
It was reserved to Marquette to throw clearer light upon this valley of what might truly have then been called ' a Dark Continent.' Together with Joliet, he ascended the Fox River, and, reaching its head waters, struck across to the Wisconsin, which they reached after a portage of a mile and a half. Once on the Wisconsin their way was plain, and they glided down to the Mississippi. Continuing their voyage on the waters of the famous river, they experienced little difficulty in navigation ; but for a fortnight they saw not a human soul. The mouth of the Illinois was reached, a distance of 1400 miles from the Gulf of Mexico ; then the Missouri, the Ohio, and the Arkansas. Here they stopped, at a distance of 723 miles from the mouth of the great river. The exploit was a great one, and it was clear that the Mississippi flowed south into the Gulf of Mexico.
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Marquette did not long survive this triumph. On his return voyage he died on the shores of Lake Michigan as he was endeavouring to reach the Straits of Mackinaw.1
Marquette was not only a great explorer but a great mission- ary, and he managed to enlist the sympathy and goodwill of the Indians, as the following incident proves : — ' In 1676 some Ottawas for whom he had performed the offices of religion at the St. Esprit Mission opened the grave, obtained the bones, and, in Indian fashion, dried them. Placing them in a cover- ing of birch bark, they carried them to the Straits of Mackinaw, where they were reverently buried with the most solemn rites of his Church in the little chapel of the Mission of St. Ignace.' This honour paid to the remains of Marquette recalls the tender care shown by the African natives for the body of our own great explorer, David Livingstone.
Another great Frenchman, whose name is conspicuous in Canada and North America during the seventeenth century, was de la Salle, the founder of Louisiana. He was born at Rouen in 1643, and is said to have belonged to a family of wealthy merchants. He was by nature and training a keen and enthusiastic explorer. Like many other men of that age, whilst an advocate for bond fide l plantations,' he frequently dreamed of the possibilities of some wonderful El Dorado; and his imagination was inflamed, even in the back- woods of Canada, by reading about the wonderful career of Columbus and the wanderings of de Soto.2 Two of his companions in adventure were Henri de Tonti, an Italian officer, and Hennepin, the Franciscan, who has left behind an account of Canadian life and scenery. He was the first to describe the great Falls of Niagara. After exploring the lake country and opening up the way to the West, la Salle embarked upon his great enterprise, which was completing the work of Father Marquette and descending the Mississippi down to its mouth. Here, on April 9, 1682, a column was
1 Kingsford's History of Canada, vol. i. p. 404.
2 Bancroft's History of the United States, vol. ii. p. 334.
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raised to Louis le Grand by the explorers, and a great and mighty province won for France.
The founding of Louisiana was a very important event in the history of New France. Communication was opened up between the Canadian lakes and the Gulf of Mexico. Here it was decided to found a French colony. La Salle returned to France in 1683; and although Colbert was dead, his son' Seignelay listened favourably to his plans of colonisation. The details of the colony were arranged by 1684, and in July four vessels left La Rochelle with 280 persons, of whom 100 were soldiers. The French, in the days of Colbert, claimed the sovereignty of the Mexican Gulf — a Frenchman named d'Estrees having been sent here to cruise about and to fight any Spanish vessel he met. This expedition, however, which, like Champlain's previous effort, might have been the begin- ning of French dominion in this part of the world, failed utterly. In the words of Bancroft, the mechanics were poor workmen, the soldiers spiritless vagabonds, the volunteers were restless, and the commanders, worst of all, untrustworthy. La Salle perished near the scene of his explorations, being killed by one of his subordinates.
After the names of Champlain and la Salle should come that of Pierre Gautier de la Verandrye as a pathfinder and voyageur in North America (1731-1738). East of the Missis- sippi the task of North American exploration had been fairly exhausted ; the regions round Lake Superior, also, had become well known. But further north and north-west the voyageur's enterprise and daring could not be arrested, and the next regions to be opened up were those of the distant Western provinces, where bands of wild Sioux roamed. In 1686, at the very time when la Salle was lingering on the coast of the Gulf of Mexico, a voyageur of the name of de Noyon was wintering at the Lake of the Woods, at the very fountain of the mighty St. Lawrence. In 1720 Charlevoix, the celebrated Jesuit Father, was sent to Canada to discover whether there was an opening here for trade, and to throw
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light, if possible, upon the geography of the continent. His letters to the Duchesse de les Diguieres furnish a very useful historical record of the state of Canada at this time. Charle- voix was anxious to explore the west of the Missouri valley, and so reach the Western sea by this route. But he was prevented himself from carrying out his plans, and the task was left with Verandrye.
This Frenchman addressed a letter to the Governor, and spoke by hearsay from the Indians of four great rivers flowing from the western height of land. These four rivers were after- wards, found to exist and to take their rise in the direction named. They were the Mackenzie, the Athabasca, the Saskatchewan, and the Missouri Rivers, and the height of land was the ' Rocky Mountains.'
The information given by the Indians about the rivers of their country was generally found to be correct. The rivers were from time immemorial their natural highways, up and down which they travelled in their birch canoes. Verandrye in his communication to the French Governor spoke of English rivalry in the Far West, but there is no proof that they ever went so far. They had commenced to find their way to the Wabash, a tributary of the Ohio, reaching it from the eastern settlements ; but this was the extreme limit at the beginning of the* eighteenth century. On Hudson's Bay no traveller had ever gone far from the shores.1
The field was clear for Verandrye, who with Messager, a Jesuit missionary, set his face to explore the great inland sea described as the Ouinipigan (Winnipeg). In 1732 he crossed the Lake of the Woods, named the Assiniboine, calling it the St. Charles after the Governor ; and the Souris, to which he gave the name of the St. Pierre. Verandrye and his sons carried on their work of exploration for many years, and it is claimed for them that in 1 742-3 they first sighted the Rocky Mountains, sixty years before the American explorers Clarke and Lewis.
1 Kingsford's History of Canada , vol. iii. p. 371.
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Such were some of the typical French colonists and ex- plorers in Canada previous to the expulsion of the French altogether as a political power from the country. There was a great deal of romance and adventure about the missionary, the pathfinder, the hunter, and the explorer ; and the cause of geographical research was greatly advanced by their efforts. But there was not much substantial progress in the work of colonisation and settlement. The New England colonists and the settlers of New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland, were waging a never-ending war with the French colonists, and held the approaches to the St. Lawrence and the east coast.
There was a lack also of perseverance on the part of the French colonists. From what Champlain himself wrote, it would appear that agriculture was neglected by the new settlers. He considers the use of the plough so important that he gives us the date of its first use, viz. April 27, 1628 ; and he bitterly bewails the conduct of the Association, which during twenty-two years had only cleared one arpent and a half of land. Kings- ford, the Canadian historian, sums up French colonisation thus : —
' In the seventeenth century there was not one settlement west of Montreal. Montreal was only commenced in 1640. In 1668 a mission was sent to the Bay of Quinte. Kingston and Niagara were never anything but trading and military posts. There was a mission at Sault St. Marie ; one at La Pointe, Lake Superior, the modern Bayfield ; Detroit (1764) was a fort which was attacked by the Indian chief Pontiac. The most ancient claim by the Michigan archaeologist goes to no earlier date than 1701. The local settlements of De la Salle and the Illinois were composed of a few soldiers and Indians. The country was thus passed over by the mission father, the trader, the coureur des bois. Where there was water to float a canoe, with a portage to a descending stream, there the explorer of New France was to be found rarely to achieve little more than its discovery.' 1
1 History of Canada^ vol. i. p. 115.
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Thus New France fell because in her struggle with New England she had no real colonial strength to rest upon. Sternly the Puritan settlers of New England were laying their grip upon the country ; and the sailors and fishermen of Nova Scotia were always ready to fight the French, whether in the Bay of Fundy, or off Cape Breton, or along the coasts of Newfoundland, or up the St. Lawrence valley. At the begin- ning of the eighteenth century the main object of France was to keep the English colonists behind the Alleghanies. Failing this, they might have cut them off on the west by making Louisiana a reality, and filling it with Protestant emigrants. The question of boundaries and outposts could never be settled except by an appeal to the god of battles.
In addition to the explorers she sent forth, France has had many brave and capable commanders to fight her cause in New France. Frontenac, at one time Governor of Canada, was an able and enterprising officer. At the close of the seven- teenth century the power of France was very great in Canada, the whole country, from Maine to beyond Labrador and Hudson's Bay, besides the valleys of the St. Lawrence and the Mississippi, falling under her sovereignty. The exploits of d'Iberville both in Hudson's Bay (1687) and on the Maine frontier were a bright and redeeming page in her annals.
But she had no greater or more chivalrous general than Mont- calm. His defence of New France was a long and gallant struggle against circumstances. Montcalm had seen service in campaigns in Italy and Germany, and in May 1756 he landed in Canada with 1000 regulars and 400 recruits. One of his officers was M. de Bourgainville, of whom we hear much after- wards as an explorer in distant Southern waters. With this com- paratively insignificant force Montcalm achieved a remarkable number of successes, taking the forts around Lake Champlain ; but when Louisburg on Cape Breton, the Dunkirk of Canada, fell and the passage of the St. Lawrence was blocked, Mont- calm knew that the fate of New France was sealed. The capture of Quebec and the gallantry of Wolfe and Montcalm
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are twice-told tales. ' Wolfe, twice wounded, died, having been informed by his attendants of his victory ; and Montcalm, shot near the city, was led in supported on his black charger — led in to die ! Rarely have two nobler spirits met in battle array than Montcalm and Wolfe.'
From the date of the British occupation, 1763, Canada began quickly to fill up. It is estimated that not more than 8000 emigrants had ever come from France to Canada, chiefly in the time of Colbert. These had increased to 65,ooo.1 Many of these Frenchmen were men of high rank, and Louis xiv. boasted that ' Canada contained more of his old nobility than the rest of the colonies put together.' The feudal system was transplanted to the banks of the St. Lawrence ; and the great landowners or seigniors, who were grantees of long strips of territory, required service and homage from the censitaire or ordinary settler, who came to them 'without sword or spurs, with bare head and one knee on the ground.' The censitaire was compelled to grind his flour at the seignior's mill, bake his bread in the seignior's oven, give one fish in every eleven caught, and work for his lord one or more days in every year. Yet, with all these advantages, the seigniors never became rich and prosperous colonists. No doubt the feeling of caste demoralised them and degraded labour in their eyes. But that man must live by the sweat of his brow and by tilling and developing the ground is the accepted condition of colonial life. Forests have to be cleared, swamps drained, and fields ploughed. Apparently the French seigniors disliked these occupations, and preferred hunting and exploring as occupations better suited to their taste, and so became path- finders and coureurs des bois. Such men, however, could not build up a State or even form a society.
Between 1780 and 1800 a new immigration set in which pro- duced a lasting influence upon the fortunes of Canada ; and this was the immigration of the United Empire Loyalists. After the close of the American War there were thousands of
1 A Short History of the Canadian People, by James Bryce, p. 221.
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British settlers who, rather than live under the flag of the United States, resolved to leave their homes and properties at vast sacrifices and go north to Canada. These men were some of the best of the American settlers, being of stern stuff and of un- doubted patriotism. By a proclamation of George HI., 1763, handsome provision was made for these refugees. To every person of field-officer's rank 5000 acres were promised; to a captain, 3000 ; to subalterns, 2000 acres ; to each non-com- missioned officer, 200 acres; and to every private, 50 acres.
The first instalment of refugees arrived off the mouth of the St. John's River in May 1783, in what is now New Bruns- wick ; and before the end of the summer 5000 had found homes along the river, laying the prosperity of Parrtown or Frederic- ton. In the same year large settlements were made in Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island. The number of the 1783 refugees is reckoned at 13,000. This number was raised by subsequent emigration to 30,000. The sum paid from the British Exchequer in aid of these Loyalist bands amounted to $15,000,000 or ^3,000,000, and rations had to be issued in some cases for three years to keep them alive.
The Loyalists laid the foundation of Upper Canada. Colonel Simcoe, the first Lieutenant-Governor of Upper Canada (1792), adopted a bold and active colonisation policy in this part of the world. His policy was to dismiss every soldier quartered in Canada and give him 100 acres of land as soon as he could find a substitute. He held out tempting offers to young Americans, and endeavoured to draw them into the English service. In its character the province of Upper Canada resembled a vast military settlement on the confines of the North- West, with endless scope before it.
The huge districts of the North- West were known as the hunting preserve of the Hudson's Bay Company, founded in 1670. Prince Rupert had obtained from Charles n. a charter which made him and the Hudson's Bay Company nominal monopolists of an extent of country stretching from Lake Superior to the Rocky Mountains, from Manitoba to Athabasca.
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Very often this territory was described as Prince Rupert's Land, and Cape Henrietta Maria in Hudson's Bay points to the Royal connection. Curiously enough, the western littoral of Hudson's Bay has the nomenclature in Pinkerton's map of ' North Wales,' and also of 'New South Wales.' Hidden from the ken of Europe, these solitudes were long believed to be little better than snowy wastes.
An epoch, however, occurred in the history of the great North- West when Thomas Douglas, Earl of Selkirk, acquired 1 16,000 square miles of land for a colonisation experiment, and led a colony of Highlanders thither (1811-1816). The earl was a most distinguished cekist or leader of colonists, and had already (1803) settled 800 Highlanders in Prince Edward Island. His schemes won the warm sympathy of Sir Walter Scott ; and surely no colonisation experiment has ever proved more successful than the Selkirk settlement, which laid the foundation of the province of Manitoba. There is no more congenial place for Orkney and Shetland men in the world than North- West Canada.
In the time of Lord Selkirk there was a great deal of acute distress in Scotland. The battle of Waterloo not only marked a great epoch in the history of Europe but also an important crisis in the history of British colonisation. The strain of the Napoleonic wars upon England and her resources had been terrible. England like a wearied gladiator had sunk back exhausted after her terrible duel. Poverty and crime were rife throughout the length and breadth of the land. A spirited emigration policy to the British colonies seemed one of the best and wisest remedies for general distress ; and Lord Bathurst, the Secretary of State at the time, gave settlers a choice of land in either Upper Canada or Quebec. The best known of the settlements that ensued was that formed in Upper Canada in 1816, in the townships of Bathurst, Drummond, Beckwith, and Goulburn, known as the Perth settlement.
The M'Nab settlement, up the Ottawa, was an attempt to
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transfer the clan system to Canada, and the chieftain wore his * bonnet and feather, tartan and sporran, and besides his bright scarlet vest with its silver buttons.' He was attended also by his piper, and the highlands of Canada re-echoed to the music of the bagpipes. In 1826 Bytown (Ottawa) was formed, and became from its position a great centre of the lumber industry; and in 1823 the British Government emigrated large numbers of Irishmen to the Peterborough district. The Huron country was surveyed into twenty townships, and for many consecu- tive years there was a ceaseless flow of emigrants to Canada. Men of all ranks flocked to the country and helped to develop its resources.
Professor Bryce records 'that a unique "logging-bee" is described as taking place in Upper Canada in which one, afterwards Chief Justice of Upper Canada, another in time a county judge, and a young man now an episcopal rector, did their share with axe or handspike, while the actual rector of the settlement drove the oxen.' Such a sight would have read a moral to the great Champlain, ' the father of New France,' who complained of the lethargy of his own countrymen in those early days of colonisation, and would have indicated to him the true and real differences between British and French colonisa- tion. It has been by hard work, and by hard work alone, that the British colonial empire has been built up. The climax of the emigration movement following the Napoleonic wars seems to have been reached in 1831, when the number of Canadian immigrants reached the total of 34,000.
Thus, then, the fabric of Canadian prosperity was built up by successive immigrations. New blood was infused into the old veins, and the life of the colony flourished. What was stagnant in the old colonial life was quickened and revivified by new ideas on trade and policy imported from Europe. The French censitaires felt the genial influences of greater indi- vidual freedom and liberty, and gained activity from the frequent admixture of Scotch, English, Irish, and German elements. Freehold and franchise came in due time, and
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within the borders of the vast domain there was peace and plenty.
The war of 1812, waged by the United States against Canada and England, was a regrettable and untimely interrup- tion, but it could not alter materially the flow of Canadian prosperity. The foremost thinkers of the Republic were ashamed to be in a bloody partnership with the imperialism of Napoleon. As far as the Canadian people were concerned, the call to arms strengthened their 'native resolution,' and gave French, British, Germans, and Scandinavians a common cause. The habitant of Lower Canada, the fisherman of Nova Scotia, the lumberer of the Ottawa valley, and the trapper of the Far West felt their patriotism glow when the news came that the Yankee meant to conquer their country. Nor did their trade suffer ultimately by the unequal conflict, the American mercantile marine being driven off Canadian waters by the superior power of the British fleet.
Much indeed has been made from time to time of the sentimental alliance between France and the United States ; and the colossal statue of Liberty, the gift of France, and, from its site overlooking the city of New York, visible afar off — like that of Athena Promachus of the Acropolis, the tutelary deity of ancient Athens, seen from distant Sunium — is sup- posed to be symbolical of the everlasting entente cordiale. Good Americans also are supposed to go to Paris when they die, preferring Lutetia to Fair Parthenope or Rome or London. O. W. Holmes has commemorated the attachment between the two peoples, begun in the War of Independence :
' Sister in trial ! who shall count
Thy generous friendship's claim, Whose blood ran mingling in the fount
That gave our land its name, Till Yorktown saw in blended line
Our conquering arms advance, And victory's double garlands twine
Our banners ? Vive la France ! '
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It is doubtful whether this sentiment can ever stand a very great strain. When it has come to practical questions of territory and sovereignty in the New World, France has been always told firmly that she must go in order that the young Republic may carry out her Monroe doctrines. W7hat the United States have said to France they have said also to Spain. The Count de Aranda, who as the representative of the Cabinet of Madrid assisted in negotiating the Treaty of Paris in 1783, which established the independence of the United States, uttered the following remarkable prophecy regarding the future of the young Republic : ' It is a pygmy, but before long it will be a giant, the formidable Colossus in the New World It will forget the immense service which France and Spain have rendered to it — for it is to them that it owes its independence — and will only occupy itself with its own great- ness. The liberty of conscience it has proclaimed, the cer- tainty which industrious men will have of procuring a livelihood in that great country, and the political institution which it has established, will attract to the Confederation, from all parts of the world, an intelligent and laborious population, and we shall have the mortification of seeing it exercise an exclusive and tyrannical sway over the New World. . . . They will begin by taking Florida, which will make them masters of the Gulf of Mexico; and they will afterwards attack the beautiful empire of New Spain.' l
On the subject also of the disappearance of France from the New World— a disappearance the United States have done little indeed to hinder — Chateaubriand writes : ' We possessed here vast territories which might have offered a home to the excess of our population, an important market to our commerce, a nursery to our navy. Now we are forced to confine to our prisons culprits condemned by the tribunals, for want of a spot of ground whereon to place these wretched creatures. We are excluded from the New World when the human race is recommencing. The English and Spanish 1 Chevalier's Le Mexique, Ancien et Moderne,
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languages serve to express the thoughts of many millions of men in Africa, in Asia, in the South Sea islands, and the continent of the two Americas ; and we, disinherited of the conquests of our courage and our genius, hear the language of Racine, of Colbert, and of Louis xrv. spoken merely in a few hamlets of Louisiana and Canada under a foreign sway. There it remains, as it were, for an evidence of the reverses of our fortune and the error of our policy. Thus, then, has France disappeared from North America like those Indian tribes with which she sympathised, and some of the wrecks of which I myself have seen.' 1
During this century the history of Canada has been princi- pally the history of political consolidation. Lord Durham's Report in 1837 gives the student of its annals a key to the inner and social life of Upper and Lower Canada. The rebellion of 1837 was a political upheaving the depth and strength of which seem to have been imperfectly understood at the time. Grievances existed and inequalities prevailed, of which time has been the great rectifier. There were angry discussions and heated recriminations on both sides. Papineau, the leader of the rebellion, was regarded by some in the light of a Hampden ; but others, and these Canadians, have called him * impassioned, prejudiced, and imprudent.' 2
Lord Durham was the pacificator of Canada, and his Report marks the beginning of a new epoch in the history of the British colonies. Lord Norton in his Colonial Policy and History has briefly stated the whole case. Ke writes : ' Lord Durham described the general state of things as that of a chronic collision between the executive and representative bodies in all the North American colonies. " In each and every province the representatives were in hostility to the policy of the Government, and the administration of public affairs was permanently in the hands of a Ministry not in harmony with the popular branch of the Legislature." English taxes were lavished as the means of quieting and demoralising 1 Travels in America, vol. ii. 2 History of Canada^ by Macmullen.
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the spirit of the colonists. It was argued that the cessation of such vexation would be the cessation of all colonial connec- tion. Lord Durham alone affirmed the opposite and true opinion, guided as he was by the enlightened views of Edward Gibbon Wakefield and Charles Buller, that cessation from such interference would be the starting-point from which a natural, free, and vigorous attachment would spring up between the colony and the Mother-country.' The whole of this question belongs more especially to the history of the Canadian con- stitution, and is a study in itself to which all readers of colonial history can turn with advantage. Since the accession of Queen Victoria there has been a gradual settling-down of conflicting elements in Canada. The Confederation of 1867, carried out by Lord Carnarvon, has seemed to complete politi- cally the ' solidarity ' of the Dominion. The Canadian Pacific Railway, one of the most daring and skilful of all mechanical enterprises, has linked the scattered provinces together and brought east and west together in one organic whole. The railway is also an imperial trade-route of the utmost value, with an outlook towards China and Japan on the east. In view of a quickly expanding Pacific trade, a new line of steamships from British Columbia to the British possessions in the Pacific has been inaugurated, and there appears to be no limit to their utility.
It is just possible that dangers from within may assail the Dominion of Canada. For a long time past a few politicians, of whom Professor Goldwin Smith is the best known, have been openly advocating annexation to the United States, and a political amalgamation with ' the Triumphant Democracy ' of the south. Canada would then cease to be part of the British Empire, and would be absorbed as a northern addition into the body of the United States. Putting aside sentiment, it is not clear that Canada would be the gainer commercially speaking. Her manufactures might be handicapped, her industries fettered, and her territories overrun by a mixed mob of emigrants. Her influence, if we take population as the
F
82 British Colonisation
basis, would be very small, and she would be dragged ignominiously at the tail of a Republic some of whose troubles are in the near future. It is by no means certain that the Roman Catholic 'population of Lower Canada would, in the event of their being an integral portion of the United States, enjoy the same rights and privileges as they do at present.
There is no sign of any real and widespread desire on the part of Canada to change her destiny. On the contrary, Canadians are passionately loyal, and are by no means pre- pared to follow the lead of political enthusiasts and vision- aries. Commercially, Canada may draw closer to England ; and how she may do this is the problem of the hour. Some have advocated reciprocity treaties between Canada and the Mother-country on the principle of give-and-take. It has been argued that a slight duty on foreign corn and meat would send up colonial industries, and especially Canadian agriculture, by leaps and bounds. But England is hardly ready to make any difference between foreign and colonial imports. The question involves a the outset a reconsideration of her whole fiscal policy. But might it not be possible, so others argue, for Canada to adopt Free Trade ? This is the question on the other side.
Quite recently, and during the numerous discussions on Irish Home Rule, some politicians have quoted the example of Canada as applicable to Ireland. If Canadians, they argue, manage their own affairs under the various Provincial Govern- ments, and in obedience to the Central Chamber at Ottawa, why should not Irishmen manage their own affairs, and yet remain loyal to the Central Chamber at Westminster, con- tinuing true to the British connection ? Surely there can be no real analogy here. In the first place, the machinery of government in Canada is different from any machinery of government yet devised, or even proposed, for Ireland. Canada has achieved a Federal form of government, but England has not arrived at this stage yet. Many Irishmen clamour for the
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rights and position of an independent nation, and ask to be dissociated from British rule altogether. It is the boast of Canadians that they intend to be loyal .to the British flag. Even supposing Canada wished to 'cut the painter' and go adrift, the danger to England would be infinitesimal compared to that which would follow upon the entire separation of Ireland, an island lying close off our shores. England can afford to give Canadians the control of their own trade and police ; can she afford to give Irishmen the same control ? The matter hardly admits of argument ; and, whatever the form of any scheme of Irish Home Rule in the future, it can hardly be modelled according to the Canadian precedent.
As Newfoundland has had a long-standing fisheries diffi- culty with France, so Canada has had a disagreement with the United States. By the treaty of 1783, which recognised the independence of the United States, the American fisher- men were given the ' liberty ' of fishing inshore through- out British America. This ' liberty ' was of course essentially different from a fishing right. By the law of nations, every State owns the sea for three miles from the shore. This liberty of fishing inside the creeks and bays of the Cana- dian maritime provinces was terminated by the very fact of the war of 1812-1814, and in October 1813 Nova Scotia memorialised the British Government 'to guard against the hateful articles of the treaty of 1783.' War terminates such agreements, and the British navy swept the whole American seaboard.
By the treaty of October 1818, the only fishery treaty now in force, United States fishermen had liberty to take fish of every kind along certain named portions of the North Ameri- can coasts, without prejudice to Hudson's Bay rights ; and they also had liberty to dry and cure fish on unsettled bays, harbours, and creeks of Newfoundland and Labrador ; but as soon as such places were settled they were to come to some agreement with the inhabitants or proprietors. At the same
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time they renounced any liberty to fish inside the three-mile limit previously enjoyed, in portions of the coast not specially mentioned. On the other hand, they were allowed to enter territorial waters for the sake of shelter, or repairing their vessels, or obtaining wood or water — but for no other purpose whatever. It is to the strict interpretation of the 1818 con- vention that Canadians wish to adhere.
The Reciprocity Treaty of June 1854 introduced a new phase into the fisheries difficulty. The United States fisher- men were given liberty to ' take fish of every kind, except shell fish, on the sea coasts and shores and in the bays, harbours, and creeks of Canada, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, and of the several islands thereunto adjacent, without being restricted to any distance from the shore.' In return for this privilege the Canadians had, amongst other concessions, free trade in fish with the Republic. After the abrogation of the Reciprocity Treaty in 1866, Canada and the United States reverted to their former position which was laid down by the treaty of 1818.
The worst of a fisheries difficulty is that the Imperial Government has to occupy a somewhat invidious position with reference to her colonies. By the law of nations Newfound- landers, for instance, claim all rights implied in the three-mile limit. The Imperial Government supersedes the Provincial Governments in what the colony deem to be a matter of provincial concern. Such a dilemma tests the first principles of our government to the utmost.1
1 For facts and figures see Appendix XII.
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References : —
Parkman's Historical Works.
The History of Canada, by William Kingsford, vols. i.-iii. Triibner
and Co., 1886.
Bryce's Short History of the Canadian People ', 1891. Bryce's Manitoba, its Growth and Present Condition, 1882. Butler's Great Lone Land, 1872. Butler's The Wild North Land, 1873.
Federal Government in Canada, by J. G. Bourinot, C.M.G., 1889. Greswell's History of Newfoundland and the Canadian Dominion,
1890. Clarendon Press, Oxford. Under the auspices of the
Royal Colonial Institute. Greswell's Geography of Newfoundland and the Canadian Dominion.
Under the auspices of the Royal Colonial Institute. Parliamentary Procedure in Canada, byj. G. Bourinot, C.M.G., 1892. The Proceedings of the Royal Colonial Institute. See also Voyages of Samuel Hearne, Alexander Mackenzie,
George Vancouver, John Franklin, etc. etc.
CHAPTER V
THE WEST AFRICAN SETTLEMENTS
CLOSELY connected with the West Indies in past times were the numerous ports and factories of the West African coast along the Bight of Benin. But the link that bound them together was that of sordid and unhallowed gain, the point in common an unholy traffic. The very thoroughfare of ocean was known as ' a middle passage ' recalling one of the darkest pages in our annals of colonisation. The manner and fashion of the West African and West Indian trade in former days was simple enough, and at one time highly remunerative. A ship would sail from the port of Bristol, for instance, with a suit- able cargo of British goods to the Oil Rivers or Sierra Leone, and by traffic with slave-dealers convert this cargo into a ship-load of slaves, who very often were huddled together like bales of merchandise, without any regard for health and comfort.
Ultimately, what was left of the stifled, half-starved speci- mens of black humanity was deposited at some such slave- mart as Port Royal in Jamaica, or elsewhere. The slaves would naturally be exchanged at the West Indian port for a certain quantity of sugar, rum, molasses, indigo, coffee, tobacco, or some other produce of negro labour equivalent in value ; and so the ship would find its way back to an English port after an unholy, but profitable, round. It is clear that in this traffic, which began and terminated in the home port, the West Indians were either the consignees or debtors of the West African merchant. Under these circumstances the West Indies were regarded as factories rather than as colonies in
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the strict sense of the word. The shipowners of Great Britain rapidly made their fortunes, and the great game of monopoly went merrily on until emancipation came and Englishmen repented in sackcloth and ashes. ' Quashie,' the quondam miserable victim of our greed, has lived to revenge himself, and lives a merry and irresponsible life in the lovely islands of the West Indies ; nor does he wish to return to the shores of West Africa.
The honours of West African exploration rest first of all with the Portuguese. By a bull of Pope Eugene iv. an exclusive grant was made in 1438 to the crown of Portugal of all the countries that might be discovered between Cape Non, the ultima Thule of early navigators, and the continent of India. When two English captains, in 1481, were reported to be equipping a trading expedition to Guinea, ambassadors were sent from the court of Portugal to remonstrate with Edward iv., and the enterprise was nipped in the bud. For more than a hundred years Portuguese supremacy was unques- tioned along the West African coasts, and it is strange that the world should have gained so little by their occupation. Portu- guese colonisation has always resembled the ' upas ' or poison- ous tree of Java, that blights everything beneath its shadow.
English sailors, however, were not long to be debarred from any part of the world where their efforts were likely to meet with success. As they regarded not the Spanish mono- poly of the West Indies and the New World, so they set at naught the Portuguese monopoly of the west coast of Africa and the East. The Reformation was letting loose forces which could not be controlled. In 1554 three vessels under Captain John Lok sailed for Guinea and brought back gold, guinea-pepper, and elephants' tusks. Lok also brought back some negro slaves. In 1588 Queen Elizabeth inaugurated an epoch in West African commerce by granting a patent to a company of merchants in Exeter to carry on a trade with Senegal and Gambia. In 1618 King James gave his royal sanction to a company, which was, however, soon dissolved.
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Thus the first steps were taken, and many sailors brought back tales of strange races, Moorish kingdoms, sea-horses, elephants, crocodiles, baboons, and, above all, of gold. The wonderful travels and adventures of Andrew Battel, who sailed from the Thames in 1589, and after incredible hardships, hairbreadth escapes, captivities, and wanderings in Portuguese Africa lived to return to England, settle in Essex, and tell his story — as thrilling, doubtless, as that of Othello — into the ear of the great Purchas, excited universal attention.
In 1662 a charter was granted to the Duke of York secur- ing to him the commerce of the whole West African littoral, extending from Cape Blanco in 20° N. lat. to the Cape of Good Hope — a truly royal concession, made, in all probability, with few ideas of the interests, as well as the localities, in- volved. This concession was returned into the King's hand by the Duke, and this led to the creation, in 1672, of the Royal African Company, with a capital of ,£111,000. They built forts at Dix Cove, Seconda, Commendah, Anamaboe, Accra, and strengthened Cape Coast Castle. This company was succeeded by the African Company of Merchants in 1750, with liberty to form settlements between 20° N. and 20° S., and this company lasted until 1821.
The eighteenth century, even more than the preceding one, was the dark age of West African history. No more unprin- cipled ruffians ever infested the shores of any country than the captains of the slave-ships. After the slavers and pirates came the ' palm-oil ruffians,' as they were called, consisting of the masters and crews of the sailing-vessels that anchored in one of the oil rivers and waited for their cargoes. It was a terrible coast, where, to use Mr. H. H. Johnston's words, ' crime raged unchecked, and fever and disease, the sure and sudden waiters upon crime, exacted their due.' There was no effort made, missionary or otherwise, to ameliorate even the fringe of the continent, the business of Europeans being con- fined entirely to a base, unholy, and precarious littoral and riverine trade.
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A new and more wholesome view of West Africa was inaugurated when Englishmen, with the dauntless energy of their race, took up the task of West African exploration. This task is second only in importance and interest to that of Central African exploration. In the beginning, the object was to discover the city of Timbuctoo, where, it was thought, all the wealth of Africa was concentrated ; and as far back as 1618 a company was formed with the express object of ascending the Gambia and making their way inland. Nothing, however, came of this venture, as the Portuguese barred the way, seizing the ship and massacring the crew.
It was due to the remarkable African Association, formed in 1788, and guided chiefly by that enthusiastic traveller and savant, Sir Joseph Banks, that the problem of West African exploration, and especially the task of determining the features of the Niger valley, was finally taken in hand. The roll of explorers employed by this Association from time to time is long and illustrious.
It may be well to state here very briefly what were the main features of the problems presented to the geographers of North and North Central Africa at the beginning of this century, and indeed for some time after. If reference is made to any old maps of the preceding century, such as those illustrating the work of Abbe PreVost, a well-known compiler of voyages, in 1780, it will be seen that the coast-line of the Gulf of Guinea, or St. Thomas, as it was called, was plentifully dotted with names of stations, trading-ports, and rivers. But the interior was a great blank. Even such an atlas as that of Pinkerton's, dated 1817, does not enlighten the student much further, as it does not show the course of the Niger further than a few degrees to the east of the meridian of Greenwich. The problem of the Niger watershed remained such, indeed, as it had been handed down by the ancients. Geographers of the nineteenth century were still at the mercy of the speculations of Ptolemy and Pliny.
There were certain preconceived ideas with regard to this river which it cost a great deal to eradicate. It was taken
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almost for certain that it flowed due east along immense regions until it merged its waters with those of the Nile ; or, it was argued, it might disappear altogether in Mid Africa, evaporated by the fiery heat of the sun. Later on, it was maintained that it turned its course south, and was identical with the Zaire or Congo. There were also rumours of lakes in the interior, about the existence of which the natives of Africa itself seemed to be agreed. What were these lakes ? Where was the outlet ? Were they part of the Niger and Nile river- system ? Or, it was thought, there might be a great inland sea somewhere in the Sudan.
There appeared to be three routes from which to assail these geographical difficulties. First, there was the waterway of the Gambia, along which an explorer could advance, cross the intervening country to the Joliba or Niger, and, when once launched upon these waters, it might be possible to descend them until the sea was reached or the supposed junction with the Nile was found. Secondly, there was the caravan-route from Cairo and the East. It seemed probable that somewhere along this route, either to the north or south, the great river might itself be discovered flowing majestically eastwards. Indeed, in their quick imaginations, cartographers had already laid down its course on maps. Thirdly, there was the route from Tripoli, along which it might chance that the Joliba or Niger might be intersected, especially as it seemed, from glimpses already gained, to flow to the north and east.
The ' ambages Nigri ' had as great a fascination as the ' ambages Nili.' Terrible indeed was the number of victims the solution of the great Niger problem was destined to exact. No Minotaur of ancient days was more hungry of human life. It was by a strange irony indeed that the ancients placed somewhere in North-West Africa or Libya the Gardens of the Hesperides and pleasant resorts, whereas in reality travellers found there nothing but lethal waters, and too often a Valley of the Shadow of Death.
One of the first to lay down his life for the cause of West
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African exploration was John Ledyard, an American, who had already travelled in Irkutsk and Siberia. The object placed before him by the African Association was to explore the Sennaar westward 'in the latitude and supposed direction of the Niger.' For this purpose he proceeded to Egypt and ascended the Nile to Cairo, where he prepared to travel with a caravan to Sennaar. Here, however, he was struck down by sickness and died (1788). What need to recall the name and exploits of the celebrated Mungo Park, whose name is a 'household word,' another intrepid emissary of the African Association, who, going by way of the Gambia, returned home victorious after his first essay to view the waters of the great river (1795), and then perished in a second and more ambi- tious attempt. Then came the German enthusiast Hornemann, who endeavoured to reach the interior from the East, using the great caravan-route across, the desert (1798). Next came Lewis Burckhardt, a Swiss by birth, who sought to purloin the secrets of African geography by stealth, turning Mohammedan and going in disguise along the Cairo trade-route, the fore- runner of such men as Bertolucci, Dr. Wallin, and our own illustrious Sir Richard Burton. But he, too, fell by the way (1817), and in his last letter wrote: 'I was starting in two months' time with the caravan returning from Mecca and going to Fezzan — thence to Timbuctoo ; but it is otherwise disposed.'
After the battle of Waterloo the British Government took up the task of North African exploration, and from this date there was a kind of official sanction given to a series of most important enterprises, which were more successful than the efforts of the African Association, and certainly procured for England the chief honours of exploration, and in a certain sense led up to her title-deeds to that vast area of West African territory known as the ' Niger Protectorate.'
The motives that led to the first important expedition (1816) setting out under these auspices were given in detail by Mr. Barrow, Secretary of the Admiralty, who was already
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celebrated for his Travels in China and his well-known Report on the Cape of Good Hope, after its first occupation by the British in 1^95- The immediate and primary object of the expedition was to determine, by tracing the Zaire or Congo upwards from its mouth, whether the idea, strongly rooted in Mungo Park's mind, that the Niger and Congo were one and the same river was accurate or not.
It was suggested also by Sir Joseph Banks, still the ardent promoter of African enterprise, and now in his seventy-third year, that a steam-engine might be used to propel the vessel against the rapid current of the Congo. In past times the mouth of the Congo had been experienced to be almost impossible to navigate.
Saving and excepting the expeditions of Ross and Parry to the North Pole, there was no enterprise during the first quarter of this century that so deeply riveted public and official atten- tion as the great Niger problem. The British public were inclined to agree with Mungo Park, who had written in his memoir to Lord Camden that ' the Niger problem was in a commercial point of view second only to the circumnavigation of the Cape of Good Hope, and in a geographical sense the greatest that remains to be made in the world.'
To assail this problem Captain Tuckey, a naval officer, was first sent out, who had already served his apprenticeship by exploring the coasts of Australia (1802) and making a survey of Port Phillip, and with him went several distinguished men — Professor Smith, a botanist ; Mr. Lockhart, a Kew official ; Mr. Cranch, a biologist ; and Mr. Tudor, a comparative anatomist. The ship that took them out was the Dorothea transport, which was employed afterwards on the Polar expedi- tion. It is sad to think, however, that fever and death thinned and decimated the ranks of this expedition also, and the pro- blem of the Niger and Congo left as obscure as it was before.
Next came James and Bowdich, who in 1817-18 were lured on to Ashantee by rumours of a wonderful El Dorado at Coomassie, whence also the problem of the Niger, it was
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thought, could be best unfolded. Then in 1822-23 Oudney, a naval surgeon, Clapperton, a naval lieutenant, and Major Denham, an old Peninsular campaigner, set out from Tripoli, and, marching southwards, reached Lake Tsaad. The Bashaw of Tripoli had signified to Lord Bathurst, always ready to take up projects of exploration, his readiness to help and escort an expedition as far as Bornou. The result of this expedition was to throw much light upon the hydrography of the interior ; still the Niger remained a puzzle.
Clapperton, said to be a perfect Bayard of African travel, undertook a second expedition from the Bight of Benin to Soccatoo (1825), accompanied by Pearce, Morrison, and Richard Lander; but only Lander lived to return. The addi- tions made by Clapperton to the geography of these regions were immense. He had measured every degree of latitude from the Mediterranean to the Bight of Benin, and of longi- tude from Lake Tsaad to Sokoto ; and, although he had not discovered the termination of the Niger, he had shown that it was utterly impossible that it could be the Niger of Ptolemy or of Pliny, or the great river of Herodotus.
In 1824 M. Caillie, the celebrated French traveller, per- formed the great feat of reaching Timbuctoo. An American sailor, Robert Adams, who sailed from New York in 1810, and after being shipwrecked on the Senegal coast had lived as a captive for more than three years in North-West Africa, had given an account of the city of Timbuctoo, which was deemed worthy of credence. His deposition was read before Lord Bathurst and Sir Joseph Banks, and the Quarterly Review of May 1816 contains a notice of the whole adventure. But it is only fair to take the Frenchman's account as the first authoritative and descriptive account of this wonderful city, although Alexander Gordon Laing had entered it the year before (August 18), but did not live to return. M. Caillie took a route eastwards from the French colony of Senegal, advancing by way of Kakondy, Kankan, Timbo, and thence northwards to Jenne. Embarking there on the Joliba, he
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noted its course, its islands, and the extensive Lake of Debo, during a month's voyage to Timbuctoo. The list of travellers who held this bourne before them had been a long and brilliant one, including Houghton, Browne, Hornemann, Park, Tuckey, Peddie, Campbell, Gray, Ritchie, Bowdich, Oudney, Clapperton, Denham, Laing, Burckhardt, Beaufort, Mollien, Benzoni.1 The next great feat was to find the Niger mouth, and to sight the Benue, or Tsadda, its eastern affluent. This was done by the brothers Lander (1830).
The later triumphs of West African exploration belong to Dr. Richardson, who, accompanied by Dr. Barth and Dr. Overweg, two Prussian gentlemen, set out by way of Tripoli and the Sahara with the object of opening up commercial relations and concluding treaties with any native power so dis- posed, especially with the Sultan of Bornou. The chief object of Richardson's journey was to endeavour to lessen the horrible evils of the slave trade. One of the first steps, in his opinion, was to encourage legitimate traffic between Europe and the great nurseries of slaves, which might be done by entering into commercial relations with the most important Sates of Central Africa — an idea which has commended itself more recently to the pioneers and merchant philanthropists of Eastern Central Africa, to whom it is abundantly clear that a developed and well-guarded highway which affords quick and easy communication with the interior is the most effective method of fighting with the slave traders and intercepting the caravan-routes.
Mr. Richardson left England on his bold and philanthropic enterprise ' under the orders and at the expense of Her Majesty's Government.' He started from Tripoli on March 1850, and followed a route southward to Lake Tsaad, parallel with that of Oudney, Denham, and Clapperton (1822-1824), keeping, however, more to the west. Unfortunately, Richardson did not live to return, as he died at Unguratua in March 1851, a year after his departure from Tripoli. But he left behind
1 Preface to Travels to Timbuctoo, by Rene Caillie, London, 1830.
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him a diary of eight small and closely written volumes, which formed a most exhaustive description of Saharan regions hitherto untraversed and unexplored by Europeans.
It was more especially due to the energies of Dr. Earth (1849-1855), the other companion of James Richardson, that the watershed of the Niger became revealed to the long- wondering eyes of Europe. Dr. Earth, after exploring Lake Tsaad, entered the kingdom of Bagirmi and reached its capital, purposing to extend his travels and to touch the Nile water- shed. Finding this impracticable, he turned south-west, and then chanced upon the Benue at Tepi. At this spot this river was 800 yards wide and eleven deep, and proved to be the eastern branch of the Niger or Quorrah. The whole of the district traversed by Dr. Earth was very fertile, and presented a vast field to the commerce of Europe. Men knew now that the Joliba and the Quorrah were one river ! The Niger was not the Nile, nor was it the Congo ! Nor did it disappear, as some thought, by magic, swallowed up in the thirsty sands of the vast Sahara !
The final touches to previous discoveries were given by an exploration conducted by the Pleiad and undertaken at the instance of the British Government. The Benue or Tsadda (Lander) was now surveyed as the eastern branch of the Niger, which discharges its waters into the Atlantic through several mouths — the Nun channel being found to be the best for navigation. It should be mentioned that owing to the obser- vance of simple hygienic rules the crew of the Pleiad enjoyed almost a total immunity from fever — a fact which told in favour of the Niger valley, hitherto associated with so many sad reminiscences and such gloomy tales of loss and failure for all Europeans.
Such, in brief, were the chief expeditions made from all quarters of the compass — from the Gambia on the west, from Tripoli on the north, and from distant Cairo on the east — to unfold the 'ambages Nigri'; and to Englishmen the tale is one replete with national daring, hardihood, and enterprise — to
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which they can refer with pride and satisfaction — giving all honour to the dead heroes who have fallen by the way.
The epics of travel are closed and the prose of commerce begins, and England is reaping a rich harvest from the toils of her sons.
To the merchant the Niger valley may mean a great deal, and he may be now seen to be entering upon the labours of the pioneer. Along the valley of the Niger and Benue the British may be brought into closer contact with the most intelligent races of the Western Sudan. Kuka, the capital of Bornou, near the western shores of the Tsaad, is one of the greatest markets of all Central Africa — second only, it is said, to that of Kano in Sokoto.
One of the most recent explorers of these regions was Dr. Nachtigal (1872), who, in company with other Germans, greatly extended German influence in these quarters.
The British Royal Niger Company has, according to recent in- formation, confirmed and extended the provisions of a treaty with the Sultan of Sokoto, and also concluded treaties with the chiefs of Adamawa to the north-east of the Cameroons. English expeditions have a free run from the mouth of the Niger to Bornou and Lake Tsaad. For the moment English, German, and French interests all seem to meet in the neighbourhood of this lake. France from the regions of French Congo, England by way of the Niger, Germany from her coast territories, are rapidly converging upon the interior of West Central Africa.
During this period of inland exploration and discovery, carried on with so much perseverance and determination, it must be remembered that the coast settlements were languish- ing and decaying. The prop of slavery had been taken away, and they had, metaphorically speaking, fallen to the ground. England maintained them not so much for their trade value as for the purpose of putting down or checking the slave trade. In the year 1819 no less than ^28,000 was granted by Parliament to the African Company. The annual value of
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the gold-dust and ivory did not exceed ;£ 100,000. Of the prospects of West Africa it was written at this date : — ' The total inadequacy of these forts to prevent the slave trade will be obvious. The first on the Gold Coast is Apollonia, garrisoned by a black sergeant and two soldiers; it pays a tribute to the chief of the town, who seizes the governor's servants or withholds provisions whenever he wishes to bring them over to his own terms. The trade is very trifling, and the expense of keeping it up very considerable. Dix Cove, the next fort, has a soldier or two more ; its expense is somewhat greater than the former, and its trade less. Seconda, the third, is a thatched house with a governor and two black soldiers. It has little trade, and the next, Commendah, none at all.
' The headquarters of the African Company's corps and the residence of the Governor-in-Chief is Cape Coast Castle, a regular and well-constructed fortress. The strength of the garrison, composed chiefly of native blacks, officered by the traders, consists of about 100 men. The expense of main- taining this fort is considerable, and the trade of no conse- quence. Nine miles to the eastward of this is Anamaboe, a position of little importance except as a check upon the Ashantees, who have recently destroyed the town; it has a governor and a garrison of fifteen soldiers. It has little or no trade. Tantumquerry follows — a very insignificant fort, in a ruinous condition, without trade, and altogether useless except as a point in the line of communication from Cape Coast Castle to the next fort, which is that of Accra, the easternmost of the Gold Coast. In importance Accra ranks next to Cape Coast. It has a small trade in ivory.'
As may be imagined, this line of forts, placed on a line of coast extending for 200 miles, was miserably inadequate to serve as a check upon the slave trade, which was openly carried on under Spanish, Portuguese, and American flags.1
In 1865 Lord Norton observed that evidence collected by the West African Committee, of which he was Chairman, 1 Quarterly Review, January 1820. G
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showed that British commerce on these coasts has thriven better when we have established no settlement, as on the Niger. ' Our penitential plans for national redress of our injury to West Africa by suppressing the trade in slaves, which we first set up, have been ill-directed. The effort, money, health, life wasted in attempting locally to staunch the supply of slaves would probably have been better devoted to checking the extra demand for them. A wall of English corpses round the African shores could not stop the egress of slaves.' The slave trade could only die a gradual death on the western coast ; and in 1865 the demand was limited to the Cubans, to whom England paid ^400,000 to induce them to give up the slave trade.
The Committee of 1865 recommended that we should ultimately withdraw from all West African governments, except perhaps Sierra Leone. Lord Norton observed that the West African squadron used to cost in round figures ^1,000,000 a year ; and in addition we have suffered directly by the fright- ful sacrifice of the lives of gallant men.
Many reformers of our colonial system laid great stress thirty years ago upon the inadequate results of our occupation of the West African coasts, and have pointed out that settle- ments like the Gambia and Sierra Leone cannot be justified by any just economical argument.
There was one use, however, which was suggested as follow- ing upon their occupation — and this was that they supplied a recruiting ground for our West Indian regiments. The Kroomen, also, make most excellent seamen, and would furnish, in tropical countries, a most valuable contingent to England's mercantile marine.
More recently it has been suggested that the coast of West Africa might become the scene of a gigantic scheme of negro repatriation, and that the descendants of the slaves of former times might now, in these more hopeful times of emancipation, be restored with advantage to all parties back to the shores whence their race was sprung. The ' middle passage ' might then be accomplished under widely different conditions, and
The West African Settlements 99
the West Indians freed of what is sometimes considered the incubus of a redundant negro population.
Under the pressing conditions, however, of the nineteenth century it is not likely that England, in a fit of misguided generosity, will restore the fee-simple of the West African littoral to hordes of repatriated negroes. Nor, indeed, is she likely to regard J;he settlements here as simply recruiting grounds for the West Indian regiments. A new industrial era may yet be in store for the West Coast after years of depression. A glance at the map will show that although explorers have long since traversed the Hinterland, England's occupation is chiefly limited to somewhat limited strips of littoral. Here, more than in any other region of the world, perhaps, the in- terests of European nations meet. British, French, Portuguese, and Germans all have shares in the west coast of Africa. This portion of the continent is curiously tesselated, and the international boundaries are especially intricate. In five different settlements or spheres of influence the red prevails. Beginning with the nearest, these are: i. the Gambia; 2. Sierra Leone; 3. the Gold Coast; 4. Lagos; 5. the Niger Protectorate.
i. The Gambia has been described as 'a small and some- what retrograde colony, where by supineness and want of commercial energy we have allowed the French to obtain a considerable hold.' x
The Upper Gambia has been taken under French protection quite recently, and by far the greater part of the commerce at the mouth of the Gambia is French. The Gambia itself is a waterway leading to the very heart of the French possessions in Senegambia. The Gambia was once a great stronghold of the slave trade, and the cessation of this traffic naturally brought about its decay. At one time it was suggested that England should effect an exchange with France, and give Gambia for French territory either on the Gold Coast, Porto Nova, or the Gaboon, or, if possible, barter it for French 1 Proceedings of the Royal Colonial Institute, vol. xx. p. 99.
ioo British Colonisation
fishery rights in Newfoundland ; but nothing has come of any of these proposals. Unlike other West African settlements, the Gambia does not possess the oil-palm. It is a very old colony, disputing even with Newfoundland the honour of being the oldest colony of Great Britain, dating back to 1588, the year of the Elizabethan patent.1
2. Sierra Leone is a younger colony than the Gambia, having its origin in 1787 ; but it has not much to show for a century of British rule. Its coast-line extends for a distance of 1 80 miles from the Great Scarcies River to the Liberian frontier ; but England's influence does not reach far into the interior. It boasts, however, of a very good harbour, and the town of Freetown, originally a settlement for freed negro slaves, is beautifully situated at the corner of a peninsula, and at the base of deeply wooded mountains. The route to the interior plateaux of West Africa has greater advantages than that by way of the Gambia. The post is strongly fortified, and is a coaling-station for the British navy. At the back of Sierra Leone are the sources of the Upper Niger. Here a Moham- medan chief named Samadu is said to have reared a native kingdom of some power, which has been at war with France. The greatest natural curiosity of Sierra Leone is the chimpanzee found in the deep recesses of its forests.2
3. The Gold Coast is not quite so ancient a settlement as the Gambia, but its occupation dates back to 1672, when a company was formed called the Royal African Company. Elmina, one of its posts, was discovered by the Portuguese in 1471 during the progress of their West African explorations. The British possessions now extend over a coast-line .of 350 miles, and are only separated by a short distance from Lagos. The inland limits are somewhat vague. The Ashantee kingdom may be regarded as falling within England's influence ; and it appears to rest with England to assume, if she wishes, a protectorate over the important kingdoms of Gyaman, of
1 For facts and figures see Appendix IV. Section A.
2 Ibid. Section B.
The West African Setttemenit iui
Salaga, and Yandi, the chiefs of which countries have sent presents to the Governor of the Gold Coast. Mr. H. H. Johnston has remarked that it would not be difficult to ex- tend British influence from the Gold Coast to the great bend of the Niger. The Gold Coast is, perhaps, best known to England through the two Ashantee campaigns : the first in 1824, when Sir Charles Macarthy, taking the side of the Fantees against the Ashantees, was killed and his force routed; the second in 1872, when Sir Garnet (now Lord) Wolseley marched up the Prah and took Coomassie, causing King Coffee to sign a peace advantageous to England.1
4. Lagos is the youngest but the most prosperous of all England's West African settlements, its separate existence commencing only in 1863. The port has been termed 'the Liverpool of West Africa,' and is said to owe its prosperity to able management and a wise fiscal policy. Its natural lagoons, also, which stretch along the coast, facilitate the transport of products very greatly ; and, as Lagos is not more than 220 miles from the River Niger, it diverts a considerable amount of trade to itself. The colony boasts of a Botanical Garden— the first in West Africa — and this institution, in encouraging enterprise and the scientific treatment of plants and products, may effect as much as similar institutions in the West Indies. It has already been pointed out what stress Mr. Morris of Kew has laid upon the value of experimental gardens as developing in the West Indies ' a diversity of cultural industries.' Lagos is said to require only an improved harbour, such as would safely admit steamers of deep draught, to send it up to a higher pitch of prosperity than it already enjoys.2
5. The Niger Protectorate is the most recent and valuable acquisition of the British Crown in West Africa. It includes the entire basin of the Lower Niger, including the Benin and Cross Rivers, and extends along the coast of Africa from the Benin River, where it joins the boundary of Lagos, to the mouth
1 For facts and figures see Appendix IV. Section C.
2 Ibid. Section D.
IO21 B'ritish Colonisation
of the Rio del Rey at 9° E. longitude. In 1886 a rtfyal charter was granted to the Royal Niger Company by which extensive powers were given to them, their operations ex- tending as far inland as Gando and Sokoto, being in touch with Darfur, Egypt, and Tripoli.
The depot on the coast is Akassa. It is deserving of notice that along the valleys of the Nile and the Niger, as well as that of the Zambesi, British influence is now predominant. This influence has followed, in the first instance, as a result of a series of those remarkable explorations, carried on, as already pointed out, at various intervals — principally since 1815 — by British explorers.
Mr. H. H. Johnston, late Vice-Consul for the Oil River and Cameroon's, and now Consul for Portuguese East Africa, has given a brief and interesting description of our West Coast colonies : — *
'The geography of true Western Africa — I am not here referring to the coast below the Cameroons, which may properly be considered as coming under the designation of Central or Southern Africa — is comparatively simple. It consists of little else than the basin of the great Niger River, with its eastern affluent, the Benue. In fact, if you draw a short line from the upper waters of the Senegal River to the Upper Niger — a distance of only a few miles — you might with these two great streams form the northern boundary of the districts I am reviewing. Beyond lies the great Sahara Desert, which separates northern, temperate, and Mediterranean Africa from true Africa, the land of the blacks. The flora and fauna of Western Africa — which is bounded on the north, as described, by the Senegal and Niger, and somewhat vaguely on the east between the water-parting of the Niger and Lake Tsaad and the River Shari, and the divide between the southern affluents of the Benue' and the streams that flow into the Cameroons estuary — are of diverse characters. There is the Ethiopian sub-region of tropical Africa generally, which is especially 1 Proceedings of the Royal Colonial Institute, vol. xx.
The West African Settlements 103
characteristic of Eastern and North Central Africa ; and there is the remarkable West African subdivision, which is confined to the narrow coast belt between the Gambia River and the mouth of the Congo, stretching inland from south of the Benue to the shores of the great equatorial lakes.
'In all the coast region between the Gambia and the Cameroons the most extravagant development of tropical vegetation is seen, except in such isolated spots of arid country as are found in the vicinity of Accra and the Gold Coast. Whereas the future wealth of the interior plateaux will most certainly lie in their mineral deposits, the riches of the West Coast region consist in numerous and valuable vegetable products, such as palm-oil and oil from ground nuts, benni- seed, shea butter, rubber, gums, spices, cotton, dyes such as camwood, cocoa-nuts, and valuable timbers, among which ebony occupies a prominent place. Negro races, of which the Kroo tribes in Liberia are the best specimens, are found along the coasts, and Mohammedans in the interior. There are many intermediate links to connect the pure negro with the typical Arab. Generally speaking, the West African colonies are interesting to us as spheres within which we may carry on a profitable trade and at the same time govern the native races. They cannot be colonies in the true sense as homes for men of our race.'1
In this part of Africa, France, who subsidises the colony of Senegal with an annual payment of two million francs, and has launched steamers on the Niger, seems to be the rival of England. Major Ellis in his West African Islands alludes to the efforts made by France to block all trade from the interior reaching our Gambia and Guinea settlements. He expects much from the opening-up of the country, where there are numerous rivers, along the banks of which live many Mussul- man races who are fairly civilised, and in time may become large purchasers of European manufactured goods. The Western Sudan is considered a great prize by many Frenchmen, and 1 For facts and figures see Appendix IV. Section E.
IO4 British Colonisation
during the last decade Frenchmen have been making great progress with a view of 'forming a vast African colony, ex- tending from Algeria on the north to the peninsula of Sierra Leone on the south ; and in order to prevent any other nation from influencing the natives they are doing their best to isolate the British possessions on the Gambia River and at Sierra Leone/ St. Louis, the capital of French Senegal, is on an island in the Senegal River; Goree, the old port, is about 100 miles north of our Bathurst settlement ; and Dakar, the new port, is opposite Goree Island, and promises to have a monopoly of trade. It is connected with St. Louis by a railway.
Extension of railways is a favourite French project in West Africa ; and if the Medine-Bammakou-Timbuctoo line is con- structed, the French will be in a good position to hold com- mand of all trade in this part of the world. Already we are told there are thirteen military posts formed between the Niger and the St. Louis. One of the most enthusiastic Frenchmen who helped to develop French Africa was General Faidherbe.
In Senegal, French trade increased from 28 J millions of francs in 1878 to 47 millions in 1883. The chief trade is in ground nuts, palm-oil, nuts, rubber, and gum. In the interior there are gold-mines, as at Bouri on the left of the Niger. Bammakou on the Niger is 1000 miles from St. Louis and 325 miles only from Khayes, on the Senegal termination of navigation. A railway between the two points would immensely facilitate intercourse. Bammakou was gained by Captain Gallieni in 1880. Within recent times there have been seventeen protectorates proclaimed by France in North-West Africa. Further south, also, it must be remembered that France holds important trading-stations on the Gold Coast, Slave Coast, and Ivory Coast, the equatorial settlement of Gaboon, and the magnificent domain of French Congo.
From the purchase of a small strip of country on the estuary of the Gaboon river, France has gone on rapidly acquiring an acknowledged foothold over a vast region
The West African Settlements 105
between the middle Congo and the ocean. One of the most distinguished French travellers of recent times in this country has been M. de Brazza, who explored the Upper Ogoue. Mr. Stanley has described the position of France in this quarter : ' France is now mistress of a West African territory noble in its dimensions, equal to the best tropic lands for its vegetable productions, rich in mineral resources, most promising for its future commercial importance. In area it covers a super- ficies of 257,000 square miles, an area equal to that of France and England combined, with access on the eastern side to 5200 miles of river navigation. On the west is a coast-line nearly 800 miles long, washed by the 'Atlantic Ocean. It contains within its borders eight spacious river basins, and throughout all its broad surface of 90,000,000 square hectares not one utterly destitute of worth can be found.'
France has come well out of the recent scramble for African territory, and at the Congo Conference she gained more actual territory than any other Power. The reversion of the magni- ficent Congo Free State, that includes the valley of the Congo and its affluents, and nearly touches the valley of the Zambesi, may be hers. Over a huge portion of Africa French influence is certainly increasing; and if she has lost colonial outposts elsewhere, she has won 2,000,000 square miles of territory here.
Patriotic Frenchmen desire to make certain definite centres in Africa where Frenchmen will 'find an asylum against the jealous competition of Europeans as much as against the hostility of the natives.' Among such hospitable stations would be Franceville, Alima, and Brazzaville. This suggestion has emanated from the veteran Lesseps, and it remains to be seen whether the colonising energy of individual Frenchmen will be sufficient to utilise their magnificent ideals. Access to the highlands of Central Africa beyond the river valleys will doubtless be much facilitated by railways.
In the history of French colonisation it cannot, however, be forgotten that at one time this nation seemed to hold the destinies of the Lake districts and the Mississippi valley in
106 British Colonisation
the New World in their own hands, and that it was chiefly through the lack of individual zeal and perseverance that their Transatlantic empire fell through. On the west coast of Africa, however, some of the hardiest sailors and colonists have been known for centuries. The seamen of Dieppe and Rouen, going southwards between the Canaries and the mainland, visited the ports of the Gold Coast and Guinea, gave their names to the bays and headlands, and formed settlements under royal sanction at Elmina, Fantin, and Cormontin. In 1600-1700, under Richelieu and Colbert, afforts were made to develop West Africa by means of companies.
Frenchmen, at first, made the same mistake as ourselves and other nations in supposing that a tropical country could be opened up by agriculturists from home. The fate of the Highlanders at Panama, and our own colonists on the Niger itself, and also at various times in the West Indian islands, overtook the French peasantry when transplanted to the malarious regions of Senegal.
French trade and colonisation were also cramped and fettered by a hidebound system of Government protection and bounties. In one thing the French were consistent, French merchants being always compelled to buy and sell at Govern- ment depots. Political disturbances at home have combined to render French occupation of the West Coast as ineffectual in its results as elsewhere. During the troubles that followed upon 1789, all the French forts of the Upper Senegal were destroyed : there was no permanence and continuity in the government of West Africa, no fewer than thirty-two officers administering the settlements between 1817 and 1857. French Africa seemed to lie like an incubus upon French home resources ; and Senegal, which surrendered to the British in 1809, but was restored by the Treaty of Paris, was returned upon French hands like a white elephant, expensive to keep and hard to be disposed of to any one. As above hinted, however, Senegal has, owing to the policy of M. Faidherbe, begun to acquire a new significance in relation to the rest of
The West African Settlements 107
West Africa. The engineering skill and mechanical inventions of the nineteenth century have come to the aid of France, and, under a peaceful and stable Government France may yet carry out a great work of civilisation in West and North- West Africa. Quite recently the Morocco question has revealed to how great an extent France is interested in this part of the world.
References : —
Park (Mungo), Travels in Africa, 1795-97.
Caillie's Travels to Timbuctoo, 1830.
A Voyage down the Dark River, by Richard and John Lander, 1832.
Up the Niger ; by Captain Mockler-Ferryman, 1892.
The Development of Africa, by Silva White, 1892.
The West African Islands, by Major Ellis.
Through Fanteeland to Coomassie, by Frederick Boyle, 1874.
Proceedings of the Royal Colonial Institute, passim.
CHAPTER VI
THE SOUTH AFRICAN COLONIES
THERE is no group of colonies whose annals abound in such picturesque and dramatic incidents as the South African. In the first place, the Kaffir wars alone furnish a whole epic of adventure. Who can read unmoved the story of our campaigns from the beginning of the present century to the last Zulu War ? British troops have met and overcome a black foe of extraordinary courage and vitality, totally unlike the aborigines of other countries, and gifted with intelligence of a high order. For those who know the Kaffir races con- cede to them a measure of understanding that goes further than mere barbaric craft. Their well-known leaders, such as Macomo, Sandili, Kreli, Cetywayo, have all been men of superior calibre, possessed of powers of organisation infinitely more effectual than those of ordinary -savages ; and they have succeeded in compelling in their own persons the unswerving loyalty of thousands. Kaffir chiefs have been kingly men, ruling as kings should, and summing up the powers of the State in themselves. L'etat <?est moi has been their motto ; and how infinitely superior the Kaffir race has been as a ruling power in South Africa may be inferred by a contrast between it and the hordes of Hottentots and Bushmen who occupied the extremity of South Africa. The Hottentots have never achieved any kind of national unity compared with that of the great Bantu race. They have simply roamed over the veldt as scattered and disorganised clans, living precariously from
108
The South African Colonies 109
hand to mouth, and disappearing before the Europeans without any adequate show of resistance.
In the case of Cetywayo, the whilom monarch of Zululand, the British had to face a well-drilled army of 40,000 men, devotedly attached to the person of their sovereign. Supersti- tion, also, had long invested the Kaffir chiefs with unspeakable powers of its own. There has always been the dreaded witch- doctor, that strange assessor of kingly power, ready to pry into the lives and fortunes of the Kaffir subjects and to bring destruction in the twinkling of an eye upon the most pro- sperous and wealthy. Such individuals have held in Kaffirland a secret and accursed monopoly rivalling that of a Vehmgericht or a Venetian Council of Ten. There has been, from time to time, the weird prophet or prophetess, arising in the land to revive the lagging patriotism of the beaten, and, Tyrtseus-like, exhort them to greater efforts. Once, in 1856, the Kaffir race, acting under the influence of a girl-prophetess named Nong- qause, who asserted that whilst drawing water from the well she had a revelation from the spirit-world to the effect that the ghosts of their forefathers would rise again in myriads and drive the English into the sea, destroyed all their grain and killed their cattle. In blind faith they waited for the appointed day when, at a given signal, their Hectors and Sarpedons and the shadowy files of heroes should come to restore their race ; and then starved inch by inch in their native forests, grubbing for roots like baboons. Such a case of national suicide has surely no parallel ! Let us not call it absolute folly in the breasts of these misguided savages ; rather patriotism gone wild and desperate, and grasping for life as a drowning man clutches at the floating straws. The Kaffir race has always given us, in the midst of all its utter hopeless barbarism, some bright spark of chivalrous devotion and the token of a faith that may remove mountains. As they have fallen beneath the sway of our missionaries and philanthropists, this devotion, chivalry, and faith have all been turned to better and more hopeful ends.
For ourselves, the incidents of Kaffir campaigns have been
1 10 British Colonisation
exciting enough for the most extravagant paintings of war novelists. Border frays innumerable, cattle-liftings, burning homesteads, hurried flights, secret ambuscades, open fights, wild border revenges, cast a lurid glow upon the story of South African colonisation. Both the colonists of Albany,, living a precarious existence of old in the historic Fish River valley, the military settlers of King William's Town, as well as the regular soldiers of the British army, have all had their strange and fascinating tales of adventure. Sometimes it appeared as if, after years of fighting, the wave of barbarism would prevail, and as if, in despair at the cost and risk, England would surrender her task in South Africa. Now and again disaster of more than usual severity has waited upon the progress of British arms.
No more mournful event than the death of the Prince Imperial in Zululand has ever happened in the annals of British colonisation ; and the author of this sketch, resident then at the Cape, well remembers how, on June 15, 1880, the Boadicea brought round the remains of the Prince, and unspeakable grief and shame filled all hearts : how, also, on January 1 9, 1879, the news came from the frontier how the gallant 24th, overwhelmed and outnumbered by the Zulu hordes, had perished to a man, selling their lives dearly under the krantzes or boulders of Isandlwana.
Still there was hope. England's mission in South Africa was not destined to be interrupted by a strategic mishap nor the untimely fate of the Prince Imperial. The Transvaal retrocession was, in reality, the hardest blow of all dealt at England's influence by men in power at home. Yet this may, perhaps, be healed by the processes of time and the develop- ment of the gold-mines, and ' the jingling of the guinea help the hurt that honour feels,' however much ' nations may snarl at one another's heels.' England, as a nation, cannot altogether be taxed with the maladministration of occasional Ministries. Her flag may be lowered for a while by a timorous and palsied hand, but it will soon be hoisted to its proper
The South African Colonies 1 1 1
position. There is no doubt about England's storage of strength and recuperative power.
' Merses profundo pulchrior evenit ' ;
and so, in spite of follies, mishaps, and depths of repentance, John Bull marches on. England has most incontrovertible title-deeds to her heritage in South Africa.
The annals of South Africa prove that no nation in the world has ever expended one-hundredth of the amount of blood and money at this corner of the Dark Continent that England has ; no nation has ever explored it like the British; no nation more truly developed all its wonderful mineral and other resources than England ; therefore the prize of South African dominion must be hers.
' Palmam qui meruit ferat.'
As matters stand at present, England is very deeply com- mitted in South Africa. The area of her responsibilities has widened, and from the Cape to the Zambesi she is the para- mount Power. She holds the Cape Colony, Natal, Zululand, Basutoland, Pondoland, Bechuanaland, Mashonaland ; and from South Zambesia her influence is reaching northwards to North Zambesia and the distant Equatorial Provinces. A railway extends for nearly a thousand miles from Table Bay north- wards, telegraphs span the country from Capetown to Fort Salisbury in Mashonaland, mines are being worked and in- dustries developed, and the English language and literature are gradually spreading over the whole country. The pax Britannica has worked wonders within the last decade. The possessions of Germany on the south-west littoral, the Dutch Republics of the Free State and the Transvaal in the interior of the country, and the Portuguese on the east coast, seem to stand somewhat in the way of British Empire in South Africa ; but the impediments they offer respectively are not serious, and the time cannot be far distant when the various elements will settle down together to work out a common destiny. Meantime, there are surely no pages of colonial history more
112 British Colonisation
deserving of study than that of the South African settlements. The annals of Australia are commonplace by their side. The latter give us pictures in abundance of stereotyped and even redundant good-fortune ; but the romance of history is absent, the glamour of adventure has passed away, and the young States seem lifted above the vicissitudes and sport of fortune. Scarcely a dark cloud can be conjured up above the horizon, and, secure in their monopoly of the South Pacific, the Australians are developing to the full an unimpeded pro- sperity. In Africa, a continent which in its whole extent falls under the influence, if it does not actually come within the State system, of Europe, the tale of development must neces- sarily be more diversified : rivalries are more keen, border diffi- culties more real, and the whole problem of reclamation and civilisation infinitely more complicated.
Perhaps one of the most interesting studies is to inquire into the nature of the circumstances under which England succeeded to her South African heritage ; and it may be worth while in the following brief sketch (i) to draw attention to a few of the historical incidents preceding the period of occupa- tion, (2) to prove the circumstances of French intrigue whilst the Cape was still in Dutch hands, (3) to point out some of the more notable characteristics of Dutch rule itself. Compara- tively few understand what the nature of this Dutch rule was — how hopelessly retrogressive and effete, how selfish and how isolated, and what a dead-weight it imposed upon the spirit of true colonisation. When England came officially to South Africa she rid the country of the incubus of an official monopoly beneath which burghers groaned and suffered in silence.
In South Africa, as in West Africa, the first honours of exploration rest with the Portuguese mariners. Prince Henry of Portugal had long inspired his countrymen with the ambition of sailing down these southern waters. Little by little, first past Cape Non, the limit of former enterprises, arid then to Cape Verde, Cape Palmas, and so down the Guinea coast to the Congo and Angola, they had cautiously felt their
The South African Colonies 1 1 3
way. The voyage of Bartolomeo Diaz was the last of a series of adventures, and the crowning feat of all (1486). When Diaz had doubled Cape Point, and made his celebrated land- fall on the island of St. Croix in Algoa Bay, the mystery of ages was unfolded and the path to the ' Golden Orient ' made clear. As far as South Africa itself was concerned, the Portuguese left it alone, and the phrase ' Cape of Good Hope ' referred to the hopeful anticipation of Indian trade rather than to the prospects of any wealth to be garnered from the shores of South Africa itself: indeed, the Cape was most studiously avoided by the Portuguese mariners as a dangerous and inhospitable place ; and the natives gained for themselves the name of being savage and intractable when, in 1510, they attacked d' Almeida, the Portuguese Indian Viceroy, and slew him, together with sixty-five of the best men in his fleet.
The Portuguese revenge was peculiar. Three years after- wards a Portuguese captain is said to have landed a piece of ordnance, loaded with grape-shot, as a pretended gift to the Hottentots. Two ropes were attached to it, and the Hottentots, men, women, and children, flocked down to drag away the gift — a truly lethale donum, like the Trojan horse — when the Portuguese captain fired off the piece and slew large numbers of them. For the future the Portuguese pilots made a clean run from the island of St. Helena to Mozambique, giving the stormy Cape a wide berth. In vain, therefore, do we look for any per- manent signs of Portuguese possession, either in Natal or the Cape Colony, and there is nothing to remind us of their presence along the coasts excepting a few names of bays and promontories. The Spaniards, it may be remarked, never adventured hither, keeping to the New World, in accordance with the papal bull.
The first English vessel that rounded the Cape was that of Francis Drake, the great Elizabethan seaman, who sailed from Plymouth on December 13, 1577, on his celebrated voyage round the world, in the wake of Magalhaens. His ship, the Pelican, was not anchored in Table Bay, nor in any South African port, and the account given of the famous Cape is :
H
114 British Colonisation
' This Cape is a most stately thing, and the fairest Cape we saw in the whole circumference of the world.' The Cape was kinder to English sailors than to others ; and van Linschoten remarks, on the occasion of a violent storm off the Cape, that ' nothing surprised him more than that God the Lord caused them, who were good Christians and Catholics, with large and strong ships, always to pass the Cape with such great and violent tempests and damage, while the English, who were heretics and blasphemers, passed it so easily with small and weak ships.'
After Drake came Candish, or Cavendish, the gentleman adventurer, who ' encompassed the globe ' on his first voyage in what was considered a very short space of time, harried the Spaniards, and returned laden with booty and spoils. ' His soldiers and sailors,' we are told, ' were clothed in silk, his sails were damask, and his topmast covered with cloth of gold.' x He was a skilful navigator, and discovered that the Portuguese reckoning of 2000 leagues from Java to the Cape of Good Hope was erroneous, his own calculation being 1850 leagues. Other famous English navigators visited the Cape, amongst them being John Davis of Sandridge, Devon, and James Lancaster, whose names are associated chiefly with Arctic exploration. From the beginning of the seventeenth century ( 1 60 1 ) the Cape was often visited by the ships of the English East India Company.
Cavendish, on his return voyage, touched at the African island of St. Helena, which had been discovered by the Portuguese on St. Helena's Day, May 2ist, 1502 — a discovery they were at great pains to conceal — and was the first English sailor who pointed out the advantages of the island as a recruiting-station and port of call. He describes it as 'a delicious island covered with trees.' St. Helena became in course of time the English station in the South Atlantic, and the East India Company ob- tained a charter for its possession from Charles 11. ; and for more than a hundred and fifty years — i.e. until 1834— it remained exclusively under the Company's jurisdiction, excepting, indeed,
1 Granger's Biographical History of England.
The South African Colonies 115
during the period of Napoleon's captivity there. This occupa- tion distracted the attention of British sailors and navigators from the Cape of Good Hope, which was colonised by the Dutch under van Riebeek in connection with their Eastern empire.
Before the British came to the Cape little was known of the Hinterland or back-country. Here the vision of some El Dorado tantalised the imagination of the old Dutch settlers. Just as Ralegh and Keymis were convinced that somewhere up the Orinoco valley could be found the golden city of Manoa and the accumulated treasury of El Dorado ; or as the numerous West African explorers kept steadily in view as a goal to be reached the barbaric splendours of Timbuctoo ; so even the phlegmatic Dutch imagined that in the interior of South Africa lay some wonderful city, the centre of a rich empire. In Dapper's map of South Africa (1668) a great river figures as a prominent geographical feature, rising somewhere north of the Tropic of Capricorn, and flowing first south and then east, finally reaching the sea south of the present boundaries of Natal. On its north bank were such places as Camissa and Vigiti Magna. The empire of Monomotapa, also, with its vast and shadowy outlines, exercised some spell upon the Dutch; and in 1660 Jan van Riebeek, the first Governor of the Cape, sent an expedition to look for it, but the explorers only advanced a short distance up Namaqualand.
During the Dutch occupation hundreds of ships of all nationalities passed by the Cape and anchored under the shadows of Table Mountain ; but what there was in the interior few took the trouble to know. The crews during their sojourn at the port would marvel at the Company's zoological gardens and the wild beasts of the country that were kept in confine- ment there, and listen to the tales of ' chimaeras dire ' which the Dutch officials thought fit to propagate. Even without exaggerating or furbishing up ' Miinchausen ' tales, the wild beasts of South Africa were a real terror and obstacle to travellers.
1 1 6 British Colonisation
Now and then, also, a shipwrecked crew, such as that of the Dutch ship Stavenisse (1685), thrown upon inhospitable shores, would be compelled to sojourn amongst the natives, and emerge afterwards, perhaps, half savages in their habits and ways of life. Strange stories have not been wanting of adventures of Europeans along the unreclaimed and unsurveyed shores of South Africa. In 1754 an English ship called the Doddington, with a crew of 220 souls, was run ashore on one of the Bird Islands at the entrance of Algoa Bay. As the sea broke furiously over the vessel, the work of rescue was rendered almost impossible, and out of the whole number only twenty- three men managed to save themselves. Here they managed to live for seven months, in trembling fear of the natives, and at last launched a boat which they had been able to construct, and sailed round the coast to Delagoa Bay, where they met an English ship which took them to India.
Still more terrible, because of the uncertainty that long pre- vailed with regard to the fate of some of the survivors, was the wreck of an East Indiaman, the Grosvenor (1782), on the coasts of Kaffraria, above St. John's River. The greater part of the crew and all the passengers succeeded in gaining the shore, and endeavoured to reach the Cape Colony by land ; only a few managed to do this, and it was conjectured that some, and amongst these some women, were taken captive by the Kaffirs, and, abandoning all hope of ever reaching England again, lived and intermarried with their captors. The Govern- ment sent out an expedition to search for them in 1783, and descendants of the unfortunate crew and passengers were said to be in existence many years afterwards. A dark cloud of mystery hangs over their fate, and the whole subject is one that might challenge the imagination and call forth the descriptive powers of the novelist.
Now and then shipwrecked sailors voluntarily threw their lot in with the Kaffirs, as was the case with three Englishmen wrecked in the Good Hope, towards the end of the seventeenth century. We are told that when a chance of escape was
The South African Colonies 1 1 7
offered them they refused to go, having formed connections with the natives ; contrasting the ease of their barbarous life at Natal with the hardships they had endured at sea. In the words of Locksley Hall, they ' burst all links of habit — there to wander far away ' in a land where f Never comes the trader, never floats an European flag, Slides the bird o'er lustrous woodland, swings the trailer from the crag. '
Sometimes, also, there were less reputable characters who lived with the Kaffirs as Kaffirs in every respect : refugees from justice in the Cape Colony. Such was Coenraad Buys, who lived as a polygamist with the Kaffir chief Nqgika. He was not, we are told, the only European in that country who had thrown off all the restraints of the Christian religion and civilisation, there being a large party of them at the king's kraal. There were two brothers Lochenberg, a German named Cornelius Faber, and the inevitable Irish deserter from the army, besides several young men connected with the old colonial families — men who, like the French coureurs des bois in Canada, associated entirely with the savages of the country.
The knowledge that such waifs and strays could communi- cate about the interior of South Africa was naturally very little. More useful was that which men of science could im- part. In 1751 the great astronomer Lacaille visited South Africa for the purpose of measuring an arc of the meridian, and travelled in the flat and somewhat sterile regions of Namaqualand. Presently, also, the tribe of naturalists and botanists overran the country, chief amongst them the great Thunberg, called ' the father of Cape botany,' and the first to grapple with the enormous mass of Cape flora — a man of most extraordinary industry and of physical endurance. Andrew Sparrmann, also, was a good and trustworthy traveller (1772) in the country. The great Linnaeus himself, so Sparrmann observes, had an ambition to visit South Africa and see for himself those wonderful heaths and orchids which were described to him, and presented to him only as a hortus siccus. Indeed, the Swedish naturalists went every-
Ii8 British Colonisation
where at the inspiration of this great father of natural science. Professor Kalm, of the Swedish Royal Academy of Sciences, explored North America in 1748 ; Dr. Hasselquist ransacked the botanical treasures of Asia Minor, Egypt, and Palestine ; Osbeck and Toreen, two other disciples of Linnaeus, explored China. But there was certainly no country in the world which so repaid research as the sub-tropical zone of South Africa. The enthusiastic botanists who conducted their researches there not only saw and described plants and flowers but also men and manners ; and, as most of them possessed that accuracy which belongs to the observers of nature, they must be accepted as authorities on South Africa in a general sense. For a long time it must be remembered that the French had been nibbling at the Cape. In 1666, during the governorship of van Quaelberg, the Dutch commander at the Cape, a well-known French expedition under the Marquis de Montdevergne, the Viceroy of the French possessions in the East, had put into Table Bay. This expedition was the result of many attempts on the part of France to form a powerful French East India Company, and was guided by Colbert, the ambitious Colonial Minister of Louis xiv., whose designs covered the regions of the East no less than the valleys of the St. Lawrence and the Mississippi on the Western continent. Louis xiv. had instructed his deputy to take possession of Saldanha Bay, and establish a French residency there. Acting in obedience to these instructions, the French surveyed the bay and set up landmarks with the King's arms upon them. These, however, were speedily re- moved by the Dutch authorities at the Cape, and shields erected bearing the Dutch Company's arms upon them. The French, therefore, were warned off South African territory ; and their designs were viewed with the greater suspicion because it was rumoured that the French intended to abandon Madagascar, or the Island of St. Lawrence, as it was called, and to gain a foothold at the Cape.1
1 Theal's History of South Africa, p. 196.
The South African Colonies 119
The Dutch were so impressed with the value of the Cape at this early date that they used to term the Cape Castle ' the frontier fortress of India.' Moreover, there was a deep national rivalry between the Dutch and French, intensified by religious hatred— one nation being the champion of Pro- testantism, the other of Roman Catholicism. The Cape was in the seventeenth century the refuge of Protestant exiles, and ' No Popery ' was plainly written up in the Cape Colony ; no popish rites or celebration of the mass were tolerated on the shores of Table Bay. In 1689 the Dutch governor, acting up to home instructions 'to treat the French everywhere as enemies and cause them all possible injury,' seized treacher- ously two French ships, the Normande and Le Cache, as they lay in Table Bay, taking the crews prisoners. In those days seafaring nations did not wait for open declarations of war either in the East or the West Indies, knowing that, by the rules of a kind of sea-divinity that was popular in those days, might was right, and acts lawful in distant quarters of the globe which would not be tolerated nearer home. In this instance Louis xiv. was powerless to take vengeance, being scarcely able to hold his own against England and her allies in Europe.
The most determined effort to seize the Cape was made about a hundred years later, when Suffren, after a well-fought but indecisive action with Commander Johnstone (1781), near St. lago, sailed southwards to Table Bay. The English admiral was so far crippled by the action that he could not pursue him, and French regiments garrisoned Cape Town. In 1782 Rodney achieved his famous victory over de Grasse in the West Indies, which not only saved the West Indies but dealt a tremendous blow upon French maritime enterprise in every quarter of the globe. In India, also, Labourdonnais and Lally suffered disaster upon disaster ; so that, even if France had made great efforts to obtain a grip upon the Cape, the post would have been of little avail to her with her sea dominion in peril in Atlantic waters and her land forces routed on the
I2O British Colonisation
Indian peninsula. Yet the strategic value of the Cape was fully recognised by the French, and it was the opinion of her admirals that the successful issue of any war carried on between two European Powers in the East depended entirely upon the acquisition and retention of the Cape of Good Hope and the Bay of Trincomalee in Ceylon. The English also attached the utmost importance to the Cape; and Henry Dundas (afterwards Lord Melville) declared in the House of Commons that the Minister who should dare to give it up ought to lose his head.
Even after the first occupation of the Cape of Good Hope by the British, we shall see that the French were extremely loth to give up all thoughts of embarrassing English policy there, and effecting, if possible, a foothold for themselves. When the Rattlesnake was anchored in Algoa Bay, a French man-of-war, la Preneuse, of forty-eight guns, sailed up to the anchorage flying British colours, and was supposed to be one of the British squadron on the coast. Dropping anchor between the Camel, an old store-ship, and the Rattlesnake, she fired a broadside into the former and hoisted the tricolour. The British made the best resistance they could under the cir- cumstances, and the troops that were on the shores of Algoa Bay erected a battery and played upon the French ship ; the action lasted six hours and twenty minutes, until darkness came on, and at last the French commander withdrew to the Bird Islands, close by. The admiral at the Cape sent a frigate in pursuit of la Preneuse afterwards, but she escaped, running into the River Plate, where she was stranded and abandoned.
It was clear, however, that in spite of sudden descents upon the shores, as that of Suffren, and surprise visits of such ships as la Preneuse, the Cape was destined to pass permanently into the hands of the British, whose sovereignty of the ocean was com- pletely established. The end both to Dutch rule and French machinations at the Cape was to come in the year 1795. In June of that year Admiral Elphinstone and General Craig anchored in Table Bay with eight ships and four thousand
The South African Colonies 1 2 1
men. Judge Watermeyer, one of the ablest essayists on Cape history, has put the circumstances of this visit in the following words : —
' They conveyed the startling intelligence that the Hereditary Stadtholder had been driven from the Netherlands, that the French had overrun the country, and a Republican Convention had been established in connection with that which swayed France. The Prince of Orange had sought refuge in England, and had implored aid from the British Government. An order from the exiled Stadtholder, addressed to the Govern- ment of the Cape, was in the possession of the admiral. It was dated from Kew, and was of the following tenor : —
' " We have deemed it necessary by these presents to com- mand you to admit into the Castle, as also elsewhere in the Colony under your government, the troops that shall be sent thither by His Majesty the King of Great Britain, and also to admit the ships of war, frigates, or armed vessels which shall be sent to you on the part of His Majesty, into False Bay, or wherever they can safely anchor; and you are to consider them as troops and ships of a Power in friendship, in alliance with their High Mightinesses the States-General, and who come to protect the Colony against the invasion of the French. — Consigning you to the protection of Providence, we are, WILLIAM, PRINCE OF ORANGE." '
There was a fear, also, that the feeling of rebellion which existed in 1795 against the constituted rule of the Dutch East India Company, and had shown itself in the uncompromising attitude of the burghers of Swellendam and Graaf Reinet, the two outlying provinces of the Cape at that time, was prompted and encouraged by the doctrines and teachings of the French Revolutionists. To some extent this fear may have been well grounded, and consequently the Stadtholder was justified, not only from his standpoint in Europe, but also a purely colonial standpoint, in placing the Cape under the protection, for the time at least, of Great Britain, the determined and successful foe of the French Republic in Europe. But it
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may have escaped his notice, as well as that of all those who were officially connected with the administration of the Cape, that the dissatisfaction of the Cape burghers against the Com- pany in 1795-6, although it may have partly been moulded by the doctrines of liberty and equality then promulgated over the whole world, was in the main the result of generations of bad government at the Cape itself. For a hundred and fifty years the Dutch officials there had lorded it as an exclusive and aristo- cratic clique, and had displayed on every occasion the worst features of monopolists. There was, therefore, a faint-hearted opposition to General Craig and Admiral Elphinstone. The Dutch Governor of the Cape, Commander Sluysken, felt himself bound to resist the British occupation in spite of the Stadt- holder's order; but his garrison consisted of only 500 men of a German regiment in the Dutch pay, and some artillery, and no dependence could be placed upon the disaffected Dutch burghers. His reply to the British officers was more bold than circumstances warranted him in making: 'Dis- avowing all sentiments of Jacobinism, he was prepared,' he said, ' to defend the colony against any force that might be sent against him by the French Convention, equally as he was now prepared to defend it against the British fleet and army.' Re- sistance proved to be futile; there was some trifling skirmish- ing at Muizenberg beach on False Bay, the burghers behaved badly, and Sluysken capitulated.
To add to his confusion, at the very time a truce was being concluded with the British an offensive message was sent to him from the rebel burghers at Tulbagh, in the form of a resolution from the ' Nationals ' of the Cape, signed by their commandant, an Italian named Pisani, demanding a reply to previous communications, and threatening hostilities. Thus placed between two fires, Sluysken had no alternative but to capitulate. This was the end of the rule of the Dutch East India Company, which had held Table Bay for so many years.
The first occupation of the Cape by the British lasted until
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the Treaty of Amiens, 1802, by which the country was re- stored to the sovereignty of the Batavian Republic. In 1803 the country was evacuated by the English, and Commissary de Mist, a member of the Council for the Asiatic posses- sions, was appointed as Commissary-General for the Republic to receive the colony from the British authorities. He also installed General Janssen as the new Governor of the Cape. A new regime for Dutch South Africa promised to begin, and Commissary de Mist occupied himself earnestly with many necessary local reforms, dividing the country into ' drostdys ' or districts, and encouraging the industries, and especially the agriculture, of the country. But these reforms of the internal administration of Dutch South Africa came too late. The Cape was really at the mercy of complications in Europe ; the Peace of Amiens was quickly broken ; the flames of war blazed out again, and hostilities were resumed between England and France.
The importance of the Cape as the frontier fortress of India seemed to be greater than ever, and in 1806 a force was sent out under General Sir David Baird, consisting of about 4000 men. The largeness of the force proved clearly the deter- mination of the British Government to secure the Cape at all hazards. After a short engagement the Batavian troops were routed in the vicinity of Cape Town, and a second time the ancient castle of Cape Town fell into British hands. For some years after this the Cape was regarded as merely a temporary possession by conquest ; but in 1814 a convention was agreed to between the Prince, sovereign of the restored and united Netherlands, on the one hand, and His Majesty the King of Great Britain on the other, by which, in con- sideration of certain charges provided by the latter for the defence of the Low Countries and their settlement in union with Holland, the colony of the Cape of Good Hope, together with Demerara, Essequibo, and Berbice, was ceded in per- petuity to the British Crown. Such were the circumstances attending the transference of the Cape from the weak rule of
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Holland to the strong tutelage of Great Britain. It was one of the greatest prizes that fell to her as mistress of the seas — far greater than any of the West Indies, which then seemed to be the most flourishing colonies for European capitalists. The Cape could, in fact, never belong to any European State whose sea power was not acknowledged on all hands to be supreme and unquestioned.
But what, it may be asked, was the character more particu- larly of the Dutch rule that was now supplanted ? What had the Dutch officials done for the country or people ? What was their policy, and how had they used their opportunities? What was the general state of society in this comparatively unknown corner of the globe ?
There are in existence curious notices of both the official life of the Dutch merchants and of the habits of the Boers and Voertrekkers. In the Castle of Cape Town there was enough and to spare of pomp and ceremony. The period of Governor Tulbagh's governorship (1751-1771) was regarded as the golden age of Dutch officialdom at the Cape ; and the laws, rules, and regulations of the little staff survive as ridiculous and grotesque monuments of the pretentious claims of the Dutch ' koopmanner' or merchants. Various class regulations and sumptuary laws were passed to keep the distinction clear between the 'koopmanner' and the ordinary burghers; inter alia : ' No one less in rank than a junior merchant should venture to use an umbrella,' and ' every person, without excep- tion, shall stop his carriage, and get out of it, when he shall see the Governor approach, and shall likewise get out of the way so as to allow a convenient passage to the carriage of any of the members of the Court of Policy' ; also, ' no woman below the wives of junior merchants, or those who, among citizens, are of the same rank, may wear silk dresses, with silk braiding or embroidery, nor any diamonds or mantelets; and although the wives of the junior merchants may wear these ornaments, they shall not be entitled to allow their daughters to wear them. All women, married or single, without distinction, are
The South African Colonies 125
prohibited, whether in mourning or out of mourning, under a penalty of twenty-five rix-dollars, to wear dresses with a train.' Moreover, in the days of Tulbagh, no man dared pass his house without taking off his hat, whether the great man was inside or not. Etiquette followed these Dutch officials to the grave, and it was a rigorous law that for a Governor and members of the Court of Policy alone dust might be strewn before the house door as a sign of bereavement.
Of the social life of the scattered Dutch Boers, Sparrmann the Swede and le Vaillant the French traveller give curious accounts. The former, who travelled in the country as a doctor, able and willing to cure complaints, found one of his patients, a Dutch vrouw, living in a state of poverty, dirt, and ignorance. ' A house plaistered up in a slovenly manner with clay, a heap of dirty scabby children, a female slave dragging after her a heavy iron chain fastened to one of her legs, the features of the old woman herself, her peaked nose, her per- petually scolding her servants,' constitute a by no means agreeable picture of an African home. Sparrmann being an entomologist, and covering his hat with 'specimens,' was regarded as an uncanny conjurer or ' hex meester,' and had great difficulty in calming the suspicions of the Dutch hostess. 'An explanation,' he observes, 'was necessary on the spot. It was now necessary for me to cease eating a while for fear of being choked with some of the big words and long Dutch phrases, which I was obliged to coin on the spot, in order to convince my hostess of the great utility of understanding these little animals for medical purposes and at the same time to the glory of the great Creator.'
Remarking on one of the churches not far from Cape Town, Sparrmann observed : ' By this edifice I could plainly perceive that these boors bestowed no more pains upon God's House than they did upon their own. This church was, indeed, as big as one of our largest hay-barns, and neatly covered, as the other houses are, with dark-coloured reeds ; but without any arching or ceiling, so that the transoms and beams within
126 British Colonisation
made a miserable appearance. Altars and altar-tables are, I believe, never used in the Reformed Church. There were benches on the sides for the men ; but the women have each of them their chair or stool in the aisle. The pulpit was too plain and slovenly.5
Mr. Latrobe, travelling in the country about 1818, gives a somewhat typical reply of a Dutch corn-boer, considered a shrewd man in his neighbourhood. To the natural query why he did not plough more land and sow corn for the neighbour- ing market of Cape Town, ' What,' cried he, 'would you have us do ? Our only concern is to fill our bellies, to get good clothes and houses, to say to one slave " Do this," and to another " Do that," and to sit idle ourselves and be waited upon ; and as to our tillage, or building, or planting, our fore- fathers did so-and-so, and were satisfied, and why should not we be the same ? The English want us to use their ploughs instead of the heavy wooden ones ; but we like our old things best.' It may be remarked that in the present year (1892) the Cape Colony, rich and important as it has become, lives mainly upon imported com and flour, and the Cape Colonist eats the dearest loaf in the world. The descendants of the corn-boer of 1818 have not wiped away the reproach of idle- ness here brought against their fathers by Mr. Latrobe.
The whole rural population was roughly distinguished as the wyn-boer or wine-grower, the koorn-boer or corn-grower, and the vee-boer or grazier. Perhaps, for dirt and unprogressive- ness, the vee-boer has the unenviable distinction of excelling the others. * To an European the whole establishment of a vee-boer presents a scene of filth and discomfort which could scarcely be imagined. His hovel, generally perched on an eminence, that no hostile attack may be made on it unper- ceived, whether by man or beast, has neither tree, nor shrub, nor blade of grass near it. A few straw huts, with a number of Hottentot women and children naked or half-clothed in sheep- skins, are the principal objects that attract the eye. Between these huts and the boer's house, and immediately in front of
The South African Colonies 127
the latter, surrounded by withered bushes of the thorny mimosa, is the pen or " kraal" in which his cattle and sheep are shut up at night to protect them from the wolves and hyenas or to prevent their straying. The dung of these kraals, the accumulation of years, sometimes rises to the eaves of the house ; this, however, gives no concern to the boer, who would probably see it overtop them with equal apathy ; the only chance of its ever being cleared away is its taking fire, which, in damp weather, sometimes happens.' *
The most hopeful industry of all was that of the wyn-boer ; but here too few attempts were made to utilise to the best purposes the good qualities of the grape. What was known as dry Pontac was the best, having the qualities of port with the flavour of Burgundy. But the sweet wines were without much flavour — the well-known Constantia being inferior to Madeira, Malmsey, Malaga, or Frontignac. Moreover, all the Cape wines possessed what was described as the 'kaap-smaak,' arising either from careless preparation or from certain qualities com- municated by the soil itself.
It may be asked whether there was any attempt on the part of philanthropists to better the condition of the black popula- tion of the Cape. Philanthropy was not much in vogue in Europe in the eighteenth century; but the Moravians were the first to take up the task of teachers and missionaries in South Africa, and to devote themselves to the cause of the Hottentots. In the year 1737 George Schmidt, known as the ' apostle of the Hottentots,' landed in South Africa, and at a place called 'Baviaans' Kloof or Baboons' Valley, now called Genadendal or the Vale of Grace, collected a small band of natives around him, to whom he taught the Christian faith. He opened a school, in which he instructed the youth to read Dutch, and even to learn the trades of craftsmen and artisans. He also induced them to learn gardening and to cultivate plots of ground. His mission and its results are thus described by Mr. Theal, the latest historian of the Cape: — 'In 1742 he 1 Quarterly Review, vol. xxii. p. 223.
128 British Colonisation
considered five of his pupils sufficiently advanced in Christian knowledge to be admitted to all the privileges of Christian membership, and at their own request baptized them. The report of this proceeding roused the jealousy of the clergy at the Cape. They disputed his right to administer the sacra- ments, as, according to law, only clergymen of the Reformed Church were at liberty to do so in the colony. Henceforth he was subjected to much annoyance and opposition from both the officials and the burghers. So little were his labours understood or appreciated by the colonists, that they imputed to him the design of making himself a chief of the Hottentots, or at least of enriching himself by illegally purchasing cattle from his converts and their friends. . . . Under such incessant labour, far away from society, and deprived of everything like ordinary comfort, it is no wonder that George Schmidt's strength and spirits began to give way. In 1744, after taking an affecting farewell of his little flock, now numbering forty- seven, and leaving them in charge of the most steady of their number, he returned to Europe to recruit his failing health and obtain assistants for his work. In the following year he applied to the East India Company for permission to return ; but an objection having been made by some persons of influence that the propagation of Christianity by the Moravians amongst the Hottentots would be detrimental to the interests of the colony, his request was refused, to his great grief and disappointment. A long night of darkness and misery was yet before the wretched Hottentots.' J
It is interesting to learn that the seed thus sown has borne good fruit, and that Genadendal has now (1891) a population of 4000 natives, many of whom go out as labourers among the farmers during the harvest and wine-pressing season. The whole body of Moravians, according to the census of 1891, numbered 16,297, of whom only 169 were Europeans. Such was the proselytising force that the ignorant Boers thrust from their gates — a force that has tended by precept and by example 1 Theal's Compendium of South African History, p. HO.
The South African Colonies 1 29
to teach the true value of labour, and to provide a class of agriculturists and handicraftsmen most useful to the colonists. But of course those men who spurned the efforts of Christianity and philanthropy — without scrupling afterwards to gain what advantage they could from the mission-Hottentots' labour — were the forefathers of those voertrekkers who burned Dr. Livingstone's house and books at Kuruman, and tried to bar the way to the interior.
It may also be asked how far slavery, which proved to be such a curse both to West Africa and the West Indies, blighting both the land that gave the slave and the land that received him, affected South Africa. Upon consideration it will be clear that as there was no mining industry, as in Hispaniola, or any tropical industry, such as sugar, coffee, or cocoa planting, in South Africa, there could be no very great need of hordes of imported slaves. Moreover, the Cape possessed a climate in which the European could work all day, and nearly all the year round, if he chose ; whereas the West Indies and Central America were wholly unsuited to him. Slaves were very use- ful, of course, to the wine-growers, the graziers and herdsmen ; but such industries as the Cape could develop formerly were purely local, hardly any produce being exported to the markets of Europe. No great pecuniary profit could, therefore, accrue to the South African farmer from the possession of slaves in any way comparable to that which was the lot of sugar-planters, for instance, in Jamaica.
In the Cape slavery was a matter of recent growth com- pared to the traffic that went on in the Caribbean Seas. Previous to 1685, the only slaves at the Cape were some ten or twelve individuals, and these came not from the West African coasts but from Malaya and Madagascar. In 1691 their number had risen to 285 men slaves, 57 women slaves, and 44 slave children ; the European colonists at this time only numbering 250 men, 50 women, and 60 or 70 children. The terms of servitude were not very hard in the early days of the Cape Colony, and there was a charitable inclination displayed
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towards the blacks, when a profession of Christianity and an ability to talk Dutch were considered sufficient grounds for claiming emancipation. We may contrast this with the con- ditions of the island of Jamaica, where the annual quantity of slaves imported from Africa and retained in the island, on an average of many years, amounted to 5700, the whole slave population there reaching, in 1792, the enormous total of
250J000.1
Still, the evils of slavery were bad enough as time went on in the Cape Colony, and as the voertrekkers wandered into the interior beyond the pale of law and order. Towards the close of the eighteenth century travellers reported that bands of runaway slaves caused terror and alarm to lonely homesteads. They were not numerous enough to cause a servile war, as in the West Indian islands ; and, the back-country being open and wide, they could get beyond the range of punishment or pursuit. Sparrmann throws a little light upon the state of society when he remarks, during a visit at a Dutch Boer's house not far from Capetown : ' Being but two Christians among twelve or fourteen men slaves, we bolted the door fast, and had five loaded pieces hung.' Even the heights of Table Mountain were not safe for a wandering botanist or ento- mologist, who at any moment stood the chance of being assailed by a predatory band of runaways. The Buganese or Malays were said by Sparrmann to be particularly revengeful — a quality they seem now certainly to have lost in the Cape acclimatisation. At the same time, he observes that the slaves were often treated ' kindly and familiarly ' by some of the settlers.
England came to the Cape (1805) with clean hands as far as the slave trade was concerned, the abolition of the slave trade taking place in 1807 ; nor had she, in this country at least, either the temptation or the opportunity to sully her hands. But the Boers never could understand the height and
1 Notices respecting Jamaica in 1808, 1809, 1810. By Gilbert Mathison. 1811.
The South African Colonies 131
depth of her repentance. Living cheek by jowl with Hottentots and bushmen, they regarded it as a divine ordinance that the blacks should be hewers of wood and drawers of water, and, being uneducated and isolated men, remained completely un- affected by that extraordinary wave that swept over Europe and touched every part of the West Indies. The compensation money, amounting to the sum of ^1,200,000, at ^85 per slave, salved but by no means satisfied the Boers, who, being un- businesslike men, did not profit by England's generosity, or even claim their money.
Such, indeed, in some of its main features, was the settlement which the English took over finally in 1805 : unpromising enough in certain respects, and as a place of production, agricultural or otherwise, poor beyond measure, and not to be compared for a moment even with one of the West Indian islands. To speak figuratively, the Cape Colony was a derelict, a wreck of old Dutch rule, brought to disaster by un- skilful steering, and floating bottom uppermost in these southern waters. If left alone it would be dangerous to all navigation, and especially English navigation; and England determined to take it under tow.1
1 For facts and figures see Appendix V. Section A — F.
References : —
Theal's Compendium of South African History, 1877.
Theal's History of South Africa, 1888.
Natal: its Land and Story, by Robert Russell, 1891.
Greswell's Our South African Empire, 1884.
Gres well's Geography of Africa South of the Zambesi, 1892.
South Africa, from Arab Rule to British Domination, by R. W.
Murray, 1891. Travels and Voyages, by Sparrmann, Barrow, Livingstone, etc. etc.
CHAPTER VII
THE AUSTRALIAN COLONIES NEW SOUTH WALES
WHILST the outlines of New France and New England were being sketched upon the map, and the islands, rivers, and mighty valleys of the western world were being explored and colonised by the rival nations of Europe ; whilst the tropical islands of the Caribbean Seas were pouring their garden wealth, as from the horn of Amalthea, into the lap of Europe ; whilst intrepid merchants ran the longitudes down the simmering coasts of West Africa, anchoring in the rivers, traversing the lagoons, bringing back gold-dust, ivory, and palm-oil from
' ... the realm
Of Congo and Angola furthest south, Or thence from Niger flood to Atlas mount ' ;
(MILTON'S Paradise Lost}
whilst beyond the stormy Cape, immortalised by Camoens, Further India and the Spice Islands were making the merchants of Lisbon, Amsterdam, and London rich ; the great island continent of Australia lay obscure and undeveloped in the wastes of the South Pacific.
There was no El Dorado nor kingdom of classic fame which even rumour could assign to this distant southern land, cut off for ever by the truly ' dissociabilis Oceanus ' from the rest of the world ; nor was there even the ruin of an ancient kingdom or people — no fabled Timbuctoo, no seat of empire like that of * Cambalu, seat of Cathaian Cham/ no * seat of Montezume,'
132
The Australian Colonies 133
no * richer seat of Atabalipa, and yet unspoiled Guiana,' to stir the sailor's imagination and whet the edge of enterprise.
Milton's fancy, bounded by his geographical knowledge, followed the route eastward taken by the merchants of Portugal and the other nations who pursued their course thither after them. This was the well-known route round the stormy Cape, past Mozambique, far to the north again where
* ... north-east winds blow Sabaean odours from the spicy shores Of Araby the blest.'
True it was that the Straits of Magellan, the gateway of the Pacific, both north and south, were known, and the mariner's eye had, long before Milton wrote, surveyed the world's waters from ' cold Estotiland ' as far south as * beneath Magellan ' ; still, the centre of attraction lay in the North Pacific waters, round the Philippines, the Moluccas, and the Malay Archi- pelago, rather than the South Pacific.
For the sake of clearness it may be pointed out that there are three prominent periods in the history of South Pacific exploration and of Australian discovery, viz. : (i) that of the in- dividual adventurers, pioneers, and buccaneers, resembling in motive and conception the West Indian 'age of the buccaneers,' Spain being in both cases the object of attack, and Spanish booty the prize held in view ; (2) that of more definite official interference, when the task of South Sea discovery was taken out of the hands of individuals and more or less sanctioned by the British Government; (3) that of final occupation and colonisation, beginning with the proclamation of the King's sovereignty by Captain Cook in New South Wales.
For Englishmen perhaps the most exciting period of South Pacific discovery is that of the bold buccaneers, who carried on their hazardous occupation with equal daring here as in the Caribbean Seas. The voyages of these adventurers created a hardy race of seamen without their equal in Europe, and those who commanded in the South Seas were nearly all
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Englishmen. Davis, a celebrated leader, had under him a fleet of nine or ten vessels, with 1000 men to man them. Within a space of thirty-six years, i.e. between 1686 and 1722, it is said that the buccaneers circumnavigated the globe no less than six times. Nor were the sailors of France, especially of St. Malo, behindhand in the exciting work of privateering, no fewer than fourteen vessels being equipped in one year (1721) by the merchants of St. Malo. The sailors of northern France were as keen as the sailors of our western ports of Bristol and Plymouth. Their places of rendezvous were islands such as Tortuga in the West Indies and the lonely island of Juan Fernandez, off the coast of Chili, the abode of Robinson Crusoe. They crossed and recrossed the Isthmus of Darien, and were at home equally in the Caribbean as they were in South Pacific waters. Sometimes they took up log- wood-cutting in the Bay of Campeche, intruding upon Spanish territory here ; but Dampier, the prince of buccaneers, himself remarked that the Spaniards should make light of their trespass, as the buccaneers were far less dangerous to them when thus employed than when carrying on their buccaneering raids. Amongst the buccaneers were all sorts and conditions of men, young and old, high-born and low-born.
But the objects of the buccaneers were mainly predatory, and they haunted well-known ocean routes, intercepted galleons, and stormed cities rather than set out in search of the visionary Notasia or Land of the South. It is generally accepted now that a Dutch crew, setting out from Java in the Dove, were the first Europeans to set foot upon Australian soil. To make a long story of exploration short — a story which belongs really to the maritime history of Holland — they were followed up by Dirk Hartog, 1616; by Edel, 1619; by Peter Nuyts, who entered the Great Australian Bight ; by General Carpenter, who gave his name to the Gulf of Carpentaria ; and by Pelsart and Tasman, 1642.
The Dutch, indeed, began to proclaim themselves * lords of the Southern Seas,' a fact alluded to by Pepys in his Diary
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(February 15, 1663-4). He records that 'This afternoon Sir Thomas Chamberlin came to the office to me and showed me several letters from the East Indys, showing the height that the Dutch are come to there, showing scorn to all the English even in our only factory there at Surat, beating several men, and hanging the English standard St. George under the Dutch flag in scorn : saying, that whatever their masters do or say at home, they will do what they list, and be masters of all the world there ; and have so proclaimed themselves soveraigne of all the South Seas ; which certainly our King cannot endure, if the Parliament will give him money.'
The day of reckoning with the Dutch was to come. Eng- land could never forget or forgive J:he bloody affair of Amboyna, which happened in 1623, and gave birth — to use the words of Campbell in his Lives of the Admirals — to England's national hatred of the Dutch, which existed long and had such fatal effects. At Amboyna, a small island of the Moluccas, the English had a house and the Dutch a strong fort garrisoned with 200 soldiers. Upon what was said to be a trumped-up charge of conspiracy with the Indians of Ternate and the King of Tidore against the Dutch Governor, the English traders and residents were tortured and put to death. This summary act was known as ' the massacre of Amboyna,' and the English continued to demand satisfaction for it from 1623 to 1672.
In the year 1699 Great Britain began to inaugurate more definitely the period of official intervention in the affairs of the Pacific. The age of filibustering and of privateering was gradually disappearing, and the maritime nations of Europe were approaching the task of final adjustment and delimitation. England being at peace with her neighbours, King William ordered an expedition for the discovery of new countries and for the examination of New Holland, as Australia was termed, and New Guinea. The man placed in charge of the expedition was William Dampier, a Somersetshire sailor.
Whilst carrying out his instructions on board the Roebuck^ a sloop of twelve guns and fifty men, placed at his disposal by the
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Government, Dampier made some observations on the scenery and products of Western Australia round Shark's Bay. Along the bay the soil was sandy, and ' further in it is of a reddish mould, a sort of sand, producing grass, plants, and shrubs. Of trees and shrubs are various sorts, but none above ten feet high. Some of the trees were sweet-scented, and reddish within the bark, like sassafrass, but redder. The blossoms of the different sorts of trees are of several colours, but mostly blue, and smelt very sweet and fragrant.' The kangaroo he described as a sort of racoon, differing from those of the West Indies chiefly in the legs. He noticed also the iguanas, sharks, green turtles, and fish, and even the shells, Dampier display- ing in his narrative those powers of accurate observation of nature which were peculiar to him. On the whole, however, the first glimpse of the Australian shores did not augur well ; and it was probably owing to his descriptions of the dryness of this great Thirst Land that explorers were kept away from the continent.
Leaving Australia, Dampier directed his course to New Guinea, following the coast south-west and west ; discovering that ' the east land was not joined to New Guinea,' he called it New Britain. Dampier's homeward voyage was -prosperous until he reached Ascension, where the Roebuck, an old and worn-out ship, sprang a leak, and he was compelled to abandon her. A few weeks afterwards he found his way home on board an English ship-of-war which anchored at Ascension. Thus ended the first official attempt to examine the coasts of New Holland.
Later on Dampier persuaded the Bristol merchants to fit out another expedition of two ships for the purpose of plunder- ing the Spaniards. The crews numbered 321, and Captain Woodes Rogers was placed in command, Dampier being the pilot. Their cruise in the Pacific was successful, and at the island of Juan Fernandez, the usual rendezvous of the buccaneers, they discovered Alexander Selkirk. His rescue is thus described : ' The pinnace came back immediately from the
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shore, and brought abundance of cray-fish ; and with a man clothed in goat-skins, who looked more wild than the first owners of them. He had been on the island four years and four months. His name was Alexander Selkirk, a Scotchman, who had been master of the Cinque Ports galley, a ship which came here with Captain Dampier, who told me he was the best man in her : so I immediately agreed with him to be mate on board our ship.'
Pursuing his object of sweeping the Pacific and plundering the Spaniards, Woodes Rogers captured the town of Guayaquil and took booty to the value of ,£21,000, together with 27,000 dollars ransom. A Manilla ship, laden with merchandise and ;£i 2,000 in gold and silver, fell into his hands. Turning his face homewards, Woodes Rogers finally reached the Thames with money and merchandise valued at £1 50,000. From this date nothing more is known of William Dampier, his end being wrapped in obscurity. Yet no career was, after a fashion, more extraordinary. Compared with its varied and chequered aspect, the adventures of Alexander Selkirk, or of such sailors as Lionel Wafer, the shipmate of Dampier and the hero of many wonderful exploits in the South Seas, or indeed of the majority of the buccaneer leaders, may be regarded only in the light of casual events. Dampier's active seafaring life extended over forty years.
The voyage of Woodes Rogers having been crowned with so much success, the Bristol merchants again fitted out two ships for the South Seas in 1 7 18. Captains Shelvocke and Clipperton were placed in command, but unfortunately the expedition was badly conducted and did not succeed. Shelvocke took some prizes, and published an account of his voyage in 1726, which has a literary interest as being the book which prompted the picturesque imagery of the immortal Ancient Mariner of Coleridge. Shelvocke described the weird ocean scenery of Patagonia and Cape Horn ; how the navigators experienced such extreme cold when driven into the latitude of 61° 30' S., that a sailor fell with benumbed fingers from the mainsail and
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was drowned. * In short, one would think it impossible that anything living could subsist in so rigid a climate : and indeed we all observed that we had not the sight of one fish of any kind since we were come to the southward of the Streights of Le Mair ; not one seabird, except a disconsolate black albatross who accompanied us for several days, hovering about us for a long time as if he had lost himself; till Hatley (my second captain) observing, in one of his melancholy fits, that this bird was always near us, imagined from its colour that it might be some ill omen. That which, I suppose, induced him the more to encourage his superstition was the continued series of contrary tempestuous winds which had oppressed us ever since we had got into this sea. But, be that as it would, he, after some fruitless attempts, at length shot the albatross, not doubting, perhaps, that we should have a fair wind after it.
In November 1739 Captain George Anson was despatched to attack the Spanish trade and settlements in the South Seas, in command of a fleet of six ships of war and two storeships. This expedition cruised against the Spaniards with success, the town of Payta being taken and a number of prizes being captured. The galleon of Acapulco, with an immense amount of wealth on board, was captured. But the voyage of Anson will ever be memorable on account of that cruel and unjustifi- able order that despatched five hundred invalids from among the out-pensioners of Chelsea to endure the terrors and hard- ships of the passage of the Straits of Magellan. Not one of these poor men lived to return to his native land.
Another severe blow was struck at the commerce of Spain in 1762 by the capture of Manilla. Spain having entered into an alliance with France in consequence of the family compact of the house of Bourbon, England declared war against Spain as well as France. A force was sent from our East India settlements, particularly Madras, for the conquest of the Philippine Islands under General Draper and Admiral Cornish. Arriving at Manilla, this force stormed and took the town in October 1762 ; but to save so fine a city from destruction the
The A ustralian Colonies 1 39
English agreed to accept a ransom amounting to ,£1,000,000 sterling. The settlement has been described as superlatively rich. Five large vessels sailed yearly to Acapulco in Mexico freighted with diamonds from Golconda, cinnamon from Ceylon, pepper from Sumatra and Java, cloves and nutmegs from the Moluccas and Banda Islands, camphire from Borneo, ivory from Cambodia, silks, tea, and china-ware from China. These ships returned laden with Mexican silver, and made 400 per cent, profit on their voyage.
The * Manilla ransom ' was never paid by the Spaniards, and formed a subject of notice and animadversion in two of Junius' Letters.1 Junius regarded the remission of the sum of money due to England as part of a feeble and retrograde policy to be classed with ' the alienation of the affection of the American colonists, the shameful abandonment of Corsica, the languish- ing of commerce, and the threatening of public credit with a new debt.'
The intervention of France in the affairs of the Pacific offers a fresh landmark and a distinct political departure. When the French power was finally broken in Canada, and the valley of the St. Lawrence, as well as the maritime settlements along the east coast, handed over to England by the Treaty of Paris in 1763, some of the more adventurous and intrepid of the French sailors turned their attention to the South Seas. The men of St. Malo, with their accustomed zeal and enterprise, had adventured as far south as the Falkland Islands, and given them the name of lies Malouines. This lonely outpost, com- manding as it does the entrance to the Straits of Magellan and the passage round Cape Horn, seemed likely to acquire a new value in case any great trade or commerce could be developed in the waters of the South Pacific. The Frenchmen intro- duced horses and cattle, and the Falklands promised to be a kind of second St. Helena as a recruiting place for vessels, the harbours being many and good, and the climate well adapted for the growth of provisions.
1 Nos. iii. and iv.
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Amongst the individual Frenchmen who had distinguished themselves in the campaigns in Canada was M. Bourgainville. It was plain to him, as well as to all others who had the colonial prosperity of France at heart, that if North America were lost some compensation should be found in the southern hemisphere. Accordingly, by way of taking the first step, he proposed to the French . Government that, if they would allow him, he would make a settlement on the Falkland Islands at his own expense. The people he wished to take with him were those unfortunate Frenchmen, many of them Malouines by extraction, who had been driven by the American War from their homes in Acadia and New Brunswick. They were splendid colonis- ing material, and as fishermen and sailors were well known along the tempestuous North American seaboard.
The Falkland Islands were already a place of resort for the New England whalers and fishermen. In his speech on * Conciliation with America,' Edmund Burke said : —
' Look at the manner in which the people of New England have of late carried on the whale fishery. Whilst we follow them among the tumbling mountains of ice, and behold them pene- trating into the deepest frozen recesses of Hudson's Bay and Davis's Straits, whilst we are looking for them beneath the Arctic Circle, we hear that they have pierced into the opposite region of polar cold, that they are at the Antipodes, and engaged under the frozen Serpent of the South. Falkland Island, which seemed too remote and romantic an object for the grasp of national ambition, is but a stage and resting-place in the progress of their victorious industry.'
It may be concluded, therefore, that the North American seamen, whether British or French, were well acquainted with the Falkland Islands some time before he proposal of M. Bourgainville.
The French leader, however, carried out his enterprise. He set sail from St. Malo in September 1763, a few months after the signing of the Treaty of Paris, and on the 3rd of February 1764 entered a bay of the Falkland Islands, to which
The Australian Colonies 141
he gave the name of ' Bale des Frangois.' The colony of Frenchmen consisted of twenty-seven persons, of whom five were women. Bourgainville left the islands shortly after settling this first detachment, and returned next year with more, so that at the close of 1765 the French colony consisted of 150 souls. As a beginning of their industries they sent home a cargo of oil and seal-skins. The colony, however, was very short-lived. The jealousy of the Spaniards was aroused, an official correspondence took place, and the result was that the post was abandoned, a pecuniary compensation offered to Bourgainville, and the place rechristened by the Spaniards Port Solidad.
It was destined, however, that the stars of Spain and France should both pale before that of England in the Pacific, as elsewhere. Her ambition was great, and her activities were many-sided. The Peace of Paris had indeed set England on a pinnacle of fame. King George exclaimed, ' England never signed such a peace before, nor, I believe, any other Power in Europe ' ; and Lord Bute said, ' I wish no better inscription on my tomb than that I was its author.' What bounds, there- fore, could be placed to England's further enterprises ? The King himself was an enthusiastic geographer, and in 1764 Commodore Byron was instructed to sail on a voyage of discovery, the objects of which were set forth in his instructions: * Whereas nothing can redound more to the honour of this nation as a maritime Power, to the dignity of the Crown of Great Britain, and to the advancement of the trade and navi- gation thereof, than to make discoveries of countries hitherto unknown ; and whereas there is reason to believe that lands and islands of great extent, hitherto unvisited by any European Power, may be found in the Atlantic Ocean, between the Cape of Good Hope and the Magellanic Strait, within the latitudes convenient for navigation, and in the climates adapted to the produce of commodities useful in commerce ; and whereas His Majesty's islands, called Pepys Island and Falkland's Island, lying within the said track, notwithstanding their having been
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first discovered and visited by British navigators, have never yet been sufficiently surveyed, as that an accurate judgment may be formed of their coasts and products ; His Majesty, taking the premises into consideration, and conceiving no conjuncture so proper for an enterprise of this nature as a time of profound peace, which his kingdoms at present happily enjoy, has thought fit that it should now be undertaken.'
This preamble deserves notice on many accounts. It points out the nature of this enterprise, somewhat different from that of Lord Anson's cruise, promoted and encouraged by the Crown, in southern waters ; it indicates the prevalent belief in a vast southern continent between the latitudes of the Cape of Good Hope and the Straits of Magellan, and most plainly asserts the right to the Falkland Islands by right of prior dis- covery— the great navigator John Davis having been driven amongst them in August 1592.
Commodore Byron left England with the Tamar and the Dolphin, the last-named ship being sheathed in copper, an experiment then made for the first time. In pursuance with his instructions the Commodore visited the Falkland Islands, and discovered a port on the western coast, to which he gave the name of Port Egmont. He was unable, however, to discover Pepys Island. His passage through the Straits of Magellan was attended with the usual tempests of these latitudes, and occupied seven weeks ; but Commodore Byron, having been round Cape Horn twice — once in company with Lord Anson — avowed his preference for this route. After effecting a few discoveries in the Pacific, he returned to England, after an absence of twenty-two months, steering the northerly and north-westerly course, first to the island of Juan Fernandez off the west coast, thence to Timour and Guam, and round to Batavia, and so home by way of the Cape of Good Hope. Byron returned in May 1766, and the result of his voyage was to inspire another in the same direction in the same year under Captain Wallis, commanding the Dolphin, Captain Carteret the Swallow, with a storeship
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Prince Frederick. Captain Wallis took the usual track by the Straits of Magellan ; and during his voyage through the Pacific discovered and described several islands, such as Whitsun Island, lat. 19° 26' S. and long. 137° 56' W. ; Queen Charlotte Island, lat. 19° 18' S. and long. 138° 4' W. ; Gloucester Island, lat 19° n' S. and long. 140° 4' W. ; Prince William Henry Island, lat. 19° S., long. 141° 6' W. ; Osnaburgh Island, lat. 17° 51' S. and long. 147° 30' W. His most im- portant discovery was of King George the Third's Island, or Otaheite, lat. 17° 40' S. and long. 149° 13' W., where 'Mr. Furneaux stuck up a staff, upon which he hoisted a pen- dant, turned a turf, and took possession of the island in His Majesty's name.' From Otaheite Captain Wallis steered for Timour, Batavia, and so to Europe by the Cape of Good Hope. At the latter place abundance of stores and provisions were procured; and Captain Wallis, in order to show the captains of the Indiamen and their officers that, upon an emergency, fresh water might be gained by distillation, de- scribed how he ' put 56 gallons of salt water into the still, and in about five hours and a quarter obtained 42 gallons of fresh water, at an expense of 9 Ibs. of wood and 69 Ibs. of coal.' A most valuable experiment, and calculated to save many lives.
In conjunction with Captain Wallis's expedition must be considered that of Captain Carteret and the Swallow. Captain Carteret, having lost sight of Captain Wallis at the western entrance of the Straits of Magellan, proceeded across the Pacific by a more southerly course than his companion-in- adventure. He discovered Pitcairn Island, destined after- wards to be the solitary refuge of the ' mutineers of the Bounty] named Egmont Island, and Gower Island. Arriving at ' New Britain,' so named by William Dampier, he found that it was divided by a channel, which he named St. George's Channel, and to the northern part he gave the name of New Ireland. Steering northward, he touched at Macassar, and thence came home by the usual Cape route.
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The greatest triumphs of South Sea exploration were gained, however, by the celebrated Captain Cook. The previous career of this officer well qualified him for the task of maritime discovery. Born of humble parents, he was apprenticed at an early age to a shopkeeper at Straiths, not far from Whitby. Disliking his occupation here, he entered into a seven years' engagement with the owners of vessels employed in the coal trade, and from the experience gained in the hazardous coast navigation of the north of England he derived the greatest advantage. He learned to be a most competent and practical seaman, well fitted to ' hand, reef, and steer.' He entered the King's service in 1755, and served on board the Eagle. His character and capabilities becoming well known, he was appointed master of the Mercury, a small vessel which was attached to the fleet of Sir Charles Saunders, then operating against the French in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. He was employed in the difficult and dangerous task of taking soundings of the St. Lawrence opposite the French encampments around Quebec, and whilst thus employed at night was very nearly surrounded and cut off, escaping with great difficulty to the Isle of Orleans. After the end of the Canadian campaign, and the crowning victory of Wolfe on the Heights of Abraham, he was employed in the work of surveying the coasts of Newfoundland and Labrador. By the work he did here he still further in- creased his reputation ; and when a competent and scientific captain was required to sail to the Pacific and observe the transit of the planet Venus over the sun's disc on June 3, 1769, no one seemed more likely to carry out this work successfully than Captain Cook. Never was an appointment more justified by its results, and the three voyages of Cook conducted to the Pacific Ocean are a monumental record of English seamanship in its best sense.
Without entering into details here, it may suffice to point out some of the main results of Cook's sea voyages. In the extent of coasts he surveyed he far surpasses all other navi- gators. He traced the eastern coast of New Holland for
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2000 miles, and on the occasion of an untoward accident on the Barrier Reef escaped solely by his cool and intrepid courage. He circumnavigated New Zealand, the eastern and southern parts of which were unknown, and believed to be part of the Terra Australia Incognita. He discovered and named New Caledonia and Norfolk Island. He also de- scribed the New Hebrides, and gave the group their definite and proper place. His run from New Zealand to Tierra del Fuego, along the latitude of 55° South, was the first instance of a run made completely across the Southern Pacific. In short, he made the circuit of the South Seas at a high latitude, and proved decisively that the great southern continent, so long the subject of fiction and theory, did not exist in fact. Cook prided himself on the discovery of the Sandwich Islands, especially of Owhyhee, the largest of them. His accuracy of observation and his correctness of survey have been warmly attested to by many navigators, such as Crozet and La Perouse.
The most important act of Captain Cook, in consideration of the vast results that ensued, was the occupation of south- east Australia at Botany Bay on behalf of His Britannic Majesty. The district was called New South Wales on account of its resemblance to the coasts of the shores of Wales. The roar of the cannon and the volleys of musketry that attended this act of occupation marked an epoch in the history of the island-continent. At no long time it was to be dragged from its obscurity and become known to all the kingdoms of Europe.
NEW SOUTH WALES.
Many causes were now inducing Great Britain to follow up the task of Pacific exploration by Pacific colonisation, and thus enter upon the heritage won for her in these distant waters by her intrepid sailors. In 1776 the United States declared their independence, and it was no longer possible to
K
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send convicts there as formerly. With regard to the West Indies, it had been proved, over and over again, that these tropical islands were unsuited to European labourers. The vast increase of the slave population and the creation of large properties had put small cultivators and peasant proprietors out of court. Clearly there was no opening for the waifs and strays of England in these islands. Very often, also, the Irish and other convicts proved a source of danger and trouble to the prosperity of the West Indies.
But Australia was a long way off — there was safety in dis- tance— and the climate was healthy. Here the convicts might have a chance of rehabilitating themselves and becoming an orderly class of citizens. For once the change of climate might bring out a moral reformation, and the proverb of ' Ccelum non animum mutant qui trans mare currunt ' proved, for once, to be untrue. Moreover, the idea of com- merce and trade, and the opportunities of extending England's power in the southern hemisphere, undoubtedly furnished a strong motive ; and the instructions given to Commodore Byron by the King in 1764, in accordance with which the British ships were commanded to visit all lands and islands in the Atlantic Ocean between the Cape of Good Hope and the Straits of Magellan, coupled with the objects set forth in the expeditions of Wallis and Carteret, were features of a continu- ous and determined policy, officially recognised and counte- nanced. More especially, the new El Dorado of the whale fishery in the two Pacifies happened to be opened up just about this time, and the discovery formed a grand era in our commercial history. A writer in the Quarterly Review (March 1839) thus expressed himself on the value of this opening : ' The enterprise of the whalers first opened up to us a beneficial intercourse with the coasts of Spanish America ; it led in the sequel to the independence of the Spanish colonies. But for our whalers we might never have founded our colonies in Van Diemen's Land and Australia — or, if we had, we could not have maintained them in their early stages of danger and
The Australian Colonies 147
privation. Moreover, our intimacy with the Polynesians must be traced to the same source. The whalers were the first that traded in that quarter. They prepared the way for the missionaries ; and the same thing is now in progress in New Ireland, New Britain, and New Zealand.' The great venture of Mr. Enderby, a London merchant, who fitted out an ex- pedition at great expense to go into the South Pacific, was made in 1788, the year of the founding of Sydney.
Moreover, to economists the relief given to the State by transportation had long appeared to be an unanswerable argu- ment. The initial expense of transportation was calculated at about ,£30 per head, but this was the first and last expense. Mr. Cunninghame, in his Letters from New South Wales (1827), put the economical argument thus : ' Every rogue whom you retain at home to labour takes the bread out of the mouth of an honest man ; as long, therefore, as England cannot keep her honest poor, so long will it be her interest to turn all her roguish poor out from her bosom to thrive or work elsewhere.' In 1 82 8 there were upwards of 4000 convicts on board the hulks, employed in the dockyards, and on other public works, at an annual expense of ,£60,000 ; the whole of whom would be turned loose on society within the short period of seven years. If these 4000 * rogues ' took the bread out of the mouths of 4000 honest poor, another ^60,000 would be required some- how to make up. To send them out to New South Wales., where many of them would become good citizens, would cost the public twice ^"60,000 ; but then all future expense would cease. The first step of this policy was taken when it was determined to send out convicts to Botany Bay, and in May 1787 a fleet was ready to sail. It consisted of the Sinus, a warship, and the Supply ', a tender, together with six trans- ports for the convicts, and three ships for carrying the stores. Of the convicts 600 were men and 250 were women, and the guard on board consisted of 200 soldiers. Captain Phillip was appointed governor of the colony, Captain Hunter being second in command, and Mr. Collins held an appointment as Judge-
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Advocate to preside in the military courts. On the i8th, 1 9th, and 2oth of February 1788 these vessels dropped anchor in Botany Bay, after a voyage of eight months.
The story of the founding of New South Wales in 1788 has often been told, and it is certainly the most unique, in a certain sense, of all stories of colonisation, whether of ancient or modern times. The colonists were not like the Trojans of old seeking a new home by stress of war, nor were they like the overflow of a Greek or Phoenician city. ' Optata potiuntur arena' could not apply to those who had no will or option in the matter. Nor did their leaders think much of the trade or com- merce that might arise. The place was to be an asylum, not of persecuted sects nor of Puritan refugees nor of injured inno- cence in any shape or form, but an asylum of criminals of various degrees of depravity. Possibly this asylum might be a kind of purgatory or a moral sanatorium. No one could well prophesy how it would turn out ; but every one felt that the convict difficulty was pressing sorely, and that the prisons of England were becoming unbearable.
Mr. Rusden, one of the best known of Australian his- torians, has pointed out that between transportation to America and transportation to Australia there was a wide distinction. Convicts conveyed to America were taken by contractors, who parted with them for a consideration to the colonists, and were obliged to prove by certificates that they had disposed of them according to the intention of the law. In Australia there were no colonists asking for labourers, and the Govern- ment were compelled to establish a society in the first place.1 Later on, it may be remarked, when the settlement was estab- lished, the Australian Agricultural Association, together with many free colonists, took the convicts and made great use of their services ; but their act naturally had to wait upon the first development. Morally and physically, this Purgatory, as the transportation was called, proved the greatest success when
1 ' Material Progress of New South Wales,' vol. xvii. Proceedings Royal Colonial Instittite.
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the examples and precepts of free labour were frequently held before the convicts in a practical way by a continual stream of free colonists.
At first the wretched convicts were shipped off with great disregard of health and comfort. Although Captain Cook, by the observance of proper rules of diet and cleanliness, had proved it possible to make long ocean voyages (1760-1774) without serious loss of life, the world was slow to learn the lesson. More than a third of the first batch of convicts were down with scurvy and other diseases ; sixty-six lay in the little hospital which was set up in Sydney Cove ; and, through want of proper precautions and foresight, the nascent colony was threatened with starvation. The Sinus was despatched to the Cape of Good Hope and the Supply to Batavia for provisions ; and the appearance of the first British settlement was that of a vast lazaretto, with gaunt and fever-stricken mortals wander- ing aimlessly about. Under these circumstances Governor Phillip was compelled to send two hundred convicts, with about seventy soldiers, to Norfolk Island, where there was a moderate chance of their being able to support themselves.
The seal of the infant colony, however, was symbolical of ultimate success. On the obverse were the royal arms, whilst the reverse displayed the landing of a party of prisoners wel- comed by Industry with tools and a bale of merchandise. The legend was, ' Sic fortis Etruria crevit,' with reference to the rise of Rome ; and no seal or legend could have been more prophetic. Industry has been the potent quality by which the wealth of this vast island-continent has been tapped.
By one of those strange discoveries which are so unex- pected in their occurrence and so prolific in their results, it was discovered that close to Botany Bay, and behind the opening which Captain Cook had called ' Port Jackson,' there lay a harbour which is perhaps the most beautiful and perfect in the world. It is hard to think how it could have escaped notice ; and if La Perouse or a French or Dutch navigator before him had sighted it, the future of Australia might have
150 British Colonisation
been changed altogether. Botany Bay — so named, it may be remembered, by Captain Cook on account of the wealth of flowers and shrubs seen and described by Banks and Solander — was found to be an unsuitable place for the settlement. The waters of the Bay were so shallow that the ships could not enter it properly, and had to lie outside in the face of the Pacific swell. On shore the swamps seemed to render the most eligible position unhealthy. So Governor Phillip took three boats and proceeded on that coast survey that gave to the British Empire, in Sydney Harbour, the most perfect vantage-ground in the southern seas. ' It seemed a vast maze of winding waters, dotted here and there with lovely islets : its'shores thickly wooded down to the strips of golden sand which lined the most charming little bays ; and its broad sheets of rippling waters bordered by lines of dusky foliage.' How great and material advantage a good land-locked harbour can be to a colony is never sufficiently realised. At vast expense and sometimes peril man is forced to supplement Nature's deficiencies ; and even then he discovers that when he has run out a mole, constructed a pier, and erected landing- places, the whole work is rendered nugatory by some unfore- seen current, silted-up beds of sand, or is swept away bodily by the force of some unusual and unexpected tempest.
The French, it must be noticed, were not to be debarred just yet from Australian waters. In June 1800, a few months after the retirement of Mr. Pitt, the French Government fitted out two armed vessels, le Geographe and le Naturaliste, for an expedition round the world, under Captain Baudin. In this expedition they sought for the friendly help of the British, and obtained a kind of passport and recommendation from the King that ' the vessels should be permitted to put into any of His Majesty's ports in case of stress of weather, or to pro- cure assistance to enable them to prosecute their voyage.' It was a national and imperial enterprise in reality, and its true purport did not at first appear. The chief object of Captain Baudin was not to go round the world for scientific purposes,
The A ustralian Colonies 1 5 1
but to seek for a French foothold in Pacific waters. His instructions were to touch, in the first instance, at the Isle of France, thence to proceed to the southern extremity of Van Diemen's Land, visit Dentrecasteaux's Channel, examine the eastern coast, enter the Strait of Bass through that of Banks, complete the discovery of Hunter's Islands, survey the south- west coast of New Holland, penetrate behind the islands of St. Peter and St. Francis, and visit that part of the continent concealed by these islands, where a strait was supposed to exist by which a communication might be opened with the great Gulf of Carpentaria. This being accomplished, they were to direct their course to Cape Leuwen, examine the unknown parts of the coast to the northward, visit the coasts of the land of Edels and Endracht, make a particular survey of the island of Rottenest and Shark's Bay, terminating their first command at the North-West Cape of New Holland. The expedition was directed to winter either at Timor or Amboyna ; and on their second expedition they were directed to go through Endeavour Strait to the eastern point of the great Gulf of Carpentaria, to survey the whole circuit of its coast to the land of Arnheim, finishing their second survey at the North-West Cape, at which their first was completed. It will thus be gathered that the real object of the French was to explore thoroughly the island-continent of Australia, and not go round the world.
The idea of a trans-Pacific colony had seized upon the great Napoleon, and, at the very moment when he was crossing the Alps he gave the order for this expedition. There was no lack of zeal amongst the French, and no want of volunteers. Captain Baudin's expedition was brought forward in the first instance under the immediate sanction of Buonaparte in con- sequence of a report of the French Imperial Institute. This Institute, it may be noticed, attached at this early date a vast importance to the nascent colony in New South Wales, noticing that the English had ' formed establishments which excite the greatest interest, of which we in Europe have
152 British Colonisation
received hitherto but imperfect and invariably false informa- tion/1 Captain Baudin carried out his instructions as a patriotic Frenchman, renaming many places, such as the North-West Cape, to which he gave the name of Cape Murat, and calling nine hundred leagues of coast ' Terre Napoleon,' along which Nuyts, Vancouver, Dentrecasteaux, Flinders, Bass, and Grant had made discoveries. It was evident that the French, even if they could not effect the planting of a colony here in the extended sense of the word, were anxious to occupy and create an Australian Pondicherry which should be a thorn in the side of the British.
Whilst Baudin was exploring the coasts of Australia on board the corvettes k Geographe and le Naturaliste^ he met the celebrated Flinders, in command of the Investigator. This Englishman was one of the most eager explorers of the new continent. Coming out originally in 1795 as midship- man on board the Reliance with Governor Hunter, he and George Bass, a young surgeon, had within a month of their arrival purchased a small boat, only eight feet in length, and made several coast explorations at great risk and peril. On a subsequent occasion they circumnavigated Van Diemen's Land in the Norfolk^ a small sloop lent to them by the governor. Bass, who was an adventurous spirit, joined an expedition with some friends to South America, carrying con- traband goods thither in spite of the Spaniards ; but Flinders pursued his Australian coast surveys, and had submitted, in 1800, a series of valuable charts to the English Government. His services were greatly appreciated, and he was placed in command of the Investigator. A passport was procured for him from the French Government, similar to that given to Baudin by the British Government. When, therefore, Baudin and Flinders met, it would appear as if, putting race rivalries aside, they would pose as peaceful explorers occupied upon a common task, viz. that of opening up a distant part of the
1 See Peron's Voyage de Decouvertes aux Terre s Attstrales, execute par ordre de sa Majeste VEmpeteur et Roi, 1807.
The Australian Colonies 153
world for both nations. Unfortunately, international courte- sies of this description were proved to be impossible at this time between French and English. Flinders was forced to put in at the Mauritius (then a French island) owing to stress of weather, feeling confident that his passport from Napoleon would be his safeguard and protection. The French Governor, de Caen, did not thus interpret his obligations, and, seizing Flinders, threw him into prison, depriving him of his charts and papers. To complete the disgraceful story, Baudin, who had been treated well at Sydney as the bearer of an English passport, took copies of Flinders's charts when he touched at Mauritius on his way home. Nearly seven years passed before Flinders obtained his release and was able to return to England, publish his discoveries, and place the truth before the world. On the very day, however, that his book was being published Flinders died, leaving behind him an imperishable name as an Australian explorer. After his death there was never any serious attempt on the part of the French to advance their claims to Australia. The Peace of Paris left England a monopoly of the Australian continent, and unquestioned command of its sea.
Freed from any threat of external danger, the Australian colonists have developed the resources of their country in a marvellous and unprecedented fashion. The two main pro- ducts of Australia have been wool and gold. Wool converted New South Wales and the rest of the Pacific colonies of that day from mere convict stations to important centres of free colonisation. The pastoral era preceded the gold era, and was in many respects quite as important. Free settlers came to tend their flocks, and at first they were an embarrass- ing factor in the midst of a penal settlement, seeming to com- plicate the methods of administration, no provision being made originally for them ; but as time went on they leavened the whole mass, and made a free and self-respecting community possible.
The beginnings of the wool industry were as follows. About
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1803 an officer of the New South Wales Corps, Macarthur by name, saw that the country of Australia was wonderfully adapted for wool-growing, and with this object in view had the foresight to procure a number of sheep from the colony of the Cape of Good Hope. During a sojourn in this colony a Colonel Gordon — who was in the Dutch service in 1790 — had been fortunate enough to secure some rams of the fine- woolled sheep of the Escurial breed, originally presented to the Dutch Government by the King of Spain. Keeping a few himself, he dispersed the rest amongst his friends in the country, who crossed them with the hairy native sheep, thus producing a rough, lustreless, but heavy and abundant fleece. The Dutch peasantry, therefore, at the Cape, by abandoning the purity of the strain, seem scarcely to have valued the merino sheep as they ought ; and when Colonel Gordon died, and his effects were sold, nine of his sheep were placed on board the English warships the Reliance and the Supply, which happened to be in Table Bay taking in supplies of corn arid flour for the settlers at Sydney Cove. To the Cape, therefore, Australia was indebted in the first instance for her flocks of merino sheep.
Mr. Macarthur was enthusiastic on the prospects of Australia as a wool-growing land, and on his return to England man- aged to obtain from George in., who was a farmer himself, some of the best sheep he possessed of the Spanish breed. These were safely landed at Sydney, and Mr. Macarthur began his experiment of wool-growing upon a grant of 10,000 acres at Camden.
Such were the beginnings of this pastoral industry, which worked a revolution in the social and political condition of this island-continent. It is calculated that for the period of fifty-five years elapsing between 1831-1886 Australasia has sent to England wool worth ^£3 5 0,000,000. During the same period the Cape is calculated to have sent about ^80,000,000 worth. At the present time New South Wales alone sends more wool than the whole of South Africa. Truly this
The A ustralian Colonies 1 5 5
was ' golden fleece ' indeed ; and although the operations of pastoral life, and the pursuits of a lonely rancher or herds- man, are not so thrilling and romantic as the experiences of a diggers' or miners' camp, still they are more substantial, more healthy, and more enduring.
In connection with the growth of this great pastoral in- dustry in New South Wales and Australasia must be con- sidered the developments, pan passu, of mechanical science in the Mother-country. In 1769 Sir Richard Arkwright ob- tained his first patent for the spinning-frame, and a revolution in labour began. The average weight of cotton annually im- ported in the three years 1765, 1766, 1767 was 4,241,364 Ibs. ; in 1822, 1823, 1824 it had risen to 153,799,302 Ibs. From the commencement of the reign of George in. the progress and extension of the woollen manufactures was equally great. The average annual importation of sheep's wool for 1765, 1766, 1767 was about four million pounds' weight; but in 1822, 1823, 1824 it had risen to more than eighteen million pounds' weight.1
When New South Wales was found to be a good country for flocks there was naturally a desire evinced to explore the Hinterland, or back country, and to solve certain geographi- cal problems. The physical aspect of New South Wales is somewhat peculiar. At a comparatively short distance from the coast, varying from twenty to one hundred miles, a great dividing range runs, separating the eastern from the western waters. This range, or cordillera, was to the earliest colonists an impassable barrier, and a general idea prevailed that the country beyond was worthless. Lieutenant Dawes, Captain Patterson, Hacking, Cayley, Mann, and George Bass, with many others, had tried often to cross the Blue Mountains, and had failed. However, in May 1813, three explorers, Gregory Blaxland, William Charles Wentworth, and Lieu- tenant William Lawson, burst through these barriers by keep-
1 The Present State of England in regard to Agriculture. By Joseph Lowe.
156 British Colonisation
ing to the ridges of the mountains, and opened up the regions beyond, which were described afterwards by Mr. Evans, the Government surveyor, as ' equal to every demand which this colony may have for the extension of tillage and pasture land for a century to come.'1 In January 1815 a road was engineered over the formidable obstacles nature had set in the way. To use the words of an old colonist : ' A pastoral era set in, and lands were occupied for grazing purposes. Enterprising men took a flock of sheep or a herd of cattle into the wilderness of the great interior, where there was room enough for all, and, like the patriarchs of old, camped or squatted down with them, waiting patiently until the few became hundreds, and hundreds thousands, and thousands tens of thousands. Thus originated the word squatter, which has since become so well known in Australasian history.' An epoch in the history of New South Wales was doubtless reached when Governor Macquarie founded the town of Bathurst on the scene of the new explorations.
The history of Australia is, for the first fifty years, the history of the mother-colony, New South Wales ; and so much so, that John Wilson Croker, instead of alluding to the continent of New Holland or Australia, spoke of it as ' the continent of New South Wales.' It was about 1817 — so we are informed by Mr. F. P. Labilliere, the author of The Early History of Victoria — that the word Australia was first used in a despatch by the Secretary of State for the Colonies to Governor Mac- quarie, which enclosed him Elinders's chart and voyages to Australia. General Macquarie, in reply, underlined the word Australia, and wrote to Secretary Goulburn in December 1817 expressing a hope that the name Australia might be substituted for New Holland. In 1606 the country, as has been already noted, was termed by de Quiros ' Terra Australis del Espiritu Santo.' French writers, also, such as M. E. Peron, generally alluded to the continent as * Terres Australes.'
The year 1851 is remarkable for the first great gold 1 Proceedings of Royal Colonial Institute, vol. xvii.
The Australian Colonies 157
discoveries made in Australia. The credit of the first find is usually attributed to Edward Hargraves ; and although the story has often been told, it will bear telling again, as it has so much of romance about it. Edward Hargraves, it seems, was a Bathurst settler who, in company with many other New South Wales colonists, had been attracted to California to seek his fortune on the banks of the Sacramento, in California. On these distant gold-fields he toiled with little success ; but whilst living there he learned the arts of mining, and acquired by experience a miner's eye for the lie of a country.
It seemed to him that there was some likeness between the rocks of the Sacramento Valley and a certain secluded valley beyond the Blue Mountains in New South Wales which he had visited fifteen years before. The similitude impressed itself upon him so strongly that he resolved to go and examine the spot again. He lost no time in sailing, and on arriving at Sydney set out on horseback to cross the Blue Mountains. 'On the nth of February 1851 he spent the night,' we are told, ' at a little inn a few miles from the object of his journey ; and shortly after dawn he sallied forth on his walk through the forest, carrying with him a spade, a trowel, and a little tin dish. In the cool air of the morning the scent of the spreading gum- trees braced up his frame as he plunged deeper and deeper among those lonely hollows and wood-clad hills. His quickened step in an hour or two brought him to the well-remembered spot — the dry course of a mountain torrent which in rainy seasons finds its way into the Summerhill Creek. He lost no time in placing a little of the grey-coloured soil into his tin dish, and at once carried it to the nearest pool, where he dipped the whole beneath the water. By moving the dish rapidly, as he had learned to do in California, he washed away the sand and earth ; but the particles of gold, which are more than seven and a-half times heavier than sand, were not so easily to be carried off. They sank to the corner of the dish, where they lay secure, a few small specks, themselves of little value, yet telling of hidden treasures that lay scattered in all
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the soil around.' * His immediate reward was ^500 from the New South Wales Government, which afterwards they supple- mented with ;£ 1 0,000. The colony of Victoria also voted him a present of .£2381. In the same year gold was dis- covered in Victoria by a Californian digger named Esmond, who, like Hargraves, had a practical knowledge of mining.
It has been remarked by Lord Norton that the discovery of gold, silver, and copper, but chiefly the attractive power of gold, opened a new era in Australian history, gave the coup-de-grace to transportation, and broke the last possible link of home control. Henceforward the Australians began to work out quickly the task of self-government, more especially under the regime of Earl Grey. In 1842 a meeting was held at Sydney to petition for representative government. The Imperial Government acceded to the desire, and in 1843 the first repre- sentative assembly met at Sydney. The Council was of a composite character, twenty-four being elected by the colonists, of whom eighteen were chosen by the colonists of New South Wales proper and six by the Port Phillip colonists. The remaining twelve were Government nominees. In 1850-51 another step forward was taken. In accordance with powers conceded by the Imperial Government, the Council of New South Wales entrusted the framing of a new constitution to a committee, which decided to adopt the bicameral system of government. The Legislature was divided into two chambers — a Legislative Council of twenty-one members nominated by the Governor, but not less than four-fifths being always un- official ; and an elected Assembly of fifty-four members. Both chambers were of quinquennial duration. Responsible government was inaugurated, and the Ministers who controlled the affairs of the country were no longer officials, appointed or dismissed by the Governor and Secretary of State. In every sense of the word New South Wales became self-governing. Subsequent modifications were made in the original then drawn out, and members of the Council were elected for life Sutherland, History of Australia.
The Australian Colonies 159
instead of five years ; and the Council itself numbers now sixty instead of twenty-one. The Assembly also consists of 124 members instead of fifty-four, the increase in both cases arising from the increasing prosperity of the country. The members themselves receive ^300 a year for their services, and are returned by a broadly based electorate.
For forty years and more New South Wales has practically held her own destinies in her hand. It cannot be denied that the experiment of self-government has answered if the measure taken be that of material wealth and social improvement. It will be only necessary to adopt the general summaries of the Government statists to be sure of this point. As New South Wales is the oldest Australian settlement, so she is now (1891) the richest. Her estimated private wealth is ^4 12,484,000, equal to .£368 per head of population, the total private wealth of Australasia being ;£i, 169,434,000. The history of the whole world cannot afford us such a tale of progress and prosperity. In a hundred years that struggling convict settlement at Port Jackson, which had to rest upon Batavia and the Cape of Good Hope for its daily bread, has expanded into the dimensions of a populous and self-governing colony, the wonder and envy of the whole world.1
1 For facts and figures see Appendix VI. Section A.
CHAPTER VIII
TASMANIA
IT is with New South Wales that the fortunes of Tasmania, or, as it was then called, Van Diemen's Land, must in the first instance be associated. In 1803 Lieutenant Bowen was sent across from Sydney with a vessel called the Lady Nelson, having on board a few convicts, whom it was proposed to settle in the island as a branch penal colony. New South Wales had been founded for fifteen years, and the grades in vice and depravity had time enough to show themselves. Some of the convicts had availed themselves of their opportunities and had amended their ways ; others had proved themselves irreclaimable thieves and vagabonds ; and it was with this undesirable remainder that Lieutenant Bowen was entrusted. He landed them at Risdon, on the estuary of the river Derwent. It should be mentioned that there was also a political motive underlying this colonising venture. It was not unreasonably imagined that the French exploring expedition under Commodore Baudin, to which allusion has already been made, was desirous of hoisting the French flag on some favourable spot on the island of Tasmania, and it was the policy of England to anticipate by prompt action any such movement in southern waters. During the same year (1803) there arrived at the island four hundred prisoners under the charge of Governor Collins. At the mouth of a little creek, with Sullivan's Bay as its harbour, Governor Collins founded Hobart Town, in honour of Lord Hobart, then Secretary of State for the Colonies.
Tasmania was also recruited by another accession of convicts
160
The Australian Colonies 161
from New South Wales, under Colonel Paterson, in 1804, who were settled near the entrance to Port Dalrymple, at the north of the island, and maintained a separate existence till 1812. In 1807 there was also a fresh centre of colonisation made by the Norfolk Island settlers, who came across and founded New Norfolk, fifteen miles above Hobart Town, in memory of their old home. These were the germs of the colony of Tasmania.
The first days of this settlement were hard and evil. At one time starvation stared them in the face, as it did in the case of the Sydney colony. They were dependent upon foreign supplies, and flour soon rose to .£112 per ton. Kangaroo flesh was 8d. a Ib. ; and when the wheat crop failed in 1807, and flour sold at ^"200 per ton, armed sentinels had to keep guard over the wheat-fields. In October 1808 all the barley was eaten up, and ij Ibs. of rice were issued as the weekly rations of each man. It was not till three years after their first arrival that sheep and oxen were imported.
The evil feature of Tasmanian life in the early days of the settlement was bushranging. The island itself was especially adapted to serve as a refuge and hiding-place for outlaws, the interior being mountainous and clothed with deep woods. Runaway sailors and convicts from Port Jackson were con- stantly coming to the islands of Bass Strait, and were known as sealers. Every year it is calculated that thirty or forty eluded the vigilance of their keepers and took to the bush or the islands. Allying themselves with the miserable aborigines, they debased them by the practice of every kind of cruelty, and created in the minds of the Tasmanians a dislike of all Europeans. There was no comfortable home here for the orderly and peaceful settler. He lived in constant fear of rapine and depredations, and bushranging effectually checked agricultural development. Twice, however, the Government attempted to rid the island of this pest : first under Governor Sorrel in 1817, and then under Governor Arthur in 1824. Governor Sorrel may be said to have scotched the snake, and Governor Arthur to have killed it altogether. It was during
L
1 62 British Colonisation
the regime of the last named that Crawford and Brady, the two desperate leaders of the bushrangers, were captured and executed, Brady being surprised and seized, as he wandered in a secluded valley without followers, by John Batman, a colonist, who afterwards assisted in the founding of the colony of Victoria.
The native question was, however, the one that most exer- cised the ingenuity of the various Governors of Tasmania. How to keep the peace between the settlers and the black fellows was a most difficult problem. Exasperated beyond measure by the treatment they had received from Europeans, unable to distinguish between the classes of Europeans, and suspicious of any method or plan of 'reserves' that might have kept them apart for a while, they maintained the attitude of hunted beasts, who roamed where they chose and retaliated when they could. Under these circumstances Sir George Arthur, whose administration of the colony is conspicuous for the attempts made to establish security, and to save the black fellows not only from the Europeans but from themselves, conceived the idea of capturing them all and removing them to some safe place. At first capture parties were organised, and rewards offered by the Government of £$ for every adult and £2 for every child. The most prominent leaders of these parties were John Batman, to whom allusion has been made, and Jorgen Jorgenson, a Dane, the latter being a clever and daring man, with a curious history. He had, during the great Napoleonic wars, proceeded to Iceland, and, claiming to represent Great Britain, so imposed upon the authorities that they actually surrendered the government to him and his companions. He proclaimed himself governor, and sent despatches to England with the news that he had added a province to the Empire ; but his message was scarcely received with the cordiality he anticipated, and he was transported to Van Diemen's Land. However,, he made himself useful in assisting to capture the Tasmanian aborigines.
The result of this first attempt to stop the native difficulty
The Australian Colonies 163
was not very successful, the natives being lithe and active, well acquainted with every nook and corner of the country, and excelling the Europeans in all the stratagems and devices of savage life. Then Sir George Arthur, by way of trying an heroic remedy, and acting from humane motives, conceived the idea in 1830 of hemming in the tribes by means of an advancing line, and by skilful manoeuvring isolating them on Tasman's Peninsula. The Governor expended a great deal of money and energy in endeavouring to secure the success of this manoeuvre, but to no purpose, the natural difficulties and obstacles of this rough country proving too formidable to be overcome. In many places it was possible for the natives to break back through the line, concealed by the deep creepers and undergrowth of the forest.
This attempt to capture the Tasmanians en masse solely with a view of deporting them to some reserve or location of their own, whether island or peninsula, where they might be out of harm's way, has been unfairly criticised : Sir Charles Dilke describing it in his Greater Britain as ' a battue of the natives conducted by the military.' This statement carries with it its own refutation, when we reflect for a moment upon the state of affairs in the island which Sir George Arthur endeavoured to rectify. It was well known that the Governor was the friend of the wretched aborigines, and had always encouraged every kind of philanthropic and religious institution that existed in the colony for their benefit.
It was clear, however, that the Tasmanian black fellows were doomed to be exterminated, and there is something pathetic about their end. In 1835 tnev onty numbered 203, and these were removed to Flinders Island in 1835. I*1 1847 tms number was reduced to 44, comprising 12 men, 22 women, and only 10 children. In this year they were re- moved to Oyster Cove, a little harbour on the west side of Dentrecasteaux Channel. The last male of the race, William Lanne, died on March 3, 1869, at the early age of thirty-four years; and on May 8, 1876, the last female, Truganini, died at
164 British Colonisation
the age of sixty-five, and by her death a race became oblite- rated from the face of the earth.
In 1837 Sir John Franklin, the great Arctic explorer, arrived in Tasmania to take the reigns of government. He had served as a midshipman under Flinders during a survey of the Australian coasts, and was popular with the Australians. Un- fortunately, Sir John Franklin became involved in a quarrel with Mr. Montague, the Chief Secretary, which resulted in his own dismissal by Lord'Stanley — an official step which has been greatly blamed by some for its abruptness and discourtesy. In 1843 Sir John was superseded by Sir Eardley Wilmot, and two years afterwards he sailed with the Erebus and Terror on that well-known search for the North- West Passage from which he and his crew never returned.
During Sir Eardley Wilmot's governorship (1843) there arose many protests from the free colonists against the importa- tion of so many convicts ; and the position of a Governor ruling over a mixed population of free settlers, ticket-of-leave men, and convicts became particularly irksome. The Tas- manian colonists asked, * Was it not enough to send out the felons of Great Britain to become Tasmanian bushrangers, without forcing the free settlers to feed and clothe them throughout their lives, after the completion of their original sentence?' Lord Stanley's answer was that Tasmania had always been a convict colony, and that the free settlers had no right to ask that their views on the subject should be humoured. A certain number of the Legislative Council who were non-official members continued their protests, and, rather than assent to sums of money necessary for the maintenance of police and gaols, resigned in a body. They were honoured by their fellow-colonists with the title of the ' Patriotic Six.' Shortly afterwards, when Mr. Gladstone succeeded Lord Stanley as Secretary of State for the Colonies, Sir Eardley Wilmot was recalled. The Governor himself did not live to return to England, but died in the colony. The quarrel, however, between the colonists and the Executive went on.
The Australian Colonies 165
The ' Patriotic Six ' were reinstated, and pressed for two great constitutional changes, viz. elective parliaments and the aboli- tion of transportation. It was found that between 1846-1850 more than 25,000 convicts had been brought into the colony : free immigration had ceased, and the colony itself had retro- graded.
It was during Sir William Denison's governorship that the Tasmanian colonists pressed home their protests against trans- portation to their shores. The Anti-Transportation League was formed at Launceston, at the initiative more especially of the Rev. John West, and the resolution adopted was as follows : ' We, the undersigned, deeply impressed by the evils which have arisen from the transportation of criminals of Great Britain to the Australian colonies, declare that trans- portation to any of the colonies ought for ever to cease ; and we do hereby pledge ourselves to use all lawful means to procure its abolition.'
This was followed up by a conference at Melbourne, and amidst much enthusiasm * The League and Solemn Engage- ment of the Australian Colonies ' was adopted in Melbourne in February 1851 : the objects of which were most unmis- takable, involving as they did the practical ' boycotting ' of con- vict vessels and the adoption of every means at the disposal of the colonists to abate the evil.
It cannot be denied that the crisis was of an extremely serious character both in the Australian colonies and the Cape of Good Hope. Earl Grey was obstinate in the case of Van Diemen's Land, observing that ' this country had been origin- ally intended as a penal settlement, and that the free inhabi- tants could not expect the imperial policy to be altered.' Earl Grey had liberal notions with regard to colonies, but somehow he could not see that, if he gave the Australians anything approaching to representative government, he was bound to consider the wishes of the colonists on such an important matter as this. Colonists everywhere were abso- lutely determined to free themselves from the convict taint
1 66 British Colonisation
and to purify their society. The alternative to a refusal to meet their wishes seemed to be nothing more nor less than rebellion.
However, the solution, to a large extent, of all Tasmanian and Australian difficulties was destined to come from a some- what unexpected quarter. The Californian gold-fields (1849) had begun to attract a large number of colonists, and a trade sprang up between San Francisco and Tasmanian and Aus- tralian ports. Then came in due course the wonderful ' finds ' of New South Wales and Victoria, which did more than any legislation in the world to settle the political and social conditions of the South Pacific colonies. Upon Tas- mania the more immediate effect was to drain off large numbers of the undesirable surplus population. In the mad race after gold, convicts, bushrangers, political exiles, sober colonists, and men of every trade and profession joined with headlong zeal.
The granting of constitutions was a corollary of the remark- able influx of population and the enormous increase of wealth ; and from 1855-61, the period of Sir Henry Young's adminis- tration, responsible government was conceded to Tasmania.
Like New South Wales, Tasmania has flourished under the conditions of self-government. Some regard the island simply as the beautiful annexe of New South Wales, whilst others claim for her an unique and unrivalled position in southern waters. Her scenery is surpassingly beautiful and her climate is almost perfect ; and her mountains and valleys are a favourite recreation-ground for visitors from Melbourne and Sydney. The stress of life is less severe in Tasmania than in Victoria or New South Wales. Here, if anywhere, can be found the Capua of the South.
Sir Edward Braddon, the Agent-General of Tasmania, has thus summed up the future prospects of his colony : — ' With a splendid soil to allure the farmer; with magnificent pro- spects for the miner ; with promising industries yet unde- veloped, or only in the first stage of development; with a
The Australian Colonies 167
climate and people second to none in the world, and physical beauties that few countries can rival, Tasmania should have a great future in store for her. Strong in the girdle of waters that nature has placed around her, she is particularly strong also in the possession of a harbour that should become in pro- cess of time the centre of the maritime system of that southern region. Hobart is that harbour. It is easily approached by friendly vessels ; it is easily defended against unfriendly ones. It has a scope and depth that would accommodate any fleet likely to be sent there ; it possesses the recommendation of being favourably situated as regards a coal supply ; and it has a climate peculiarly adapted to the requirements of our British seamen. Whether from a strategical, economical, or sanitary point of view, it may be claimed for Hobart that it is the harbour of the south. Nor is it beyond the bounds of possi- bility that Tasmania, with her many peculiar advantages and her wide range of seaboard, may attain her destiny in becom- ing the maritime power of Australasia.'1
It may be added that, in the event of Australasian con- federation, Hobart, from her central position and unrivalled advantages, has already been designated as the seat of govern- ment. In these days of quick and easy ocean communication, the island of Tasmania is more accessible than any other colony. Here, in one of the fairest portions of the globe, may be assembled at some future date the Parliament of an Australasian Dominion.2
VICTORIA.
As the beginnings of Tasmania were from New South Wales, so the beginnings of Victoria were from Tasmania. In 1798 the discovery of Bass Straits had enabled mariners to shorten their voyage to New South Wales ; and in 1 800 Lieutenant Grant made use of this advantage. He took his brig, called the Lady Nelson, through the Straits, and gave names to the
1 Proceedings of the Royal Colonial Institute, vol. xx. p. 342.
2 For facts and figures see Appendix VI. Section B.
1 68 British Colonisation
bays and inlets. In 1802 the Governor of Sydney sent the Lady Nelson, under Lieutenant Murray, to explore a small inlet, which proved, upon close examination, to be the entrance to a broad sheet of water. To this bay the name of Port Phillip was given in honour of the first Australian Governor. The first attempt to colonise Port Phillip was made in 1803, under Governor Collins, who landed there with about four hundred convicts. This experiment was unfortunate, as there seemed to be no suitable place for a township. The blacks were hostile ; and, leave being given to Collins to remove to Tasmania if he thought fit, he did so at once, abandoning the site.
For more than thirty years Port Phillip was left to its solitude. In 1835 Jonn Pascoe Fawkner, who had been one of the children allowed to accompany their convict parents in the Collins expedition of 1803, returning to Tasmania with it afterwards, formed a project of colonising the old site. He is said to have been urged to this enterprise by reading an account of an expedition led in 1824-5 by two explorers named Hume and Hovell, who had recently travelled in this part of the world, leading a party from Sydney southwards across the Australian Alps to Geelong.
Together with five friends, Fawkner set sail in a small vessel called the Enterprise ; but, the winds proving contrary, he asked to be put ashore for a time, as he was a great sufferer from sea- sickness. His party, however, proceeded on their way, land- ing at Hobson's Bay, carrying with them horses, ploughs, grain, fruit-trees, materials for a house, as well as a boat and provisions. Fawkner himself joined them shortly after their arrival. About the same time John Batman, also a Tasmanian, who has already been alluded to as the capturer of the notorious Tasmanian bushranger Brady, formed a similar project, and in 1835 landed at Port Phillip after tossing about Bass Straits for nineteen days in a little sloop called the Rebecca. Batman ex- plored the bay, made friends with the natives, obtaining a grant of land from them to the amount of 600,000 acres.
The Australian Colonies 169
These were the beginnings of the great city of Melbourne. Before a year had passed nearly two hundred persons had crossed over from Tasmania with more than 15,000 sheep, and spread over a great extent of country from Geelong to Sunbury. Con- flicts arose between the settlers and the natives, and Governor Bourke endeavoured to check the nascent settlement, issuing a proclamation warning the settlers not to make their home there. But here, as elsewhere in England's colonial empire, official protests against colonisation and expansion were unavailing. At the close of 1836 Governor Bourke was compelled to recognise the colony, and, in 1837, visited Port Phillip him- self, and planned the town of Melbourne, so named after Lord Melbourne, at that time the Prime Minister of England. The history of Melbourne and of the colony of Victoria can be said, therefore, to begin almost exactly with Queen Victoria's accession.
For a short time from this date Port Phillip continued to be an integral portion of the mother-colony of New South Wales. When Governor Sir George Gipps came to Sydney in 1838, he found that the question of separation was already being agitated. At this time the jurisdiction of the New South Wales Governor extended over the eastern half of Australia, from Cape York to Port Phillip. There were in this vast region at that time only about 150,000 colonists, of whom about 120,000 were centred around Sydney and 30,000 around Port Phillip. At these two places, six hundred miles apart, lay the germs of two great colonies. In 1 840 the people of Melbourne formally peti- tioned for a separation.
The Home Government were, generally speaking, rather in favour of separation ; although it might have been thought that, when in July 1843 a Council of thirty-six members was given to Sydney, of whom six were elected for Port Phillip, a modus vivendi between the two centres of colonisation might have been attained. This distribution of political power was found to be unsatisfactory, the people of Port Phillip objecting to the large share of representation enjoyed by the Sydney colonists,
170 British Colonisation
and asserting, amongst other matters, that a sum of more than ;£i 80,000 had been taken from the sale of public lands around Port Phillip to encourage immigration to Sydney. Practically speaking, they were at the mercy of the Sydney majority.
The friction between the two component parts of the Legisla- ture grew worse and worse, and the Port Phillip electors adopted rather a novel plan for drawing the attention of English states- men to their unfair position. At this time (1848) Earl Grey was Secretary of State for the Colonies, and accordingly they elected him as their member by a great majority. By this means Earl Grey's attention was turned to Port Phillip, and after weighing the matter carefully he informed his constituents at the Antipodes that he would at once prepare a bill for the Imperial Parliament and obtain the necessary powers, at the same time intimating that Queen Victoria would be pleased if the new colony around Port Phillip would take her name. In 1851 the colony of Victoria, being separated from New South Wales, commenced a separate existence.
When gold was discovered in New South Wales, the first effect was to deplete the neighbouring settlement of a large number of its colonists \ and in June 1851 a number of leading citizens of Melbourne offered a reward of ^"200 to the first person who discovered gold within two hundred miles of Mel- bourne. In June a find was announced by the Hon. W. Campbell from Clunes in the county of Talbot, 123 miles from Melbourne ; and this was followed by a find at Burnbank or Lexton, 128 miles from Melbourne, in the same county, and another in the quartz rocks of the Yarra ranges at Anderson's Creek. In the same year gold was discovered at Mount Alex- ander, at Buninyong, and Ballarat. The first ship that took gold from Port Phillip was the Honduras, which left for London August 29, 1851, with eighteen ounces ; the second one, the Melbourne, sailed in the December following, with 54,000 ounces ; and in August 1852 the Eagle carried 145,843 ounces.1
i Gordon and Gotch's Handbook, 1891, p. 243.
The Australian Colonies 171
When the fame of the Ballarat diggings spread abroad, the effect upon Melbourne was extraordinary. There was a rush thither from all parts of the world. In 1852 nearly 100,000 immigrants landed at Melbourne, and the population was at once doubled. In 1853, 92,000 arrived, and Victoria became the most populous of all the Australian colonies. In 1854-5, 150,000 came; and in 1856 Victoria contained 400,000 in- habitants, or about five times the number it possessed in 1850. In 1852 one hundred and seventy-four tons of gold were raised, valued at £"14, ooo, ooo ; and from 1852 to 1862 £"100,000,000 worth of gold was exported from Victoria. Victoria went ahead rapidly from New South Wales, the latter colony not producing more than ,£2,000,000 worth of gold annually, with the exception of the year 1852.
The wealth of Melbourne and the progress of Victoria, in consequence of the gold finds, can best be proved by figures. The assessed annual rental of property in Melbourne in 1843 was £91,270; in 1854, £"2,330,947. For the province of Victoria the total imports in 1851 were £1,056,437 ; in 1857, £17,256,209. The total value of imports during seven years was £82,499,296. The number of ships and vessels entered inwards at the custom-house in Victoria in 1851 was 710; in 1857 it was 2190. The tonnage in 1851 was 128,959 tons; in 1857, 694,564 tons. The number of men employed in 1851 was 7785 ; in 1857, 34,777. The increase in the num- ber of vessels was therefore very great. The departures in 1851 comprised 657 vessels of all classes, having a total tonnage of 110,659 tons. In the year 1857 the number of ships cleared outwards at the various custom-houses in Vic- toria was 2207, with a tonnage of 684.
Before this extraordinary development all previous theories of colonisation broke down. Gold brought about a complete social revolution, and a self-paying emigration succeeded to State-aided emigration. Formerly the emigrating class consisted mainly of distressed agricultural peasants and their wives, whose passages were defrayed out of the rent and sales of waste
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lands. The character of emigrations, or rushes from one gold- field to another, was extraordinary. Twenty thousand people, earning fair wages and doing well, would rise, we are told, en masse in a day, and, striking tents, precipitate themselves upon a new district — sometimes, it must be added, to find reverses and bitter disappointment. Life often became a wild orgy, the flood of immigrants swamped the old settlers, and many of them fled from the invading hordes.
The gold-mining industry was found to react favourably upon all industries, and especially those of a pastoral and agricultural character. If it is true that every gold-digger gives occupation to at least three other men in feeding and clothing him, there was abundant opportunity, in the presence of such an influx, for the farmer and agriculturist to make a profit. The host was composed of all nations — Germans, French, Italians, Chinese, Americans, and Californians. There are said to have been, at one time, 50,000 Chinamen at the Australian gold-fields, and at Ballarat in 1856 a Chinese news- paper was printed and circulated. To the Chinese some of the greatest of the gold discoveries are due. The immigration tax levied upon them at Port Sydney and Port Phillip com- pelled them to enter the gold-fields by way of Guichen Bay, in South Australia ; and, taking a course from that point over the frontier and across the Grampian ranges, they came upon gold near Mount Ararat. In their search after the precious metal they chanced upon a spot called 'The Chinaman's Hole,' which yielded 3000 ounces in a few hours. This led to the greatest rush ever known at the gold-fields — no less than 60,000 people congregating there in a few weeks. 'Thus, within the space of two months, a wild mountain gorge was converted into a teeming city, where frontages were almost as valuable as in the heart of London.' *
With regard to wheat-growing in Victoria, it advanced by leaps and bounds all over the country. It was only in 1835 that the first acre was fenced in and sown with wheat in 1 Quarterly Review r, January 1860.
The Australian Colonies 173
Victoria. In 1858 the quantity of land under crop was 237,729, yielding 1,808,438 bushels of wheat, besides maize and oats, the average yield of wheat per acre being 23.1 bushels.
As in New South Wales, so in the colony of Victoria, the amazing influx of immigrants brought about important social and political changes. It was no easy matter to keep law and order in the country ; and, as many convicts crossed over from Tasmania, the Victorian Legislature passed a stringent Convicts Prevention Act in 1852, by which any ship-captain who brought a convict into the country was to be fined .£100. The licence fee was also found to be a grievance by the diggers, who, according to its provisions, were compelled to pay 305. a month — an amount trifling in itself in the case of lucky diggers, but pressing hard upon the unlucky. Thousands of miners had been disappointed in their hopes of wealth, and formed an unruly mob ready at any moment to vent their rage against the Governor and all constituted authority. A certain number of them formed a camp under the command of two leaders — Vern, a German, and Lalor, an Irishman — and proclaimed the ' Republic of Victoria.' This rebellion, however, was soon crushed by the Ninety-ninth Regiment, aided by marines from the men-of-war and the colonial police. All these circum- stances were particularly embarrassing to a young colony which, little by little, was feeling its way from a representative to a fully responsible form of government. Nevertheless, the country weathered all its storms, and in 1855 the new consti- tution, framed by the colonists in the Colonial Constitution Act, was confirmed by the Imperial Government.
The tale of Victorian prosperity is a twice-told tale. Nature has, to use Sir Arthur Hodgson's words, made a present to the colony of 220 millions in hard gold, and Victorian colonists have not been slow to avail themselves of Nature's bounty. Melbourne, with her population of 491,378 (1891), is one of the great cities of the world, and a railway map of Victoria will show us that the capital is linked with
1/4 British Colonisation
the outlying counties by 2469 miles of railway, costing more than ^34,000,000 to construct. A study of Victorian statis- tics proves that in all the elements of material wealth the colonists are most amply provided.1
WESTERN AUSTRALIA.
In 1829 a new experiment was destined to be made in a remote part of the Australian continent. In this year certain regulations, for the guidance of those who may propose to embark as settlers for the new settlement on the western coast of New Holland, as it was still called, were issued from Downing Street. From their tenor it is easy to see how totally and essentially different this colonising venture was from that which resulted in the founding of New South Wales, Tas- mania, and Victoria. The settlement was termed the ' New Colony of the Swan River,' but this hardly gave a proper idea of its extent, as it included all the line of coast from Cape Leuwin in lat. 34° 30' to lat. 31°. The Swan River was the Riviere des Cygnes of the French, and the Zwanen Riviere of Vlaming. The country had been visited by the French, but not closely surveyed ; and in March 1827 Captain Stirling stood along the coast and, anchoring opposite the Swan River, ascended it in boats. The impression he took away with him was favourable : very different from that of the French explorers, who had arrived off the coast in the winter time, and appear to have been alarmed at the gales of wind and the rocks and reefs, such as the Reef de Naturaliste, the Shoals of Rottenest, Houtman's Abrolhos, and the rough coast off Cape Leuwin. Geographer's Bay provided a good anchorage, its position being exactly like that of the Table Bay in the Cape, facing north-west. Cockburn Sound, lying behind a protecting island, just south of the Swan River, was considered by Captain Stirling to be always safe. Such was the spot designated by the founders of the new settlement. The land, also, according 1 For facts and figures see Appendix VI. Section C.
The Australian Colonies 175
to Captain Stirling, was favourable to vegetation, and the climate cool and agreeable — the latter assertion borne out by all those who have lived at Perth and Fremantle. The idea that the western coast of Australia consisted mostly of barren sandhills — an idea gathered from the appearance of the lime- stone hills, which were often covered by sand blown up from the sea — was proved to be erroneous, and plains and forests were found to exist. Here, then, might be a home for a pas- toral and agricultural population. Further, the colony seemed to be situated well from a commercial and strategic point of view, lying as it did in the track of ships proceeding to New South Wales and Van Diemen's Land, and on the fair-way, also, of ships from India to South America — a line of trade just commencing. The colony might also serve as a convalescent station for the numerous invalids from India, not only of the East India Company's service, but also of our regular army there. In relation to our Indian empire, a glance at the map showed that the Cape of Good Hope and Swan River formed two most important stations.
At the beginning of its career it was hoped that the Swan River settlement might draw upon the Cape of Good Hope and the Isle of France for supplies. Above all, it was highly imperative that the post should not be occupied by an enemy who from this position might be a standing menace to our other settlements in Australia and Van Diemen's Land. It was advisable for England, now that her occupation of the island-continent had been an accomplished fact for more than forty years, to establish a cordon or chain of posts all round the whole habitable portion of Australia. The importance of Australia, from every point of view, was being thrust upon England ; and a writer in the Quarterly Review (No. Ixxviii.) expressed a general feeling thus in 1829: 'We are satisfied that these Australian colonies require only the fostering hand of the Mother-country for a little while to elevate them to a degree of prosperity equal to that of the United States in pro- portion to their respective populations,' The colonies were to
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be encouraged as affording the surest and most constant markets for the demand and consumption of British manu- factures. The wool sent home was already proved to be equal to the -Spanish wool, and the import was interfering already at this date with Saxony wool.
Such were the reasons which were advanced by political thinkers in 1829 for the development of our colonial power in Australia. These reasons were based on high State policy, and proceeded from a broad view of England's requirements, as the foremost colonising and manufacturing Power in the world. In this case it was no haphazard discharge of criminals upon a new country, to work out, if they could, a regeneration for themselves under seven, fourteen, or twenty-one years of penal servitude ; it was a bond fide colony and a deeply considered project of colonisation. Then, as afterwards, there were found many in England who were not only averse to the establish- ment of new colonies, but industriously promoted the idea that the sooner we got rid of the old ones the better.
They have, for the last thirty years, had their counterpart in the Goldwin Smith school of politicians. It is hardly worth while, however, to consider into what straits these unpatriotic lecturers and writers might, at this period, have landed England. Gibraltar might have been surrendered long ago, Malta might have been re-occupied by France, Egypt have become a series of French provinces, and Australia occupied at various points by French Pondicherrys, if not French settlements. It has been well and ably pointed out that Napoleon felt that there was one point by means of which England was always able to beat him, and that was by her maritime strength — a strength derivable from her colonies, Talleyrand also spoke of Eng- land's colonies as the sheet-anchor of Great Britain and the stronghold of her power. ' Deprive her of her colonies,' he said, ' and you break down her last wall ; you fill up her last ditch.' Napoleon had his eye upon Australia ; and by virtue of the expedition of Baudin, to which attention has already been drawn, the French might possibly have claimed a position on
The Australian Colonies 177
the western coasts, where, in the words of M. Peron, * the labours of English navigators are finished, and our discoveries of the Land of Napoleon begin.' In 1826 a rumour prevailed that the French were actually going to occupy Western Aus- tralia, and the Sydney authorities sent a detachment of soldiers to take formal possession of the country and found a settle- ment at King George's Sound.1 The first regulations issued from Downing Street and bearing upon the Swan River settle- ment were as follows : — The Government, it was said, did not intend to incur any expense in conveying settlers to the new colony, and will not help to support them whilst there. Land licences will be issued on certain terms to those who will settle, and there will be no convicts or other description of prisoners. Western Australia will not be a penal settlement.
To a great extent the hopes first entertained of its welfare and prosperity have been falsified, and the sum of its wealth and population, when contrasted with that of New South Wales — of which it was once thought it might be a successful rival — is comparatively insignificant. Still, with the policy that boldly occupied this region of Australia and took up the task of colonisation here we cannot be too greatly impressed. It was both wise and patriotic. The chief commercial and strategic reasons which made Western Australia valuable to England in 1829 exist now. It is close to the markets of Java and Singapore, which can now be reached in less than ten days, and it is just possible that its proximity to the Asiatic labour market may enable it to solve certain labour questions which are a difficulty elsewhere. Now, as before, Western Australia is useful as a health resort for invalids from Ceylon and India.
When the experiment was begun on the Swan River, there
seems to have been a good deal of mismanagement. Captain
Fremantle landed as the first pioneer, and shortly afterwards
disembarked 800 settlers. No adequate provision was made
for them, and for months the colonists had to endure as well
1 See Sutherland, History of Australia.
M
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as they could the rough blasts and winter storms of the Indian Ocean, sheltered only under fragile huts. Not only on this occasion, but on many others, and in many parts of the world, the same mistake in landing on new shores and facing a winter without adequate provision has been made. It is one of those violations of common sense it is difficult to under- stand. At the Cape of Good Hope the Dutch East India Company landed their first Table Bay colonists just before the approach of winter, exposing the weakened, scurvy- struck passengers to those storms that sweep over the Cape pen- insula ; the first French settlements up the St. Lawrence were made just before the winter months ; and in much later times a party of the Selkirk settlers dared to face all the hardships of a Canadian winter as their first experience of the country.
The colony of the Swan River seemed to be destined from the beginning to be a comparative failure. The little port of Fremantle was founded, the beginnings of Perth laid, and in 1830 a thousand new immigrants arrived, most of them being attracted by the prospect of obtaining large estates, forgetting that the standard of the value of land is different in old and new countries, ten acres of good pasture-land in England being worth a whole district of unreclaimed and desert land abroad. Erroneous ideas also prevailed amongst the colonists as to the nature and extent of pasture-land, and to measure the Australian bush by reference to English standards was a common mistake. Even now it is a difficult task for an English farmer to realise that in such countries as the Cape and Australia the science and practice of husbandry and agriculture have to be learned anew. There is no equivalent in new countries to the carefully kept sward or ' spine ' of Old England; the sheep wander backwards and forwards over immense areas of bush or veldt ; they feed on different herbs, and are liable to all kinds of strange and unexpected diseases. The tasks of a veterinary in Australia and the Cape are quite different from those of an expert in England, and experience has invariably to be a bitter teacher. Nor in many cases were
The Australian Colonies 179
the colonists aware, whether at the Cape or Australia, that their part or allotment, granted with a free hand by Govern- ment, was very often in possession of a hostile race of savages, or at any rate exposed to their cattle-liftings and maraudings.
The British Government thought it possible, however, to make the colony of Western Australia self-supporting by paying for everything with land, as the grants cost nothing, and were readily accepted by others as payment. We are told that very few of the first colonists made any attempt at agriculture, and that the instruments of husbandry lay rusting by the shore ; the horses and cattle died off; the sheep that had been intro- duced at a great expense perished from feeding on a poisonous plant, and the colonists themselves were forced to loiter aimlessly at Perth. One gentleman, Peel by name, had spent ^"50,000 in bringing to the colony everything that could be required for farming on a large scale, and he introduced no fewer than three hundred labourers into the country. But this costly experiment failed, and Mr. Peel was ultimately com- pelled to take up his lot as an ordinary settler. Some of the colonists turned their attention from the land to the sea, as likely to be a more remunerative market, and employed their energies in opening up the whaling fisheries at Portland Bay.
In 1836 the colony of South Australia was formed, and a large portion of the country previously marked as belonging to West Australia was assigned to this new settlement, and Adelaide was founded. It is somewhat curious that the pro- sperity which followed upon the founding of South Australia did not fall to the lot of Western Australia; and in 1848, this colony being still in a state of stagnation, a message was sent to it from Earl Grey, asking the colonists whether they would entertain the idea of convict-labour in their midst. After some hesitation the colonists consented to have the convicts in their midst, although it was completely contrary to the original stipulation, thinking, perhaps, that the convict population, as well as the soldiers and police, might give a spur to their industries. But no permanent good came of it ; and when
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the gold-fields were discovered in the eastern colonies, the prisoners, immediately they were liberated, drifted off thither. It was found that neither Victoria nor New South Wales would put up with this influx of discharged criminals in their midst ; and, in order to defend themselves against the taint, they refused admission to every colonist coming from West Australia unless he could show that he had never been a convict. The colony of Swan River thus became branded, free immigrants ceased to go thither, and many of the original settlers left it altogether.
The gold discoveries, therefore, did not benefit West Australia to the extent even of stimulating agriculture as in South Australia, an adjacent settlement. It was left high and dry, and for many years its development has been hampered at every turn by the want of population. Neglected and im- poverished, she has been called the Cinderella of the Australian colonies. In 1867-8 the colony ceased to be a penal settlement, free immigration was encouraged, public works begun, and a new era commenced, lasting up to the present time.
Western Australia is the last Australian colony to which responsible government has been offered. The constitution was granted only so recently as 1890, and on October 2ist of that year first came into operation. The population of the whole settlement is only about 43,000, living in a country that has a coast-line of about 3000 miles and an area of 1,000,000 square miles. One advantage Western Australia possesses in being one or two weeks nearer England by sea than the rest of the Australian colonies. The colony, however, has suffered from isolation, and a mere glance at the map will show the enormous distances which separate Albany and King George's Sound on the south from the Kimberley division on the north. In course of time a railway from north to south for 1300 miles may be constructed, but at present such an idea is somewhat ambitious, although it has been mooted by no less an authority than the late Sir John Coode.1
1 For facts and figures see Appendix VI. Section D.
CHAPTER IX
SOUTH AUSTRALIA
IN May 1835, during the very month that Batman was survey ing the banks of the Yarra, the British Government was defining the conditions upon which a fourth Australian colony could be founded. The South Australian Association, which was called into being in 1833, had asked for powers from the Imperial Parliament simply to sell waste lands and apply the proceeds to immigration. This was conceded to them by an Act which directed also that commissioners should be appointed to frame laws for the colony, establish its courts, nominate its officers. Free grants were henceforth to cease. Land was to be thrown open for sale at not less than twelve shillings an acre, to be raised to £i per acre subsequently. No convicts were allowed to land, and in every way the settle- ment was designed to be a model community. This colonisa- tion scheme, which was to result in the formation of a great colony, owed its beginnings to Mr. Edward Gibbon Wakefield, who in 1829 had published a small book purporting to be letters written from Sydney. It created a great sensation, not only on account of its style, but also for the originality of its ideas. . The system received the approbation of Lord Howick (Lord Grey), the Secretary of State for the Colonies. For the development of waste lands capital is clearly an essential preliminary. In a public way the Australian colonists have recently solved this question, on the strength of their credit, by
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1 82 British Colonisation
borrowing huge loans and constructing railways and public works. When Australia had no credit worth speaking of, and could not borrow, Mr. Wakefield sought to enlist the aid of capital by means of a private association.
Mr. Wakefield demonstrated that a revenue might be derived from land sales at a sufficient and uniform price — * the land price being a labour tax on purchasers,' to use Lord Norton's expression, by which all might equally benefit. It did three useful things : it prevented land speculation, furnished a fund for surveys, and, although it might check labourers from be- coming landowners quickly, it prevented concentration of settlement. ' The sufficient price was a matter of calculation, and no index of the market value of land.'
The prairie value is not really the market value, as a land ring may be formed, and Crown lands — themselves a most important public asset — disposed of for a mere trifle at sales and auctions. As a matter of fact, even the 'upset' price in our colonies has often been most misleading. Mr. Wakefield's scheme also presupposed — and rightly enough — the greater value of money in a new country than in an old. Eight and ten per cent, has often been got in colonies themselves upon safe security in the earlier days. This probably is an estimate falling below the real truth. Mr. Wakefield argued that on account of the immense natural resources of Australia, their vast wealth in minerals, and their forests of timber, an associa- tion possessed of large capital would obtain as large an income from this as from one several times as great in England. There was to be no absenteeism. The capitalist was to be- come a colonist — as, indeed, Mr. Wakefield did himself — with the prospect of a learned and cultivated leisure. The project had much to be said in its favour, and provoked much discussion among such writers as Colonel Torrens, Poulett Scrope, Mr. Elliot, and others. It has been remarked by Lord Norton that the Hudson's Bay Company, with their rich and magnificent territories in the North-West, might have studied it with advantage, 'as it never occurred to any one of the
The Australian Colonies 183
disputants that a revenue could be raised from the sale of waste lands more than sufficient to supply immigrant labour and the opening costs of surveys and roads — the return being expected afterwards to arise out of profits from capital so attracted to the country.'
The labour question was of course the great crux, and perhaps it might have been guessed that the Australian immigrant would view with jealousy and ill-will the spectacle of a leisured class for whom he would in the first instance be asked to work. In a new country the immigrant is impatient of social distinctions. In New Zealand we shall see that Mr. Wakefield conceived the idea of a Church of England settlement under the auspices of a company, thus importing a religious bond into a new country.
It was in December 1837 that the beginnings of Adelaide were made. Governor Hindmarsh, the first Governor, read his commission to a small audience of emigrants and officials beneath a gum-tree near the beach. This is the site of the present wealthy town of Glenelg, seven and a half miles from the city of Adelaide, and the old gum-tree is said to be still standing, although in a state of decay. In 1836 the only landing-place for vessels was ' in the midst of a mangrove swamp at the mouth of a muddy little creek,' and so undesirable did the site seem that it was seriously suggested that the colony should be removed to Encounter Bay. But the site of the town of Adelaide, which was a broad plain beneath the steep hills of the Mount Lofty range and on the banks of the Torrens, had already been determined upon by Colonel Light ; and, in spite of differences of opinion, it was adhered to and developed.
South Australia has never been the actual scene of such busy mining operations as New South Wales or Victoria ; but, incidentally, the colony profited greatly by the gold-mines of the sister colonies. Port Adelaide was found to be a con- venient port for the crowds of diggers, Chinamen and others, who were bound for the Ballarat fields ; and at the same time a great market was opened up for South Australian flour and
184 British Colonisation
wheat, and a spur thus given to her agricultural prosperity. It must be remembered, also, that before the gold discoveries had been made in New South Wales and Victoria the colony of South Australia had derived great profit from her own mineral wealth. In 1842, at the Kapunda Station, forty miles to the north-west of Adelaide, Mr. F. C. Button, searching for lost sheep in the bush, had chanced to discover by accident rich copper- mines. Eighty acres of land were bought for .£80, and during the first year the mines yielded ^4000, the next ^10,000. The Burra-Burra mines, also, which were bought for ^£2 0,000, yielded copper to the value of ^700,000 during the first three years. The value of these finds does not approach that of the gold-fields, but still the copper era served to stimulate every industry in South Australia, and to bring capital and labour to bear upon the land. Agricultural industries went ahead. In 1839 there were only 440 acres under cultivation ; in 1842 there were 23,000 acres bearing wheat, with 5000 acres of other crops. In 1845 the colonists were not only able to supply their own wants, but were able to export about 200,000 bushels at cheap rates to the neighbouring colonies, at the same time holding a surplus of 150,000 bushels at their disposal.
In 1860 the South Australian Government had offered ^2000 as a reward to the first person who should succeed in crossing Australia from south to north, and the feat was attempted by John M'Douall Stuart, who had served as draughtsman in Sturt's expedition to the Stony Desert. After two attempts, in which he came first within 400 miles and then within 250 miles of the northern shores, Stuart succeeded in reaching Van Diemen's Gulf. Burke and Wills, two other explorers, had anticipated him, as they had reached the Gulf of Carpentaria from the south in February 1861, whereas he did not reach Van Diemen's Gulf until July 1862. Along the route opened up by Stuart it was resolved to construct an over- land telegraph line, which should link with a submarine cable from Singapore to Van Diemen's Gulf. This great public
The Australian Colonies 185
work was finished successfully in August 1872, when the two ends of the telegraph wire were joined and the first message was flashed across the great wastes of Central Australia. In October 1872 through communication was opened between London and Adelaide, and on the second of this month the Mayor of London sent a message of congratulation to the Mayor of Adelaide, a distance of 12,500 miles. Another telegraph wire was laid between Perth and Adelaide, from west to east, so that the colony of South Australia was in touch with the civilised world by two different routes. A glance at the geographical conditions of South Australia will prove how important telegraphic and, wherever possible, railway com- munications are to this colony.
It was in consequence of the favourable report given by the explorer John M'Douall Stuart that the South Australian Government petitioned the Home Government for that part of the continent which lay between the i38th and 1 2 gth meridians of longitude and the 26th parallel of latitude and the sea. This northern territory was formerly known as Alexandra Land, and is now calculated to embrace an immense tract of country with an area of 523,620 square miles. This part of Australia had been first sighted by the Dutch, although it had never been colonised by them. The first British settlements had been formed on Melville Island in 1824, chiefly with a view of holding it as a military post and providing a harbour of refuge for dis- tressed vessels. The principal harbour of the northern territory is Port Darwin, second only in magnificence to Port Jackson, New South Wales. It was named after Dr. Darwin, who sailed with King in his survey of the north coast in 1818-1822. The northern territory has been recognised as part of the colony of South Australia since 1864, and the acquisition of this vast tract, with its tropical climate and tropical products, constitutes a distinct epoch in the history of the colony. Numerous exploring expeditions, in 1877, 1878, 1882, 1883, 1885, and 1886, have combined to throw much light recently upon this territory, and it is predicted that the
1 86 British Colonisation
peninsula of Arnheim Land may become one of the rich mining districts of South Australia.
It will be noted, therefore, that South Australia consists of two well-defined regions of settlement, one on the north and the other on the south of the Australian continent, separated by vast extents of desert and totally unorganised territories. It seems hardly probable that a trans-continental railway will ever knit together these two disconnected portions, and bring Port Darwin and Port Adelaide together — the two centres of commercial wealth and industry.
The constitutional history of South Australia exhibits the same phases of development as New South Wales and Victoria. First there was the Governor, ruling with the aid of a nomi- nated Council; next there was called into existence a more representative form of government (1850), with a Legislative Council being partially nominated by the Crown, and carrying with it powers of self-reform, subject only to the Queen's assent; thirdly and lastly (1856), there was a reformed con- stitution, with a Legislature of two houses, and full responsible government. It is through distinct stages of this sort that all present self-governing colonies have passed. With regard to South Australia it may be observed that her history was never complicated by the convict problem, criminals being expressly excluded at the very beginning from her shores. South Australia is noted for a reform (1858) in the transfer of pro- perty which is being copied and adapted to a considerable extent by nearly all the civilised races of the world. The reform was introduced and carried through by Sir R. Torrens, who drew up a scheme by which all transferences of land were to be registered in a public office called the Lands Titles Office, the purchaser's name to be recorded and a certificate of title given to him. If his possession were challenged, reference could be made at once to the office. This reform was of the greatest possible benefit to the colonists, and it has been adopted not only throughout Australia, but in the Cape Colony and elsewhere. It has facilitated business transactions,
The Australian Colonies 187
encouraged freeholders, given a spur to industry, economised time and money, and secured owners against oppression and wrong.1
QUEENSLAND.
In the year 1859 the territory of Eastern Australia, extending north of the 2Qth degree of latitude to the York Peninsula and Torres Straits, was erected into a separate colony under the title of Queensland. In December of this year Sir George Bowen, the first Governor, arrived. Upon the subject of his governorship Sir George has himself remarked : 2 ' When I arrived there I found a population of only 25,000 whites : in the treasury I found just sevenpence-halfpenny ; and, what is very curious, the night after my arrival a thief, supposing the new Governor had brought some kind of outfit for the new colony, broke into the chest and stole the sevenpence-halfpenny.' That the treasury has been replenished, and that the popula- tion has increased, we have Sir George Bowen's word when he tells us that Queensland has an annual revenue of ,£4,000,000, and that the Queenslanders number 350,000 instead of 25,000. Brisbane was in 1859 a town of only 7000 inhabitants, yet a full-blown Legislature of two houses was given to the colony. It might have been thought that the gift of responsible govern- ment was somewhat premature, as the area of the colony was 6yo,ooosquare miles, and the population were greatly scattered ; yet, in the absence of border and other difficulties, the infant settlement has advanced to the position of a great colony. In no other part of the world could a small community achieve greatness so quickly as in Australia. First and foremost, there has never been a thought of fear or apprehension about foreign invasion or foreign complications ; the fee-simple of the con- tinent has been assured to the Australian colonists from the beginning ; there have been favourable land-laws and numerous aids to immigration; there has been unbounded natural wealth
1 For facts and figures see Appendix VI. Section E.
2 See vol. xx. Proceedings of Royal Colonial Institute.
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at hand to develop ; and there has been a ready market from which to raise capital. The national heritage of Crown lands covering an extent almost equal to the whole of Europe has been handed over to the small handful of colonists by the action of the Colonial Office, and the colonists have made a lavish use of their opportunities. The marvellous advance of our Australian colonies, which is sometimes represented as not only astounding but little short of miraculous, can be explained easily enough. It is probably true that in the history of the world similar advantages have never been given to such small communities.
Queensland, like New South Wales and Tasmania, but unlike South Australia and Western Australia, owed its be- ginnings to a convict settlement. In 1823 Governor Brisbane sent the discoverer Oxley in the Mermaid to select a new place for a convict settlement in the northern district of New South Wales. On this voyage he discovered Moreton Bay and Brisbane River, up which he ascended for fifty miles. On his return he recommended the position as suitable for a settle- ment, and the following year landed a party and occupied what is now the site of the city of Brisbane. The convict detach- ment were recruited gradually by the squatters of New South Wales, who wandered northwards to the Darling Downs. In 1829 Cunningham had explored the country and hit upon the pass which led from the Darling Downs to Moreton Bay, and communications were therefore opened up between the squatters of the interior and the convict settlement on the coast. The squatters would often secure the services of the convicts as shepherds on their runs. In 1840 the land around Moreton Bay was entitled the ' Northern District of New South Wales,' and Government lots thrown open for sale at twelve shillings an acre. Free immigration set in, and the banks of the Brisbane River were soon occupied by a number of settlers, who found the soil wonderfully adapted to the growth of wheat and maize. In 1841 the free settlers around Brisbane began to send representatives to the Legislative Council at Sydney.
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Sir Arthur Hodgson, the veteran Australian colonist, hasgiven us two pictures of Australian life : first when, in March 1839, he landed in Sydney after a voyage of 1 16 days ; and then when, in March 1889, fifty years afterwards, he landed at the same place after a voyage of thirty-four days. Inter alia he ob- serves : ' It was with mixed feelings of interest and astonishment that I found myself travelling by rail from Sydney to Brisbane, a distance of 600 miles : fifty years ago, and up to a much later date, I travelled the same distance always on horseback, with the exception of taking steamer from Sydney to Newcastle. . . . The railway bisects the property discovered by me in 1840, and I alighted at a railway station three miles from the home where I had passed fourteen years of a very happy life. . . . Twelve miles from my old Darling Down home, the railway passes through Toowoomba (a native name), with a population of 8000, and the sanatorium of Queensland. Through numerous tunnels, and by a very clever zig-zag, you descend rapidly to the coast district, and to Brisbane, the capital of Queensland, with 70,000 inhabitants. I entered Brisbane fifty years ago under very different circumstances, in company with my partner, the late Mr. Gilbert Elliot, and a black boy whom I had brought from New South Wales. . . . We were the first white men to arrive in Brisbane overland. . . .Within seven miles of Brisbane we met a mounted constable, who took us into custody, nobody being permitted to enter " the settlement," as it was then called, without an autograph letter from the Governor of the colony.'
Sir Arthur Hodgson goes on to say : ' Queensland possesses an area of 430 millions of acres, as large as New South Wales and Victoria united, with a coast-line extending over 1400 miles. With this large extent of territory she has marvellous resources, and can grow almost everything — wheat in the south, sugar in the north ; and it has long since been a fallacy to suppose that the interior of the colony was not adapted to pastoral purposes, millions of sheep and cattle now grazing over a country reported by early pioneers to be a desert.'
British Colonisation
It may here be pointed out that a biography of such an old colonist as Sir Arthur Hodgson, or such a veteran statesman as Sir Henry Parkes, or such a pioneer, explorer, and governor as Sir George Grey, provides us with perhaps the best illustra- tion of the wonderful advance of our Pacific colonies in all the elements of wealth. No public men of past times have ever presided over more extraordinary developments, or given a turn to a more pregnant page of history, than these leaders of Australian progress and makers of Australian history. No proconsul of ancient times, no autocrat of a province, no dele- gate of imperial rule — indeed, no conqueror of men— has ever had a more illustrious role. Surely the peaceful subjugation of a continent and the crowning of a State's prosperity with the works of peace has been their exceptional lot j and such a lot, as the history of the world goes now, cannot easily occur again to any class of men. It must ever be a source of national pride that the moulding of Australian life and society has been entrusted to pioneers, explorers, and bold cekists of British extraction.
Within recent years there has been a desire evinced on the part of Northern Queensland to separate from Southern Queensland : the colonists around Townsville and the north protesting that by the mere force of geographical circumstances their interests are sufficiently distinct from those of Brisbane, which is close to the New South Wales frontier. The separa- tists would draw a distinction between sub-tropical Queens- land and tropical Queensland — between Queensland north of the Tropic of Capricorn and Queensland south of it. Some, indeed, would divide Queensland up into three separate colonies. The matter is still a bone of contention between Queenslanders. The northern districts are adapted to the growth of sugar, an industry that brings always in its wake a native or coolie immigration question. In 1889 there were about 8000 Polynesian labourers imported from the islands of the South Pacific ; but in 1885 a protest was raised — somewhat unreasonably, according to some Australian colonists. An Act
The Australian Colonies 191
was passed disallowing Kanaka labour after 1893; but this, again, is a vexed question of Queensland politics, as the sugar industry is threatened.
There have been gold rushes in Queensland as in New South Wales and Victoria ; therefore this colony inherits all the advantages incident to this particular form of immigration. The first gold ventures were unfortunate. In 1858 it was rumoured that there were rich deposits on the Fitzroy River, and many vessels landed hundreds of miners at Keppel Bay ; but, although gold was discovered there, it was on a small scale, and disappointing to those who had imagined that a second Ballarat and Mount Alexander were to be found in Queensland. Towards the end of 1867, however, a miner named Nash found a large auriferous area at Gympie, about a hundred and thirty miles from Brisbane. The estimated gross produce of gold in the colony from 1867 to December 31, 1889, has been 6,827,888 oz., valued at ^23,897,608.!
THE STORY OF AUSTRALIAN EXPLORATION.
This may be a convenient point at which to review briefly the tale of Australian inland discovery, which is only second in interest to that of African discovery in the nineteenth cen- tury. From notices already given it will be seen how much, for instance, was due to the hardihood of those pioneers who, in the early history of New South Wales, burst the apparently impassable barriers of the Blue Mountains, and led the way for squatters and herdsmen to follow ; how much also was due to the intrepid explorers who made the overland telegraph possible from Adelaide to Port Darwin. The task of explor- ing a country of 3,030,234 square miles was no small one when we consider the terrible hardships which had to be endured. The perils of the great Thirst Lands of Australia were far greater than the perils of Australian circumnaviga- tion.
1 For facts and figures see Appendix VI. Section F.
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The problem of inland exploration had its fascination for the great African explorer, Mungo Park, who offered to go out and conduct an expedition in 1798. His offer came in the form of a letter to Sir Joseph Banks, the scientific companion of the Cook expedition, and was written in May 1798, ten years after the foundation of Sydney. Commenting on the proposal of this illustrious explorer, Sir Joseph Banks said that ' although the country had been possessed for more than ten years, so much has the discovery of the interior been neglected that no one article has hitherto been discovered by the importation of which the Mother-Country can receive any degree of return for the founding and hitherto maintaining the colony.' 1
By 1815 the coasts of Australia had been fairly well sur- veyed by Dutch, English, and French explorers. The efforts of Dampier, Cook, Bass, Flinders, Baudin the Frenchman, and others have already been noticed. Still the great interior lay as an almost entirely unknown land. Beyond the pasture- lands of Bathurst men wished to know, first of all, how the land lay ; and in 1817 Mr. Oxley, the Surveyor-General of New South Wales, was sent to explore the country towards the interior. Oxley followed the river Lachlan to what he thought were its sources — a dreary waste, apparently, of interminable marshes, perhaps the margin of a great inland sea, and, to use his own words, ' for ever uninhabitable/' At the time, there- fore, it was thought that the expeditions of Mr. Oxley had nearly settled two points of great importance. The first was that colonisation was not very likely to extend beyond two hun- dred miles from the eastern coast, and that from the nature of the interior the settlers would have nothing to apprehend from any foreign Power planting its subjects at the western shores, as was once said to be the intention of the French. At this time there was no Monroe doctrine laid down with regard to the Australian continent, and it would have been difficult to have raised any strong objection to a French settlement in 1 Proceedings of the Royal Colonial Institute, vol. xvii.
The Australian Colonies 193
Australia, convict or otherwise. The second point was the improbability of either the Lachlan or Macquarie reaching any part of the sea coast, and the total inutility of both for any commercial purposes. Indeed, a writer in the Quarterly Review l seemed to take it for granted that ' no river of any mag- nitude empties itself into the sea on the northern, western, or southern coasts of New Holland.' Dampier had once recorded it as his opinion that a great strait or river opened out behind the archipelago of the Rosemary Islands ; and in the absence of definite information it was reasonable to suppose that some vast drainage system in the interior sloped from east to west. Not yet was the torrid nature of the interior fully realised.
In 1825 Allan Cunningham, one of those enthusiastic botanists who have done so much in opening up the dark regions of the world, starting from Sydney, chanced upon a picturesque gap over the Liverpool range, which he named the Pandora Pass. His discoveries gave the Australians a way to the fine pastoral lands of the Liverpool Plains and the Darling River. To the south and south-west of Sydney, Hume and Hovell, as already mentioned, pioneered the way across the Australian Alps to Port Phillip.
Then, in 1828, Sturt took up the problem which Oxley had assailed, and exploring the Macquarie and Darling rivers, found an open country to the west, proving that the idea of a great inland sea was erroneous. With Sturt, also, rests the honour of tracing the course of the Murray to Lake Alex- andrina and the sea, and of exploring a thousand miles of previously unknown land. Major Mitchell, in 1831 and 1835, made two expeditions to the north-west of Sydney, in which he failed ; but in 1836 he went southward, crossed the Murray, discovered the Glenelg, and reached the sea just at the present boundary between Victoria and South Australia. By these explorations the south-east of Australia was fairly well known, and fertile areas thrown open to the enterprise of ranchers and squatters, especially in the Loddon district. 1 December 1820. N
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But the greater and more formidable tasks of continental exploration were still left to be assailed. Seven-eighths of the island-continent was still shrouded in obscurity, and the great belt of desert seemed to lie between east and west as a hidden vast and impenetrable zone. In 1840 Edward John Eyre offered to conduct an expedition from Adelaide, and with a small escort explored Lake Torrens and Lake Eyre, which were lakes in name, but in reality closely resembling sheets of salt-encrusted mud. He then turned westward, and, after incredible hardships along the bleak and barren coasts of the Australian Bight, reached King George's Sound. Here they found a French whaling-ship — the crew of which enter- tained them hospitably, giving them clothes and food — and shortly afterwards reached Albany. Resting for a few days, they returned to Adelaide, after an absence of a year and twenty-six days. Eyre must be remembered as the first explorer who braved the worst horrors of the Australian desert.
In 1844 Captain Sturt, who had explored the valleys of the Darling and Murray, led an expedition into the interior, and reached Cooper Creek, and the Stony Desert, and Strzelecki Creek. In this region the fiery heat of the sun was intense — the thermometer standing sometimes at 130 degrees Fahren- heit in the shade ; and it is recorded that the explorers were unable to write, as the ink dried on their pens ; their combs split, their nails became brittle and broke, and if they touched metal it blistered their fingers. They were even forced to dig an underground room to evade the direct action of the sun. Sturt's reports of the arid country gave rise to the opinion that the interior of Australia was one vast sandy desert.
In 1844 a German botanist, Ludwig Leichardt by name, starting from Sydney with five men, made his way northwards to the Gulf of Carpentaria, and discovered and followed up the tributaries of the Fitzroy, the Dawson, the Mackenzie, the Burdekin, the Mitchell, and the Gilbert. Ultimately he followed the Alligator River to Van Diemen's Gulf, and,
The Australian Colonies 195
embarking on a ship which was waiting for him, returned to Sydney. Encouraged by this success, Leichardt organised an expedition to make further discoveries in North Queensland, in which he was not successful. Then in 1848 he planned his last and great enterprise, which was to traverse the whole Australian continent from east to west — from Moreton Bay- to the Swan River settlement. On this expedition he and all his party were lost — more completely, indeed, than the gallant Franklin and his crew in the Arctic regions ; for to this day the desert has never revealed any signs of their presence or proof of their fate.
While Leichardt was exploring the north-eastern portions of the continent, Sir Thomas Mitchell, the discoverer of the Glenelg, undertook a journey into the interior of Queensland, and discovered the higher point of Sturt's Cooper's Creek, which he called the Victoria. Kennedy followed up Mitchell's dis- covery, and traced the Victoria River for a hundred and fifty miles beyond the place where Mitchell had left it. This river, about which so much mystery hung, was proved to have a course of about 1200 miles, and to be the largest in Central Australia. It finds its way to the marshes around Lake Eyre, and, spreading over the country, is there lost by evaporation. In 1848 Kennedy was sent to explore York Peninsula; but this expedition was one of the most disastrous of all, only two survivors being left out of an original party of eight.
In 1860 a new era of Australian exploration set in when Burke and Wills formed the determination of crossing the continent from south to north — from Melbourne to the Gulf of Carpentaria. These explorers, accompanied by two men named King and Gray, struck Cooper's Creek, and then followed the i4oth meridian, striking the Flinders River, which they followed to the Gulf of Carpentaria. On their return home they suffered the most terrible hardships, and all died with the exception of King, who was discovered by a search party as a gaunt and emaciated skeleton, so wasted and re- duced that with difficulty could the relief party catch the
196 British Colonisation
whispers that fell from his lips. The camels and horses were all dead, and the explorers had been driven to the extremity of living on nardoo seed and occasional windfalls in the shape of a crow. The desolate character of the Australian deserts seems only to be equalled by that of the gloomy region of the Barrens and the Arctic seas in mid-winter — with this difference, that in the Arctic regions caches of fish, flesh, and food pre- served for months by frost are possible ; not so in Australia. In one region the thermometer drops to 70 degrees below zero, in the other it rises to 130 degrees. Perhaps the terrors of an Arctic region are less even than those of an arid and inhospitable desert where men are driven in despair to hide themselves in holes and caverns from the pitiless rays of the sun. In both regions blindness comes upon the traveller — in the one case from snow, and in the other from the glare of the sun on countless leagues of sand.
Just at the time that a party despatched by the Victorian Government were bringing the remains of Burke and Wills back to Melbourne, M'Douall Stuart, who had served as draughtsman in Sturt's expedition, had accomplished in 1862 the task, already alluded to in the account of the telegraph enterprise of South Australia, of traversing the continent from south to north along the i33rd meridian, about seven degrees west of the route taken by Burke and Wills. With their triumphs certain great geographical questions were set at rest. Australia, divided almost equally by the Tropic of Capricorn, was known to be a vast Sahara-like stretch of country, almost impassable for man, and scarcely fit to be the abode of bird or beast. In our estimate of the probable future resources of Australia it is well to remember how greatly the desert areas predominate in the land, and that pastoral and agricultural areas are limited in number. In mineral wealth Australia may still provide us with fresh sur- prises, but at present it does not seem likely ever to become the chosen home of agriculturists or small freeholders to the same extent as the territories of the great North- West of
The Australian Colonies 197
Canada. Population converges in certain well-known capitals and centres, and for the newly arrived immigrants the bush with its isolation, weariness, and monotony would seem to hold forth but few attractions. It is rather in Tasmania, and more especially in New Zealand, that we must look for a re- production of our national life at its best, where the climate, the first consideration, is most favourable.
In his History of England after the Great War^ Mr. Spencer Walpole remarks that ' the greatest fact in the history of the nineteenth century is the foundation of a new Britain — which may eventually prove a Greater Britain — in the Southern hemisphere ' (see vol. v. p. 446). We may not, indeed, feel inclined to go quite as far as Mr. Walpole, either in his assertion or in his prophecy : the phrase ' a Greater Britain ' meaning, of course, a Britain that is greater than the Mother- country in all those spiritual and heroic qualities that go to make up the life of a nation, whether it be deeds of war, genius in literature, chivalric fulfilment of duties towards subject races, political wisdom, social reform, and generally a wise and fearless example placed before the world, worthy of imitation. In all these departments the history of 'a Greater Britain' in Southern waters has yet to be made. On the material side the motto * Advance Australia ! ' has a deep and pregnant meaning ; for in mere wealth, expansion of trade, and in general well-being, Australia has advanced and is the wonder and envy of the age. It could scarcely have been conjectured by the founders of Sydney that within the comparatively short period of a hundred years a number of distinct communities would arise on the continent, fully en- franchised, self-governing, and equipped with all the resources of young nations. The progress yonder has been noiseless. Whilst men slept here, the colonies of New South Wales, Tasmania, Victoria, South Australia, Queensland, and West Australia have grown, and they have grown very vigorously. The process has been the peaceful acquisition and peaceful reclamation of a continent and its adjacent island of Tasmania.
198 British Colonisation
Removed, by virtue of their great distance, from the ken of Europe, Australians have enjoyed a quiet and uninterrupted period of prosperity. Compared with other colonies, whose course has been like that of a turbid river checked by rocks, choked by morasses, and hindered on all sides by nature's obstacles, the waterway, as it were, of Australia has been clear, resembling a broad, placid reach. To borrow an illustration from the poet Wordsworth, the history of Australia is like the final, but only the final, stage of the river Duddon, when loosed from ' rocky bands ' it flows ' in radiant progress towards the deep,' 'and glides in silence with unfettered sweep.' There has been no brooding curse of slavery to banish from the land, as in the West Indies ; no stern border frays between races, as between French and British colonists in Canada ; no powerful and cruel aborigines to combat, as in Canada, the Cape Colony, or Natal, The natives of Tas- mania and of the great island-continent have been far too weak to oppose any real obstacles to the Tasmanian and Australian colonists.
However, to share the perils and expenses of empire is the proud wish of patriotic Australians. There was something in the recent offer of a Sudan contingent from New South Wales that appealed to the imagination far more powerfully than all previous accounts of gold-mines. It was a gleam of chivalry that flashed through the annals of Australia, awaken- ing sympathy and prompting devotion. Not alone, but in company with loyal colonists, the Mother-country, heavily burdened with her imperial task, posed before the world as the champion of imperial interests.
The Australian Colonies 199
References : —
Sutherland's History of Australia , 1606-1876.
Westgarth's Early Melbourne, 1888.
Wakefield's (Edward Gibbon) View of the Art of Colonisation, 1849.
Wakefield's New British Province of South Australia, 1835.
Paterson's History of New South Wales, 1811.
Bonwick's Last of the Tasmaniaiis, 1870.
Fenton's History of Tasmania.
Labilliere's History of Victoria, 1878.
Oceana, by J. A. Froude.
Poems, by Adam Lindsay Gordon, 1884.
Gordon and Gotch's Australian Handbook, 1891-2.
J^ravels and Voyages of Flinders, 1814; Sturt, 1833; Stirling, 1833;
Mitchell, 1838 ; Grey, 1841 ; Eyre, 1845 J Leichhardt, 1847 ;
Burke and Wills, 1863, etc. etc.
CHAPTER X
NEW ZEALAND
FOR a considerable portion of the present century the islands of New Zealand, although discovered and named by the Dutch sailor, Abel Tasman, in 1642, remained to all intents and purposes an unknown land. Why the island was so called is not exactly clear, as, generally speaking, the contour and natural features of the Pacific islands are totally unlike the Zeeland of Europe ; but it is supposed that Tasman saw a marshy flat at the end of one of the islands, which sug- gested the nomenclature. Tasman's report was not acted upon by the Dutch Government, and the real discoverer of New Zealand was the British navigator, Captain Cook, who first landed there on Sunday, the 8th of October 1768, and by hoisting the British colours proclaimed the British sovereignty. Three years after this rediscovery, Benjamin Franklin en- deavoured, but unsuccessfully, to establish a company with the object of colonising New Zealand by a system of barter with the natives.
On his second voyage to the Pacific in command of the Resolution and Adventure, Captain Cook was accompanied by Andrew Sparrmann, the great Swedish naturalist, who joined him at the Cape of Good Hope, in which country he was con- ducting his researches into natural history. From his narrative, as well as that of Captain Cook, we gather that on March 26, 1773, the Resolution anchored at Dusky Bay, near the
southernmost promontory of New Zealand, after sailing in the 200
New Zealand 201
Southern Pacific for 122 days without seeing land. The main object of this expedition was to determine the existence of a Southern continent; and Captain Cook, after reaching the fields of ice, ran along them a great distance without seeing any signs of land, and therefore concluded that what Bouvet had on a previous occasion reported to be land was nothing else but ice. Sparrmann observed that in sailing so far south they were the ' only mortals who could boast of the frozen honour of having passed the Antarctic Circle.' New Zealand was a naturalist's paradise to him, as there were ' ferns and mosses almost entirely unknown, and these, together with the new species of birds and fishes, afforded me an agreeable occupa- tion.' He records, however, that the Maoris were a race of cannibals, and had such manners as might excite pity and repugnance — a remark which was proved to be true when the Adventure, whilst anchoring in Queen Charlotte's Sound, in Cook Strait, lost a whole boat's crew of ten men, killed, roasted, and eaten by them.
Queen Charlotte's Sound, on the west of Cook Strait, was a kind of base of operations from which Captain Cook con- ducted his Pacific explorations in the direction of the New Hebrides, New Caledonia, and elsewhere : Sparrmann observing, 'On October 18, 1774, we came to anchor for the third time in Queen Charlotte's Sound.' On his return voyage, Captain Cook, with the westerly winds behind him, undertook the voyage from New Zealand to Cape Horn, running along high latitudes in search of the great Australis Terra, so that the English flag might be planted, if possible, on the supposed sixth part of the globe ; and for six weeks the keel of the Resolution ploughed these lonely wastes.
On arriving at Table Bay, after an absence of two and a quarter years, the Resolution was found to have gained a day by sailing east. Those who had sailed before round the globe always went west, and they lost a day ; but as Captain Cook's crew made the same voyage to the east, they were conse- quently the first, and indeed the only, navigators who had
2O2 British Colonisation
gained a day. Captain Cook had only lost one man during the two and a quarter years, owing to his ' unparalleled pre- servatives of sour krout and wort.'
Curiously enough, the Spaniards still seemed, even at this date, to have claimed a kind of monopoly of South Pacific waters. It was observed that Spanish ships had apparently been here recently, and that a Spaniard was living amongst the natives at Huaheine, who tried to conceal himself from obser- vation. This, with several other circumstances, Sparrmann remarks, made it highly probable that the Spanish ships were sent both years to be spies upon the English, and to make reprisals upon them in return for their visits in a part of the world of which they were so extremely jealous, and of which they 'looked upon themselves as the sole proprietors.
The French also had put in certain claims to South Pacific islands and territories. It was even said that de Gonneville had visited New Zealand as early as 1504, more than a hundred and thirty years before Abel Tasman ; but these claims are generally regarded as unwarrantable. Nevertheless, there shortly followed in the wake of Captain Cook a French captain named d'Urville, who had some dealings with the Maories ; and he was followed, 1772, by Marion du Fresne and Crozet, with two vessels, the Mascarin and Castries. Marion met with his death at the hands of the New Zealanders under peculiar circumstances. Landing on the New Zealand coast, the French commander and his crew began dragging their nets for fish. The Maoris came down in large numbers, and endeavoured to explain to them that this particular spot was holy ground — tabooed — a spot set aside for some religious ceremonies of the highest importance. Not having an inter- preter, the Frenchmen could not or would not understand the nature of the protest, and involuntarily added fuel to the flames of Maori resentment by killing the fish — also tabooed — and spreading their blood and offal over the ground. The Maoris, wrought up to a pitch of frenzy, rushed upon Captain Marion and his crew, and speedily overpowered them. In the
New Zealand 203
words of ' King George,' a native potentate, who was present, and afterwards* told the story to the English, 'They were brave men, but they were all killed and eaten.'
The first assumption of British authority in New Zealand was made in 1787 by the terms of the commission issued to Captain Phillip, who, as Governor of New South Wales, took it, in a kind of official manner, under his jurisdiction. Throughout the Pacific there was a flotsam and jetsam of escaped convicts, sealers, and refugees of all nationalities, establishing themselves on isolated spots, holding intercourse with the natives, and resembling in their roving lives the buccaneers of the Gulf of Paria and the Pacific. In 1814 four justices of the peace were appointed in the country to preserve law and order ; but the fact of such occasional residences did not constitute British sovereignty over Maoriland.
In a certain sense the South Sea whalers were the more legitimate successors of the buccaneers \ and the whaling in- dustry, profitable as it proved to be, was \]\eprimum mobile of South Sea occupation. In the building-up of our colonial empire it is curious to note how over and over again the pluck and enterprise of our sailors, scouring the ocean every- where, forced the hand of our Home Government. Scotchmen, as usual, were to the fore, and in 1832 there was a settlement of many hundreds of them at Kora Kadika trading and fishing with a fleet of a hundred vessels, and by their presence inviting the official countenance and support of England.
But, before any idea of New Zealand colonisation could be put into effect, it was necessary to make sure of British sovereignty on those waters. Sixty years ago it was by no means certain that the British would be supreme in the South Pacific, and that British colonisation would be the only colonisation en evidence. The individual merchant and adventurer might cry ' Forward ! ' still the official tongue cried * Back ! ' French explorers had long since traversed the Pacific together with our own ; and, although none of them could vie with Captain Cook, still d'Urville, Crozet, Marion
204 British Colonisation
du Fresne, la Perouse, Dentrecasteaux, and Baudin were all well-known names in these distant seas. The jealousy of England and France was of ancient date, here as elsewhere. When the French power was finally crushed in Canada and along the banks of the St. Lawrence in 1763, some of the more adventurous of French sailors turned their attention to the great Southern land.
An opportunity for French intrigue was given in 1837-8. Early in that year a certain Baron de Thierry, an Englishman with a French title, arrived at New Zealand on board the Nimrod. This adventurer, in virtue of an agreement made with a chief named Hongi, who had visited England in 1820, proclaimed himself ' the Sovereign Chief of New Zealand.' Thierry had given thirty- six axes for a large tract of country, and actually landed in New Zealand in order to take possession of it in company with ninety-three persons, including his secretary, master of stores, and other officers. The Rev. James Buller stated in his Forty Years in New Zealand that he was present at a conference Thierry had with the native chiefs at Otararu. They smiled at the Baron's demands, but the conference ended in the cession of 300 acres of good forest-land.
But it is with a brother of this eccentric Baron that some further interest lies, who sought out the advice of Mr. George Fife Angas, and represented the urgent necessity of England's assuming at once the sovereignty of New Zealand. Mr. Angas was unwilling at first to take the matter up seriously, but, happening to learn that the Thierrys were in communica- tion with the French Government, and were pressing upon them the advisability of seizing some part of the New Zealand islands, he wrote at once to Lord Glenelg (December 20, 1838). After alluding to the failure of the New Zealand Land Com- pany twelve years previously, and to the more recent, though abortive, attempts of the New Zealand Association, and, further, to the unsuccessful attempts to obtain an Act of Parliament establishing a British settlement in the country, Mr. Angas pointed out that the ground was clear for the
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French. Technically, there could be no very strong objection to the hoisting of the French flag.
The imperative necessity of immediate attention to this matter was most apparent to his mind, he observed, from his interview with Thierry, as well as from a fact that had subse- quently transpired, viz. that the Count de Mole, the President of the Council of France, had expressed his determination to appoint de Thierry to the office of French Consul in New Zealand. For more than a year this gentleman had been trying to induce the French Government and the merchants and manufacturers of that country to direct their attention to New Zealand. The flax industry was beginning to flourish, and the specimens of rope, sail-cloth, waterproof linen, made from the Phormium tenax, were exciting considerable attention in France. Mr. Angas alluded, also, to the great increase of French war- vessels then traversing the South Seas ; and, in the event of New Zealand falling into the hands of France, the possession of our colonies in the South Seas would become insecure — not one of them being able to offer any successful resistance. Mr. Angas wrote : ' I need not remind your Lordship that the French vessels easily destroyed the English settlements at Sierra Leone . . . and your Lordship is also aware that New Zealand is at present nominally an independent nation, in which British interests are represented by a consul, and that in its present position and relation to this country the French may establish a settlement there with as much propriety as the British, provided de Thierry possesses sufficient influence with the leading chiefs to obtain their concurrence.'
M. Guizot, in his France under Louis Philippe, alludes to the convenience of securing a place of rest and of refreshment in the South Pacific. Towards the end of 1839 a company formed itself at Nantes and Bordeaux for the purpose of founding a French colony in New Zealand. It asked for support and gained it ; but when the time for execution arrived it was discovered that the English had forestalled them.
It was the action of the New Zealand Company to which it
2o6 British Colonisation
is necessary to ascribe, principally, the assertion of British sovereignty in the islands of New Zealand. This Company took up the work that had been attempted by the New Zealand Association and the N.Z. Colonisation Company. It issued its first prospectus in May 1839, being founded substantially upon the principles laid down by the celebrated Gibbon Wakefield, who was already known for his colonisation schemes in South Australia. In the beginning of this month Colonel Wakefield was on his way, in command of the Tory, a vessel belonging to Mr. Somes, to make a purchase of the new settlement ; and such was the confidence placed in the principles adopted by the Company that, within six weeks of the departure of their agent, no less than ^"100,000 worth of land was disposed of out of their contemplated purchase.
On the 3oth of September 1839 tne Tory dropped anchor at Port Nicholson, and the British flag was run up — a most important day in the annals of New Zealand.
The annexation was made not a moment too soon. Forty- eight hours afterwards Baron de Thierry arrived from Brest, and attempted to claim the same spot for France by climbing an adjacent hill and hoisting the tricolour. Sir Frederick Young, the son of George Frederick Young, one of the most active members of the New Zealand Company, describes in his volume of Colonial Pamphlets the chagrin of the French when they saw the Union Jack flying on the beach immedi- ately at the base of the hill on the other side of the point at Port Nicholson. Had the weather proved more contrary, or had the Tory delayed anywhere on her journey out, or had she met with a trifling mishap, this vantage-ground might have been lost to England.
Early in 1840 the British Government, thoroughly a wakened to the gravity of the situation, despatched Captain Hobson as Governor of the islands. He established the seat of govern- ment at Auckland, and in February 1840, by the terms of the famous Treaty of Waitangi, entered into with the Maoris, pro- claimed the Queen's sovereignty over the North Island,
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The French, being debarred from the North Island and from Port Nicholson, turned their attention to the South Island, and an expedition was actually despatched thither by King Louis Philippe, the destination being Akaroa on the Banks Peninsula, near the site of Christ Church and Port Lyttelton. Captain Owen Stanley, brother of the late Dean of Westminster, who was stationed at the Bay of Islands, heard of this expedition while the Treaty of Waitangi was being negotiated. The Bay of Islands was the destination of the French squadron, and, determining to anticipate any possible act of annexation, he sailed at night, while the French ships, FAube and Britomart, were actually alongside of him, and, steering south, reached Akaroa, and, planting the British flag there, took formal possession of the country in the Queen's name* (August n, 1840). The French, finding the English vessel gone, and suspecting the object, instantly followed, but did not reach Akaroa till four days after Captain Stanley.
In face of this fait accompli, M. Guizot, commenting on the transaction, observed that the French could not set up against the anterior possession of the British Government. It became necessary to seek elsewhere than in New Zealand for the ex- tension of French rule in the Pacific ; and Captain Thouars, having returned from a voyage round the world in the Venus, presented to the Minister of Marine a report on the Marquesas Islands.
We may feel assured, however, that had it not been for the prompt action of the commander of the Tory at Port Nicholson in the North Island, and afterwards that of Captain Owen Stanley at Akaroa in the South Island, the French would have made their claim good to one or both of the New Zealand islands, and they would now be French colonies. The object of the French was twofold, viz. to obtain a good maritime station as well as a convict station ; and had they succeeded in either project, they might indeed have proved to be a thorn in the side of our Pacific colonies. In all probability the Fijian group might have been annexed by them also. As things are
2o8 British Colonisation
now, the French reddiviste question has created an extraor- dinary amount of friction, in spite of the distance of New Caledonia. The New Zealand Company, therefore, certainly deserves a generous recognition as having been the undoubted instrument of practically effecting the colonisation of the country, and of preserving it to England.
There was one man of unbounded zeal and remarkable talent who by his writings and theories was destined to move forward the cause of New Zealand colonisation, and this was Edward Gibbon Wakefield. Up to 1831 the general practice of the British Government had been to grant land in her colonies for nothing without stint as to quantity, but Wakefield contended that this disposal of waste or Crown lands was foolish and short-sighted. It was better, he said, to sell these waste lands 'for ready money, and utilise the sum thus realised as an Emigration Fund for defraying the cost of the passage of labourers to the colonies. Thus labour would be sold, as it were, along with land, and from the funds of the capitalist the new acres of a new country would at once acquire a consider- able value. Lands would not be without hands, and population would be concentrated at convenient places. Wakefield drew a distinction between emigration and colonisation. As hitherto carried on, State emigration was of a loose, promiscuous kind, degrading to the individual and subservient in every way to the State. Wakefield endeavoured to raise the conception of colonial life, and asked for a greater amount of local govern- ment. In the case of South Australia this was refused, and this refusal is said to have been the cause of breaking up the South Australian settlement and sending the colonists to join the rebellious political unions of the time, whilst others sailed for the United States, where they prospered, although they resembled Irish-Americans in their feelings towards England.1
It must be remembered, also, that according to Mr. Wake- field's plans emigrants were to be selected from both sexes, and thus a distinction — and a very broad distinction, too — 1 Art of Colonisation, p. 47.
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would at once be drawn between them and the riff-raff that had hitherto been shovelled on to Australian shores. It was obvious, as Mr. Charles Buller remarked in his Parliamentary speech of 1843 on systematic colonisation, ' that such a selec- tion of emigrants would relieve this country of the greater amount of actual competition in the labour market, and also of those most likely to contribute to the increase of population, whilst it would remove to the colonies, at the least possible expense, the persons whose labour would be most likely to be useful.' Such, in the main, were Gibbon Wakefield's ideas. They were adopted by the Colonisation Society of 1830, and commended themselves to the Duke of Wellington, who bluntly said that the experiment ought to be tried — and the name of Wellington in New Zealand bears witness to his advo- cacy— to Archbishop Whately, and a new school of colonisers led by Sir William Molesworth.
It must be remembered that Gibbon Wakefield was par- ticularly well qualified to inaugurate new ideas and a new policy with regard to British colonisation. He had resided in Canada as a colonist, and had been elected a member of the House of Assembly in that country during the administration of two of its Governors, Sir Charles Bagot and Lord Metcalfe. He not only approached colonial questions from their economical aspect, but also from their strictly political side. Colonial freedom was, in his opinion, to be a reality, self-administration a logical sequel. England's colonists were identical with Englishmen at home, and, sooner or later, were bound to be entrusted with their own destinies. The ties between Great Britain and her colonists would not necessarily be loosened by this delegation of governing power ; on the contrary, they might be made stronger than ever, and a cessation from undue or vexatious interference would become the starting-point whence a vigorous and natural attachment would spring up between the colony and the Mother-country. That these ideas of colonial reform should be hatched in Canada was just what might have been expected from the state of affairs in 1830-1840.
o
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The old system of colonial government was breaking down, and the Canadian colonists were, by force of circumstances, continually being driven to assert local independence and local liberties as against the nominated Executive. Lord Durham in his famous report, termed the Charter of Colonial Liberties, described the state of things in Canada as that of a chronic collision between the executive and representative bodies in all the North American colonies. 'In each and every province the representatives were in hostility to the policy of the Government, and the administration of public affairs was permanently in the hands of a Ministry not in harmony with the popular branch of the Legislature.' Gibbon Wakefield is rightly credited with many of the important re- forms which are contained in Lord Durham's famous report on the state of Canada ; and to his influence the Right Hon. Sir C. B. Adderley (Lord Norton) gives abundant testimony in his review of the Colonial Policy of Lord J. Russell's Adminis- tration by Earl Grey. Moreover, such was the state of the colonies and the general importance of colonial questions about this time, that John Stuart Mill's assertion to the effect that colonisation * was the very best affair of business ' in which the capital of an old and wealthy country could possibly engage found an echo in the breasts of the most thoughtful and enlightened Englishmen.
When the British flag was firmly planted, New Zealand colonisation went speedily on. On January 25th, 1840, the first public meeting was held in Plymouth, on the subject of the colonisation of New Zealand from the counties of Devon and Cornwall; and in less than two months the Plymouth Company of New Zealand had disposed of one quarter of a contemplated * New Plymouth ' in New Zealand. The Earl of Devon was president of the West of England board; and amongst the directors appear the names of Sir Anthony Buller (Pound), John Crocker Bulteel, Esq. (Fleet), Sir William Molesworth, M.P. (Pencarron), E. W. W. Pendarves, Esq., M.P. (Pendarves), Edward St. Aubyn, Esq. (Devonport), Right Hon.
New Zealand 2 1 1
Lord Vivian (Glynn), and T. Woollcombe, Esq. The governor of the New Zealand Company was Joseph Somes, Esq ; the deputy-governor Hon. Francis Baring (afterwards Lord Ashburton); Viscount Ingestre, M.P., Lord Petre, H. Aglionby, Esq., M.P., Charles Buller, Esq., M.P., Russell Ellice, Esq., William Hutt, Esq., M.P., Ross Donnelly Mangles, Esq., M.P., Stewart Marjoribanks, Esq., M.P., John Abel Smith, Esq., M.P., W. Thompson, Esq., M.P., Hon. F. G. Tollemache, M.P., George Frederick Young, Esq.
The colonisation of New Zealand was under distinguished patronage, and the experiment of the 'New Plymouth,' dif- ferent indeed in motive and conception from New Plymouth, Massachusetts, answered well. West-countrymen joined in the undertaking with ardour. On the iQth of August, 1840, the London, the fourteenth vessel chartered by the New Zealand Company, carried out the surveying staff of the Ply- mouth Company ; and on the 3oth of October the approaching departure of the pioneer expedition was celebrated at Plymouth by an entertainment given by the directors, at which no less than four hundred persons were present, the Earl of Devon being in the chair. It was on this occasion that it was first publicly announced that the Government, who had been antagonistic to the scheme, had now altered their views ; and an official letter from Lord John Russell was read showing that the various objections which had hitherto been raised to the proceedings of the Company were now removed. This news was carried out to Wellington in February 1841, and created great satisfaction. In August 1840 a royal charter was granted to the Company, giving them, along with other im- portant privileges, an undoubted title to about 1,000,000 acres of land, and guaranteeing to them, in future, indemnifica- tion in land, at the Government price, for their outlay in sur- veys and emigration.
It should be mentioned, also, that a New Zealand bishopric was formed, the Company making a grant of 4000 acres and the New Zealand Church Society purchasing a like amount.
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The Company bound themselves to expend, in respect of the whole 8000 acres, the usual proportion of their funds in emigration. The first Bishop was the Rev. G. A. Selwyn.
In addition to the Wellington and New Plymouth settlements, that of Nelson was also formed under the auspices of the Com- pany. In September 1841 an entertainment was given by the Company at Blackwall to celebrate the departure of the Nelson settlers, at which the Duke of Sussex and many influential noblemen and gentlemen were present. This expedition carried out nearly 800 souls in four ships of from 500 to 600 tons each.
Starting under such favourable auspices, New Zealand has had a very different early history from any of the Australian settlements. Dr. Hinds, the Bishop of Norwich, was justified in terming it 'the Belgravia of colonies.' One weak point, however, in the settlements of Wellington and Nelson was the large number of absentee purchasers. Gibbon Wakefield pointed out in a letter to Mr. Godley (June 22nd, 1850) that out of 1000 sections of 100 acres sold at Wellington 595 were bought by absentees, and out of 432 sections of 150 acres sold at Nelson 352 were bought by absentees and only 80 by colonists. True it was that the capital was raised and devoted to the proper purposes, but Wakefield's main idea was to attract bond fide settlers.
In the middle of 1845 Wakefield formed the project of the Otago settlement. This scheme was in connection with the Free Church of Scotland, and the leaders of the enterprise were Captain William Cargill and Dr. Aldcorn of Oban. This Otago settlement was the first instance in which Gibbon Wakefield's plans for securing a sound kind of colonisation by means of ecclesiastical and educational endowments from the land fund were carried into practice.
The members of the Free Church purchased from the New Zealand Company an area of 400,000 acres of the eastern sea- board of the South Island. To the seaport was given the name of Port Chalmers, in honour of Dr. Thomas Chalmers,
New Zealand 2 1 3
the eminent leader of the Free Church. The chief town was called Dunedin, the Celtic name for Edinburgh : and the first band of emigrants landed at Port Chalmers from the John Wiclif'm March 1848. The first Presbyterian minister was the Rev. Thomas Burns. This emigration reminds us in some of its features of the Selkirk settlement in Canada, when the clan emigrated in a large body under Lord Selkirk as an * cekist' : although, of course, the Wakefield system is peculiar to the New Zealand ventures, the money being raised by the sale of land at £2 an acre, the New Zealand Company retaining one-fourth, and the remaining three fourths being expended on purposes of emigration, surveys, roads, bridges, churches, and schools. In all three countries, however, we may notice the Scottish nucleus— the determination and fearlessness of the Scots as colonists, and Scottish success and prosperity.
In 1849 the Canterbury Association was formed on similar lines by Gibbon Wakefield for founding a settlement in New Zealand, designed to be 'complete in itself, having as little connection as possible with the other centres of population in the colony, and composed entirely of members of the United Church of England and Ireland.' No less than 2,400,000 acres were placed at the disposal of the Association by the New Zealand Land Company. The price to be paid for the land was fixed at £$ per acre ; but out of this amount -£i was set aside for the religious and educational funds, £i for the emigration fund, and los. for surveys, roads, and bridges, leaving only los. per acre as the actual price of land. About 20,000 acres were bought by the Association, the port town being called Lyttelton, and the chief town Christ Church, at the side of the Canterbury Plains nearest the port. The patrons and supporters of the scheme were the Archbishop of Canterbury, Lord Lyttelton, the Duke of Manchester, Sir John Simeon, Bishop Hinds, Lord Norton, Lord Ashburton, Mr. Henry Sewell, and others. The leader or ' cekist ' of the under- taking was Mr. J. R. Godley, to whom Mr. Wakefield first suggested the idea of his becoming the main instrument of
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organising a Church of England settlement. Mr. Godley was sent out in 1850 as resident official head of the settlement, and in November of this year the ships Sir George Seymour, Cressy, Charlotte Jane, and Randolph arrived at Port Cooper with the first immigrants, still known as the Canterbury Pilgrims. In the course of a single year no fewer than 2600 persons had landed in Canterbury, and, unlike the Otago settlers, these included many colonists who were well off, and held command of capital. The New Zealand Company, which had done so much for the colonisation of the country — had been instrumental in founding Wellington, Taranaki, Nelson, Otago, and Canterbury — was wound up in 1850. Its prime mover, Edward Gibbon Wake- field, emigrated to Lyttelton in 1853, and took up his abode at Wellington. Here he became a member of the Provincial Council of Wellington, and a member of the House of Repre- sentatives for the Hutt district. His policy was to oppose with all his might the ' cheap land ' scheme of Sir George Grey. This most remarkable man, gifted with most extraordinary talents, a most daring and original thinker, whose views have been embodied in a scarce book entitled A View of the Art of Colonisation, the close friend and adviser of the Earl of Durham, the leader of the well-known band of colonial reformers (1840-1850), died in 1862 on the scene of his labours.
In his able review of the colonial policy of Lord Russell's Administration (1869), the Right Honourable C. B. Adderley speaks with pride of the province of Canterbury, in the founding of which he bore a great part together with Lord Lyttelton and John Robert Godley. It originated 'on the true colonising principle of a homing-off of complete English society, supplied with all the requirements of civilised life, and capable of all the functions of citizenship.' Of John Robert Godley he writes that no one did more,, in the words of his epitaph, 'aequales ad majorum praeceptl revocare, quibus colonise non tarn regendae sunt quam creandae.'
Mr. Charles Buller has given in outline the main ideas of systematic colonisation, which were, perhaps, best illustrated
New Zealand 2 1 5
in the Wakefield methods. Speaking in the House of Com- mons on April 6, 1843, he observed that 'neither Phoenician, nor Greek, nor Roman, nor Spaniard — no, nor our own great forefathers — when they laid the foundations of an European State on the continent and islands of the Western World, ever dreamed of colonising with one class of society by itself, and that the most helpless in shifting for itself. The foremost men of the ancient republics led forth their colonies; each expedition was in itself an epitome of the society which it left. The solemn rites of religion blessed its departure from its home ; and it bore with it the images of its country's gods, to link it for ever by a common worship to its ancient home. The Government of Spain sent its dignified clergy out with some of its first colonists. The noblest families in Spain sent their younger sons to settle in Hispaniola and Mexico and Peru. Ralegh quitted a brilliant court and the highest spheres of political ambition in order to lay the foundation of the colony of Virginia. Lord Baltimore and the best Catholic families founded Maryland; Penn was a courtier before he became a colonist; a set of noble proprietors established Carolina, and entrusted the framing of it to John Locke ; the highest hereditary rank in this country below the peerage was established in connection with the settlement of Nova Scotia ; and such gentlemen as Sir Harry Vane, Hampden, and Crom- well did not disdain the prospect of a colonial career. In all these cases emigration was of every class . . . and thus was colonisation always conducted, until all our ideas on the sub- ject were perverted by the foundation of our convict colonies, and emigration, being associated in men's minds with trans- portation, was looked upon as the hardest punishment of guilt, or necessity of poverty.'
Charles Buller drew a picture of the culpable way in which emigrants were allowed to drift to their destinations in Lower Canada : how the pauper families walked in their rags from the quays of Liverpool and Cork into ill-found ships, and drifted hopelessly over the country. There was no guidance, no
216 British Colonisation
medical supervision, no friendly hand to help, and the emi- grants settled down in a haphazard way without church or school, education or religion. Respectable tradesmen and labourers shrank from colonisation, and the idea of a gentle- man emigrating was almost unheard-of in those days. A reform was urgently needed both from the moral, religious, and economical view of the case, and for this reform no one worked harder than Wakefield and Buller. The stigma of convictism began to be removed, a colonial career was voted an honourable one ; and, with regard to New Zealand, more men of good family settled there in the three years since the beginning of 1840 than in British North America during the first thirty years of the present century. Public opinion was undergoing a vast change, and random emigration was shaped into systematic colonisation. Those people who responded to Cobbett's denunciation of the attempt of their rulers to trans- port them began, under better tuition and example, to look upon colonisation in a different light.
Certainly in no colony have the tangible results of colonisa- tion been more en evidence than in New Zealand. Within fifty years the beginnings of a young State have been formed, already cities have been built, industries developed, and a population of half-a-million trained to the duties and tasks of citizenship. It is a land of law and liberty. Her peculiar system of land laws, by which village homesteads and farm homestead associations bring land within the reach of the poorest labourer and the smallest capitalist, has been produc- tive of much good. The experiment of co-operative settle- ment, by which blocks of land not more than 11,000 or less than 1000 acres can be taken up by an association consisting of not less than twenty-five members, has for the political economist of the present day a great interest. The develop- ment of New Zealand industries has enabled every member of the population to export annually ^15, 3s. 5d. worth of pro- duce— no mean result for a colony fifty years old. Mr. Westby Perceval has remarked : * ' We have already exported nearly 1 Proceedings of the Royal Colonial Institute, vol. xxiii., 1892.
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^50,000,000 of gold . . . our coal-mines are magnificent, and practically inexhaustible. A great trade in timber is in store for us, and our splendid fisheries await development. Our manufactures have grown to an extent that seems to justify the belief that New Zealand will become the manufacturing centre of the Southern Seas.'
New Zealand has, with a considerable show of reason, been termed 'the Britain of the South.' The climate is an improve- ment upon our own, but in many respects it is not dissimilar ; the New Zealanders enjoy the advantage of an insular posi- tion, and, proportionally, a far larger area of their country is available for cultivation than is the case in Australia. The Maori question is rapidly being solved, and, unlike Cape Colony and Natal, New Zealand has no overwhelming sense of the presence of a native question. Nature has given her everything she can desire : a good soil, fertile valleys, noble mountains, rich mines, and scenery that is not easily surpassed in any part of the world — in fact, a magnificent home fit for a free people. Some have objected that New Zealand, by borrowing extravagantly, has mortgaged her magnificent heri- tage ; but against this it may be alleged that her resources are immense, and that New Zealand statesmen have recently displayed a more wise and cautious policy in the matter of loans, and have advocated retrenchment in Government expenditure.1
1 For facts and figures see Appendix G.
References : —
Buller's Forty Years in New Zealand, 1878. Rusden's History of New Zealand, 1882. Gisborne's Handbook of New Zealand, Life of Bishop Selwyn, by G. H. Curteis. Bush-Fighting : the Maori War, by Sir J. Alexander. The High Alps of New Zealand.
CHAPTER XI
THE ISLANDS OF THE SOUTH PACIFIC AND FIJI
THE islands of the Pacific have only recently attracted attention in Europe as strategic points, convict stations, and centres of colonisation.
For a very long time after their first discovery they were left to those solitudes of ocean in which they were found : beautiful, indeed, in their surroundings — more beautiful, per- haps, than the West Indies— but defiled by the cruelties and atrocities of man. Primeval man was a cannibal; so-called civilised man either a corsair or a convict. It was the story of the West Indies over again, with certain modifications. European sailors, wandering from island to island, were a law unto themselves, and seemed to cast aside Christianity and decent manners when they entered the Southern Seas. Here, at any rate, it seemed, however, as if savage life were destined always to flourish and European law and order never to appear. Lying outside the world, in the midst of the great hemisphere of waters, the scattered sporades of the Southern world were the roving ground of desperadoes and the unsettled spirits of the world.
There was apparently no rich bait to tempt the merchant- venturer thither so far from home ; no El Dorado concealed behind the coral fringes, no city of gold in the island forests ; on the contrary, the inhabitants appeared to be rude, savage, and inhospitable. Cannibalism was rife, and threw a depress- ing gloom over these far regions. Thither also the French sailor la Perouse had gone, never to return, and a strange
218
The Islands of the South Pacific and Fiji 219
mystery hung over the unexplored wastes of water. Cowper, picturing the islander waiting for a second visit from his European friends, says :
' Expect it not ; we found no bait To tempt us to thy country : And must be bribed to compass earth again By other hopes and richer fruits than yours.'
The poet treats the South Sea islands very differently from the manner in which Andrew Marvell, Waller, and Moore dwelt on the charms of the Bermudas — happy islands which, to use Waller's expression,
' Heaven sure has kept this spot of earth uncurst, To show how all things were created first.'
Public attention, however, was called to this part of the world by the strange story of the mutiny of the Bounty, one of the great romances of the sea. In 1787 King George in., at the request of a number of West India merchants in London, sent out the Bounty to transport plants of the bread- fruit tree to the West Indies from Tahiti. The well-known mutiny occurring on board, Captain Bligh was cast adrift with some companions near the Friendly Islands, and the mutineers returned with the ship to Tahiti, and finally reached Pitcairn's Island, in which they sought concealment. Captain Bligh, destined to be Governor afterwards of the penal settle- ment of New South Wales, made that most remarkable boat voyage of 4000 miles in forty-one days.
Ten years afterwards the South Pacific was the scene of a notable enterprise, very different in character from those usually chronicled in these waters ; and this was the voyage of the Duff, an English vessel with thirty missionaries on board, sent to convert the natives of Tahiti and the other islands to Christianity. This voyage was fraught with great results, and effected much to raise the natives in the social scale and to throw light upon these distant islands. As long as these mis- sionaries lived at Tahiti they were the means of protecting all
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European ships ; but when they were driven away by the civil wars in the island, there was no longer any security. On several notable occasions the South Sea islands showed their hostility to Europeans. The captains of the Fair American^ when becalmed near the shores of Hawaii, of the Butterworth^ returning in 1795 to tne harbour of Honolulu, and of the Port au Prince in 1816, were all seized and murdered by the natives. No unarmed ship was safe in the South Pacific waters.
The earliest commercial advantages resulting from the dis- covery of the South Sea islands consisted in the means of re- freshment which they gave to English and American vessels engaged in the sperm-whale fisheries. The pearl-oyster was found amongst the coral islands of Eastern Polynesia and also the Beche-de-Mer ; and the fragrant sandal-wood, so highly prized by the Chinese as an article of commerce, was collected by a number of ships of small tonnage, many of them coming from New South Wales. The first era was undoubtedly one of cruelty and of reprisals on both sides. The crews from New South Wales and the traders generally throughout the Pacific were not distinguished for their humanity. In the South Pacific there was no settled government, and no Euro- pean Power stretched forth its aegis of protection.
In the fierce colonising rivalries of the nineteenth century all this has been changed. One by one these coral and volcanic groups have been appropriated, and the geographer has had the task of colouring and recolouring the more im- portant islands. Dutch, French, Russians, English, and, more recently, Germans, have all turned their attention to Pacific waters ; and within very recent times the New Hebrides, New Caledonia, New Guinea, have afforded a great deal of material for official correspondence.
Most of the principal groups in the Pacific were first made known to England by Wallis and Cook, who often hoisted the English flag on them as token of possession and occupation, although this was a meaningless ceremony. In 1767 Captain
The Islands of the South Pacific and Fiji 221
Wallis raised the old flag on the Tahiti group. This was resented by the Tahitians at first ; but afterwards their king, as well as the king of the largest of the Sandwich Islands, ex- pressed a desire to be under the protection of the King of England. South Sea exploration was a favourite project with King George, who, according to Ur. Hawkesworth, * having the the best fleet and the ablest navigators in Europe,' improved commerce, diffused geographical knowledge, and caused, in seven years, discoveries to be made * far greater than those of all the navigators in the world collectively, from the expedition of Columbus to the present time ' (I773)-1
For a long time the British Government were satisfied with the results of the voyages of Byron, Wallis, Carteret, Cook, and others, and were by no means anxious to extend their dominions to these distant waters. The King of Tahiti wrote to George iv. to ask permission to use the English ensign as the national flag; and in answer to this Mr. Canning (1827), Secretary of State, observed that, * although the customs of Europe did not allow the use of the flag as solicited, His Majesty George iv. would be happy to afford Pomare and his dominions all such protection as His Majesty could grant to a friendly Power at so remote a distance from his own dominions.'
The presence in the Pacific of our convict settlement in New South Wales gave England the opportunity of cultivating relations with the Pacific islanders. Successive Governors of New South Wales frequently solicited assistance of the King of Tahiti for supplies, and respectable foreign residents were stationed at Tahiti or the adjacent islands to watch over the conduct and interests of our countrymen. The appointment of their agents by the Governors of New South Wales was the only political influence exercised by England in Pacific waters for many years. Until the year 1833 a French trading-vessel had scarcely ever made its appearance at the South Sea islands. The voyages of Bourgainville and the ill-fated la 1 See Dedication of Hawkesworth's Voyages.
222 British Colonisation
Perouse were made before the nineteenth century had begun, and circumnavigators like Dumont d'Urville had occasionally visited them. Still, no official proclamation or official inter- ference had followed upon these enterprises.
French influence began in connection with religion. By a decree of the Propaganda in June 1833, the conversion of the inhabitants of the South Sea islands was confided to the Society of Picpus. In 1834 three Romish priests and one Irish catechist reached the Gambier's Islands, the most easterly cluster of the Pacific islands. This was the starting- point of the Roman Catholic missions. Shortly afterwards a catechist was sent as a carpenter to Tahiti, and thence to the Sandwich Islands to prepare the way for the priests. In 1841 Dupetit Thouars was sent to occupy the Marquesas Islands, and thence in 1842 he proceeded to Tahiti. The proceedings of the French were extremely arbitrary and high-handed, and the ' Pritchard ' incident arose. British interests in Tahiti were entrusted to Consul Pritchard, who, for his stand against Admiral Dupetit Thouars, was made a prisoner on the flag- ship. The English Government, with Sir Robert Peel as Prime Minister, protested strongly against such treatment, and as the result of diplomatic representations the French Ad- miral was recalled, the annexation of the island annulled, and a handsome indemnity paid over to Consul Pritchard.
By a laissez faire policy, however, after this incident, the French were allowed to have their own way in the island, and in 1847 an agreement was signed by which we acknowledged the French protectorate over the islands. The French sub- sequently visited the Sandwich Islands, demanded the repeal of the laws prohibiting the sale of spirituous liquors, and estab- lished the Roman Catholic religion by force. An English officer, Lord George Paulett, took possession of an island about the same time, but his act was disallowed in England when it was made known. The native Government, being alarmed for their independence, sent an embassy to England, France, Belgium, and the United States; and in 1844, by a
The Islands of the South Pacific and Fiji 223
convention entered into between these Powers, the independ- ence of the Sandwich Islands was guaranteed. From what has been stated, therefore, political interference in the Pacific Islands would seem to have originated with the French, their armed vessels being employed primarily at the instance of the Roman Catholic priests. Up to this point they do not seem to have regarded any of the islands as suitable for convict stations or as naval and strategic posts. These latter ideas occurred subsequently.
New Caledonia, lying off the east coast of Australia, was so named by Captain Cook after Scotland. It was frequently visited by English and French sailors, and even made the field of missionary labours by some Jesuits from Paris ; yet no European Power attempted to occupy it until, in the year 1851, the massacre of a boat's crew belonging to the French frigate Alcmene, commanded by Comte d'Harcourt, drew the atten- tion of the French to it. In 1853 Admiral Febvrier-Despointes took possession of it, and in the same year he occupied the neighbouring Pine Islands, and a few years later the Loyalty Islands. In the year 1864 Napoleon in. resolved to convert New Caledonia into a penal settlement, the island being suffi- ciently remote from other countries, and being infinitely superior, as far as climate and surroundings were concerned, to French Guiana. This latter place had been proved to be terribly unhealthy and altogether unsuited for the purposes of a convict station. Up to the fall of the Empire convicts were sent in considerable numbers to the island, and they seem to have been well guarded. After the suppression of the Com- mune, however, when it was uncertain how best to dispose of the human fiends who had tried to destroy Paris and institute their wild reign of terror, M. Thiers bethought him of New Caledonia. Thither, accordingly, they were deported in large numbers ; and from that day to this these criminals, and those who have succeeded to them, have been a scourge to Australia and our Pacific colonies. They have been allowed to escape by the French authorities, whose prison regulations and
224 British Colonisation
surveillance generally would seem, of set purpose, to be lax and insufficient. Between France and our Australian colonists the reridiviste question has been a constantly recurring difficulty beyond the range of diplomacy to adjust. It is their open sore, just as the fisheries question is to the Newfoundlanders ; and the Home Government is practically powerless to act in both matters. On the part of the French the establishment of a convict station in the Pacific would strike one as a weak copy of our own policy in New South Wales (1788), and Noumea would seem to be a poor French imitation of Sydney. The recidivistes or habitual criminals can regain their civil rights as far as New Caledonia is concerned ; but what really purified, elevated, and finally redeemed the bad character of our Australian penal settlements — viz. the introduction of free labour and the immigration of a wholesome agricultural ele- ment— is probably impossible in New Caledonia. New Cale- donia is certainly most important as a military point close to New Zealand and Australia, and this view has been stated by a Frenchman named M. Pigeard. ' La position geographique,' he observes, 'qui la met aux portes deplusieurs grandes colonies anglaises et a petite distance du continent, lui donne une serieuse importance politique, si Ton considere qu'avec la pos- session d'iles a Test elle pourrait nous assurer une croisiere sure et lucrative, en cas de guerre dans toute 1'Oceanie cen- trale, en menageant a nos escadres des ports au vent et sous le vent pour se ravitailler ; mais, si cette ile peut devenir un point militaire, elle n'est pas moins destinee, selon nous, a figurer comme colonie commerciale importante.'
THE FIJI GROUP.
The example of Tahiti, coupled with what was done by the French in New Caledonia, induced the chief of the Fiji Islands to apply to England; and in 1874 the group, discovered by Tasman in 1643 and visited by Cook in 1769, was taken under British protection by Sir Hercules Robinson, then
The Islands of the South Pacific and Fiji 225
Governor of New South Wales. Fiji is about 1900 miles distant from Sydney and 1200 miles from Auckland. The Tongan or Friendly Islands lie 180 miles to the south-east, and Samoa 500 miles to the north-east. New Caledonia is 700 miles to the westward. The number of islands has been stated as between 200 and 250, but some are mere rocks. The largest islands are Viti Levu, with an area of 4112 square miles; Vanua Levu, 2432 square miles ; Taviuni, 217 square miles: Kadavu, 124 square miles; Koro, 58 square miles. The area of the whole colony is calculated at 7435 square miles.1
As in the West Indies, so in Fiji and the Pacific islands the labour question is the chief one that engrosses the planters' attention. Solomon Islands and the New Hebrides supply the largest amount of what is known as Polynesian labour, but it is irregular and limited. Coolies were first imported from Calcutta in 1879, when 480 arrived. There are now about 6000 Indian coolies in Fiji, the cost of introducing them being a little over £21 for each individual over ten years of age. The indenture is for five years after the date of arrival, and their interests and well-being are provided for by the Indian Immigration Ordinance, which regulates l time ' work and 'task' work. As in the West Indies, the Indian coolie is found a better and cheaper labourer than the African negro. In Natal, also, he is proved to be better than Zulus or any branch of the great Bantu races ; so in the South Seas he is superior to the native Fijian and Polynesian. The markets of Fijian produce lie in the adjoining continent of Australia and in New Zealand, just as the markets of West Indian pro- duce are found in the adjoining territories of the United States and Canada. The record of trade begins only in 1875, and naturally it is not of very great volume. New South Wales, Victoria, and New Zealand are the best pur- chasers of Fijian products. As Mauritius provides sugar for Africa, so Fiji gives sugar to Australia. The imports from 1 Colonial Office List, 1891. P
226 British Colonisation
British possessions were, according to Sir Rawson W. Rawson, no less than 87 per cent., her exports 79 per cent. There is comparatively little trade done between Fiji and the United Kingdom, her imports being only 9 per cent, and exports 7 per cent. Her imports from foreign countries amounted to 4 per cent, but the exports reached 13 per cent., chiefly to Portugal and Germany. It is worthy of notice that the in- crease of British tonnage between 1877-9 and 1884-6 has been threefold. The conclusion to be gathered from Fiji trade is the same as that which can be gathered from the example of other islands adjoining large tracts of country, and it is this : that according to a natural law of attraction it flows more and more in the direction of these tracts. Owing to their natural position and natural surroundings, islands situated in tropical waters must supply colder climes, where population is large, with what they cannot or do not produce.
The total number of inhabitants is 124,100, of which 1 1 1, ooo are natives, 9700 coolies and imported Polynesians, and 3400 white people. Nearly half of all the inhabitants of Fiji live on the largest island, Viti Levu, where the capita], Suva, is situated. The islands are as a rule mountainous, with a few isolated peaks reaching to the height of 3000 to 4000 feet, many of them being clearly of volcanic origin, with hot springs — in this respect, as in many others, reminding us of the West Indies. The heat is moderated by the trade winds, and hurricanes are not so violent and destructive as in the West Indies. The flora of the Fiji Islands is very magnifi- cent, but there is great poverty of fauna.
The most important industry of the islands is the growing of the sugar-cane and the manufacture of raw sugar. There is a species of wild sugar in the island known as dovu ; but the variety grown is imported from Honolulu, and the best districts are reported to be the drier parts of the islands. Next to sugar in importance is the growing of bananas, cocoa- nuts, tea, and tobacco. The cultivation of coffee is almost entirely abandoned now in Fiji owing to the attacks of a little
The Islands of the South Pacific and Fiji 227
insect called the Acarus coffece, which destroyed the leaves. Maize and oil-producing plants also grow well. Land can be either bought or rented in Fiji, and well-cultivated ground costs from >£io to ^20 per acre. Virgin land can be bought for £i to £2 per acre.1
1 For facts and figures see Appendix VIII.
References : —
Fiji and the Fijians, by Williams and Calcraft, 1853. The Mutineers of the 'Bounty J by Lady Belcher. Myths and Songs from the Pacific, by Gill, 1876. Two Years in Fiji, by Sitton Forbes, M.D., 1875. My Consulate in Samoa, by Churchward, 1887. Picturesque New Guinea, by T. W. Lindt, 1887. New Guinea, by Charles Lyne, 1885.
'Agriculture in Fiji,' Proceedings of the Royal Colonial Institute, vol. xxi.
CHAPTER XII CEYLON AND THE MALDIVE ARCHIPELAGO
LIKE many other parts of Asia, Ceylon has been subject in turn to the three dominations of the Portuguese, Dutch, and British. After finding their way to the East by way of the Cape in 1497-8, under Vasco da Gama, the Portuguese held the monopoly of the East for a hundred years. In 1505 they began to form settlements on the west and south of the island. The Portuguese held two opinions with regard to the main features of an Oriental policy, represented by two great authorities, Almeida and Albuquerque. Francisco d' Almeida, the first Viceroy, who went out in 1505 in command of twenty- two ships, and laid the foundations of Portuguese commerce in Indian waters, argued that Portugal needed no large number of forts and positions in the East, provided only one good harbour was secured. He who was master of the sea, he observed, was master of India. Albuquerque nourished a higher ambition, and encouraged not merely the idea of a sea traffic but also of a chain of forts and strong insular and continental positions everywhere. The policy of Albuquerque prevailed, and Portuguese dominion came to be represented in many places by many strongholds.3 But their Eastern empire was too unwieldy as a whole to stand : the Portuguese rulers were cruel and rapacious — one of their own countrymen, Diogo do Couto, observing that the governors of Portuguese India who doubled the Cape of Good Hope lost all fear of God and fear of the king.
1 Three Voyages of Vasco da Gama, Hakluyt Series.
228
Ceylon and the Maldive Archipelago 229
In Ceylon the Portuguese found no difficulty in planting their factories along the coast, and from this basis carried on a succession of raids to the Kandian capital, burning everything, and not sparing the king's palace. As a sign of submission, they exacted an annual tribute of three elephants. The Kandian king called in the aid of the Dutch, who easily expelled the Portuguese and established themselves (1655). At the beginning of this century the Portuguese name, language, religion, and numerous missionary establishments existed ; but in the growth of the island even these signs and landmarks have been lost sight of and obliterated.
Nearly a hundred years ago (1803) Mr. Cordiner wrote: ' There is still a large body of inhabitants at Colombo and the other settlements in Ceylon known by the name of Portuguese. They probably amount to the number of 5000. They are, however, completely degenerated, and exhibit complexions of a blacker hue than any of the original natives. Yet they retain a considerable portion of the pride of their ancestors : wear the European dress ; profess the religion of the Church of Rome; and think themselves far superior to the lower classes of the Singhalese. They are, in fact, a spurious race of all mixtures. Any black fellow who can procure a hat and shoes, with a vest and breeches, and who has acquired some little smattering of the Roman Catholic religion, can aspire to the title of a Portuguese.'
This passage, written in 1803, is instructive, as it throws light upon a somewhat kindred subject, viz., the nature of Portuguese colonisation on the east coast of Africa, in the vicinity of Delagoa Bay, Sofala, and the mouths of the Zambesi, about which so much has recently been said in the delimitation of boundaries between Great Britain and Portugal. Such as the Portuguese colonists were in their mongrel and debased character near Colombo in Ceylon, so were they for generations along the east coast of Africa. The Portuguese colonial life has been a feeble and retrograde factor, their governors incompetent, their colonists black fellows with
230 British Colonisation
Portuguese names only, and their soldiers hired native mer- cenaries. With regard to Ceylon, it could not have been without a pang of national regret that the island was lost to Portugal. The King of Portugal was so anxious of preserving it that he inserted this clause in all his instructions : ' Let all India be lost, so that Ceylon be saved.'
At the beginning of this century Ceylon was divided betweeen Their High Mightinesses the States-General and the King of Kandy. The Dutch held a belt of sea-coast running all round the island, broad in some parts and narrow in others, within which the latter was cooped up ' as in an enchanted circle.7 The Kandians had certain articles of commerce for exchange or sale, such as areca nuts, ivory, and honey ; whilst the Dutch had two indispensable articles for the Kandians, e.g. fish and salt. On this basis trade was conducted, but the Kandians naturally desired an establishment on the sea-coast. When the island passed into the hands of the British in 1795-6, the number of Dutchmen amounted to about nine hundred. In their habits and customs the Dutch of Ceylon resembled the Dutch of Batavia, or of any other of their Eastern settlements: described by one traveller as 'all rising early to drink a cup of coffee and smoke a pipe ; all wearing velvet clothing, eating freely, and sleeping after dinner ; and all so averse to walking that it was a common saying that no Europeans but Englishmen and dogs ever walked in Batavia.' Travellers at the Cape of Good Hope and Natal will in some of these characteristics detect a strong family resemblance between the Dutch colonists of Ceylon and of South Africa, especially in their preference for cups of coffee and their dis- like to pedestrianism. In Ceylon the Dutch settler would seem to have been poor and indigent, compelled, after the surrender of the island to the British, to practise rigid economy. The trade system of the Dutch had been one of strict commercial monopoly. As long as pearls and nutmegs bore a high price in Amsterdam, the Dutch cared nothing whether fisheries were stopped, spice-trees were dug up, and
Ceylon and the Maldive Archipelago 23 1
all native arts checked. The prosperity of the island itself and the good of the inhabitants were never considered. A judicious land-tax levied fairly on the island might have been found by the Dutch to be a most legitimate source of revenue, such as in fact our own Governor Raffles found it to be in Java, the Dutch possession temporarily occupied by ourselves from 1808 to 1814. This land-tax in lieu of forced services, forced delivery of goods, and a compulsory system generally, is always more popular amongst subject native races, and better calculated to stimulate their industries.
Such was the island which, after its feeble occupation by Portuguese and Dutch, was destined to pass into the more energetic hands of the British. Our growing empire in India seemed to demand the speedy occupation of this fair island, with its magnificent harbour of Trincomalee, lying close to its shores. Our rule would not be safe with the Bay of Trin- comalee in the hands of a foreign Power. The island com- mands, by virtue of its position, the two coasts of Malabar and Coromandel, and at the beginning of this century it was considered * as the master-key to Hindustan ' in the event of any disturbances in the Peninsula. It was also regarded as the depot of the distant China trade, in case England's position was in jeopardy in Canton. On the subject of the importance of Trincomalee at the beginning of this century a writer in the Quarterly Review has observed : * Had Trincomalee been in our possession when the dreadful famine ravaged Madras during Lord Macartney's government, and the fleet of Sir Edward Hughes was compelled to flee for shelter to Bombay, whilst the French frigates insulted the coast of Coromandel and obstructed the provision-ships intended for its relief, Madras might have escaped the horrible evils to which its unhappy inhabitants were subjected.'
Some of the chief strategic and commercial reasons that made Ceylon and the port of Trincomalee so valuable and important a hundred years ago have wholly or partially dis- appeared. The British foot is firmly planted in the adjoining
232 British Colonisation
peninsula, and neither Trincomalee nor Colombo is regarded in the light of a last resource or a city of refuge. Our China trade at Hong Kong lies now in a well-protected zone of British influence, and our chief entrepots in Chinese waters can take good care of themselves, and all branches of Eastern trade have made marvellous progress along distinct and separate channels. In a certain sense, therefore, the relative importance of Ceylon as a strategic position is much less than it was a -hundred years ago.
Nevertheless, the island has a rare vantage-ground. It lies in the fair-way of ocean traffic, and is the meeting-place of all nations. Although it is but ' a silver streak ' that divides the island from India, this streak at some future time may have an immense and almost incalculable value. Should British rule be imperilled in the peninsula in some future war of nations, the island of Ceylon might be for the British an impregnable stronghold and a priceless basis. For no enemy of England could regard the conquest of the Indian peninsula complete unless he conquered as well the island at its foot.
Coming to recent times, it may truly be said that the prosperity of Ceylon has within the last fifty years hung upon the development of two leading products — coffee and tea. There has been an era of great coffee-plantations in past years, and now the era of tea-plantations is before us. To describe the history of these two remarkable industries is to tell nearly the whole tale of Ceylon progress. With regard to coffee, it may be truly stated that for thirty years — from 1837 to 1867— the whole energy of the planters was devoted to its cultiva- tion. To a certain extent the berry had been grown under Dutch rule, and in 1825 Sir Edward Barnes, the Governor of Ceylon, formed a coffee-plantation near Kandy. Sugar, cotton, nutmegs, cinnamon, tobacco, cocoa-nuts, were all planted in the island ; but little by little attention came to be concen- trated almost wholly upon coffee. About this time the abolition of slavery in the West Indies and the reduction of import duties upon coffee into the United Kingdom stimulated coffee-
Ceylon and the Maldive Archipelago 233
planting in Ceylon. The profits that ensued were at that time fabulous and unprecedented, and an extraordinary rush was made by every class of society upon coffee-planting in Ceylon.
Mr. Loudoun Shand has described this rush and the con- sequences ensuing upon it : ' Soldiers, sailors, clergymen, civil servants plunged into coffee-planting with every penny they had or could borrow ; and accompanied, as all such fevers are, by injudicious selections and extravagant mismanagement, who could wonder that a heavy fall in the price of coffee in Europe, and a consequent cessation of credit to plant and cultivate estates, produced a crisis which checked and threatened to stifle the coffee enterprise of Ceylon ? But as in the case of Indian tea, so from the coffee crisis in Ceylon there emerged a body of men poorer, perhaps, but wiser; and now, founded upon experience taught by misfortune, the enterprise steadily grew, though subject, of course, to all the vicissitudes incidental to tropical agriculture; and in 1870 and the two preceding years the average annual value of the coffee was roundly ^4,000,000.' J
Ceylon prosperity was at its height about 1866-1872. During the governorship of Sir Hercules Robinson (1865-1871) no less than 227,000 acres of Crown lands were sold to the planters. Before this, and during the years 1861 to 1865, there had come into the market 156,000 acres, and upon this, for the most part virgin soil, British energy and capital had been flung with an unstinting hand. The cost of clearing a single acre of forest is estimated at ;£io, and some idea of the planters' investments may be gained. The sale of Crown lands was a wise measure and productive of great results, although some have thought that, under the circumstances, it would have been better if the land had been leased instead of alienated.
The year of greatest export of coffee was from 1874 to 1875, when nearly 1,000,000 cwt. of coffee was shipped 1 Proceedings of the Royal Colonial Instittite, vol. xix.
234 British Colonisation
from the island. From this year must be dated the sudden and rapid decline of the industry. In 1886-7 on^y 150,000 cwt. was sold in the London market. In 1891, for nine months of the year, i.e. from January to September 21, the export was only 63,109 cwt.1 The cause of this decline was a parasitic growth on the leaf of the coffee-bush known as the Hemileia vastatrix. This disease first showed itself in a place called Madulsima, in the Uva district. At first the planters thought little of it, as the natural vigour of the coffee-shrub seemed long able to resist it, and a great deal was done to strengthen the plant by artificial means. Under the impression that an imported shrub would best be able to withstand the attack (just as the imported American vine resists better in France the ravages of the Phylloxera), the Liberian was substituted on some estates for the native shrub. Unfortunately, the imported shrub succumbed quicker than the others, and in ten years the once fertile and prosperous area of coffee-plantations pre- sented a forlorn and desolate appearance. It was evident that a crisis had come and gone in the history of Ceylon, and the planter's ruin was complete.
From this wreck of the coffee industry a new one was destined shortly to arise. Between the withered rows of coffee-shrubs, by way of a precarious venture, the tea-shrub was planted, ' the green monitor of hope in the ranks of despair.' The plant itself ( Camellia Theifera} was not indigenous to the island, its native place being in the mountainous parts of Assam, and near the frontiers of China.2 But as the Chinese had long acclimatised this Assam product, and the Indian planters had already succeeded with it, there was no reason why the Ceylon planters should not make an experiment. Moreover, the Planters' Association had already (1866) appointed a commissioner to visit and report upon the tea- plantations in India. One of the earliest experiments was
1 Returns in Ceylon Observer.
2 Statement by Mr. D. Morris, Proceedings of the Royal Colonial Institute, vol. xix.
Ceylon and the Maldive Archipelago 235
made by Mr. James Taylor, the manager of the Loolcondura estate, who may almost be termed the pioneer of the new industry. At first it was thought that tea could be grown at high elevations only, but about 1876 it was proved that the lowlands of Ceylon were equally well adapted to the industry. Tea-planting began in earnest, and over all the surface of Ceylon, from the sea-level to a height of 6000 feet, plantations have been laid out.
This new industry has advanced by leaps and bounds, and constitutes one of the marvels of the age. It is an industry, however, which requires the greatest skill and science, as well as an unwearying attention to details. In Ceylon the tea-bush ' flushes ' all the year round in suitable weather, a period of ten or fifteen days elapsing between the ' flushes.' The leaves have to be picked with care, and the shrub carefully watched lest the wood become thickened and the obnoxious ' crows'- nests ' multiply upon its branches. When a tea-shrub bunches its efficacy becomes impaired. The leaf is useful in three stages — in its youth, maturity, and old age. First there is the delicate * Pekoe,' or the young leaf before it is unfurled ; next the 'Souchong,' or the leaf in its maturity; and lastly the * Congou,' or the old and coarsest leaf, which is of a brittle nature and difficult to roll.
In the factory itself the planter has to be as watchful as in the field. To dry the fresh-plucked leaves in the right way, to break and crush their tissues by the pressure of rolling- machines, and to pass the heaps through a process of natural fermentation, are all delicate operations. The leaf that is plucked on a Monday morning should give a refreshing beverage on Wednesday, and from week to week and from month to month the operations of the Ceylon tea-planter are incessant. Some would say that the shrub has not enough cold weather, and consequently a rest, in Ceylon, and that from this circumstance it may become deteriorated ; but hitherto no diminution of natural vigour has shown itself. To China, and even India, Ceylon is now a formidable rival, and she threatens
236 British Colonisation
to monopolise the trade. There are from 200 to 250 estates in cultivation, yielding between seventy and eighty million pounds' weight of tea, worth close upon ^3, 000,000 annually. The best market is the United Kingdom, where it is calculated that the consumption averages yearly four or five pounds a head. This is exceeded by the Australian colonist, who drinks seven pounds a head. Besides Australia, a growing market for tea is found in Canada and the United States, where the article is admitted duty free. Should Americans become tea-drinkers, the fortunes, surely, of Ceylon planters are assured, as the Pacific routes — especially that by way of the Canadian Pacific Railway — become better known and used.
The great fear of the Ceylon planters is over-production. In 1876 the export of tea was 282 Ibs. ; in 1887-8 it was 13,500,000 Ibs; in 1890-1 it exceeded 40,000,000 Ibs. ; in 1891-2 it was close on 70^000,000 Ibs ; and in 1892-3 it is cal- culated at 78,000,000 Ibs.
THE MALDIVE ARCHIPELAGO.
In connection with Ceylon, the Maldive Islands, a Ceylon dependency, must be mentioned. Pyrard de Laval, the French explorer, who was wrecked on the group in 1602, has left a very good account of them, which Captain Christopher, employed on the survey of the islands in 1834-5, and Mr. Bell in 1880, have in the main substantiated, thus proving the immobile nature of Eastern civilisation. This group of islands, lying in the Indian Ocean, has provided its visitors with much that is extremely interesting. ' Each inhabited island is a little village, separated from its neighbours by sea and lagoon ; yet the whole forms and, as far as we can trace the islands in history, has formed a compact kingdom, with a well-designed constitution, a Cabinet of Ministers, a body of executive and judicial, religious and revenue officers, all in due subordination. Were not the whole aspect of Maldive
Ceylon and the Maldive Archipelago 237
civilisation coloured and penetrated by Mohammedanism, that ever-present factor in the East, we might regard Pyrard's description of this little kingdom, so strange and yet so par- ticular, as one which might have come from the hand of Swift or Defoe.
The islands are almost countless, and are said to number 12,000 or 13,000. According to Ptolemy, there were 1368 islands in the vicinity of Ceylon. Friar Jordanus had heard of 10,000 or 12,000, and Marco Polo asserted that there were 12,700 inhabited and uninhabited. Most of the islands are very small, separated by narrow channels, and the Maldivians are almost amphibious in their habits, swimming easily from one to the other. They are very skilful fishermen, and export fish to Ceylon.
All these islands and banks have been divided into thirteen provinces, called atollons, from a Maldive word atolu — a word which has become of general use.2 The chief atoll is Male, which has eight inhabited islets attached to it. Altogether there are 175 inhabited islands. The religion of Buddha found its way there in past times, and on one of the islands there are said to be ' the jungle-covered ruins of a tope or dagoba,' as in Ceylon. One of the islands is known as * Buddha's City ' and another as ' Bo-tree Island.' At present there are only two Bo-trees growing in the group. The Maldivians have borne the character of being kind and hospitable islanders. From time to time they have been visited by many travellers. In the time of Pyrard (1602) two languages were in use — one of them peculiar to the Maldives, and the other Arabic, by which they set great store, learning it as a classical language. They also spoke, according to the same authority, the languages of Cambay, Guzerat, Malacca, and even Portuguese. Moham- medanism is the current religion of these islanders. The Fast of Ramedan, the rite of circumcision, and all the rules of Mahomet are most scrupulously observed.
On the islands Goma or Ambergris, the sea coco-nut (coco 1 Voyage of Pyrard de Laval, p. xliii. 2 Ibid.
238 British Colonisation
de mer\ the ancient remedy for all ailments, was found. Here also is gathered in large quantities the cowry, the most widely used shell-money in Africa and the East. In former days the Portuguese bought cowries in large numbers at the Maldives. The current coin was, acording to Pyrard, a silver one called a Larin, stamped with the king's name in Arabic characters. The word is said to have been taken from the city Lar in Persia. Coco fruit, cordage, and the well-known Maldive mats, made of a rush growing in one atoll only, are articles of commerce. Cotton cloth also has been manufac- tured for centuries amongst the Maldivians.
Another, and perhaps the chief, occupation of the Maldivians has been fishing from time immemorial — both deep-sea fishing, by which they catch albacore and bonito (known, when cured, as komboli mas in Ceylon and Indian bazaars), and in-shore fishing, by which they catch the ' red chief of fish,' or the rangoo ; and also fishing at low-water, when the equinoctial season comes, by means of a fish-kraal — an ingenious method, practised also in Ceylon, for driving the fish into stone enclosures.
The Maldives have passed successively under the rule of Portuguese, Dutch, and British. The Portuguese took Male, deposing the Sultan and building a fortress. When the Dutch drove the Portuguese out of Ceylon, the archipelago of the Maldives was included in their rule, and in 1640 a Dutch vessel was sent to the Maldivians from Ceylon. The Dutch were always on friendly terms with the Maldivians, and recog- nised the Maldive flag. In 1754 Dupleix sent a few French troops to Male, but they were soon withdrawn. When Ceylon was taken by the British the Maldives were included in the conquest ; and the Sultan of the Maldivians, who are supposed to number about 30,000, recognises the protectorate of Great Britain by sending annually an embassy to Colombo with presents to the Governor of Ceylon. To the ethnologist the Maldivians have provided a most interesting study. Male is about 400 miles distant from Ceylon, and the islands
Ceylon and the Maldive Archipelago 239
themselves have succeeded in preserving for centuries a peculiar and distinctive character of their own.1 1 For facts and figures see Appendix IX.
References : —
Description of Ceylon, by Robert Knox.
Lucas's Hist. Geog. of the British Colonies, vol. i.
Ceylon, by Sir James Emerson Tennent.
Fergusson's Handbook of Ceylon, 1892.
Proceedings of the, Royal Colonial Institute, vol. xix.
Rifle and Hound in Ceylon, by Sir S. Baker.
Two Happy Years in Ceylon, by C. F. Gordon Gumming
The Ceylon Observer.
CHAPTER XIII MAURITIUS
MAURITIUS, like Madagascar, must be regarded as an African island, although it lies so far removed from the great continent. Originally (1505) it was discovered by Mascarenhas, the Portuguese explorer ; but the Portuguese only made use of the island as a port of call. In 1598 a Dutch fleet sighted Mauritius, and the commander gave the island its present name, calling it after Prince Maurice of Nassau. For some years, however, they neglected to utilise the island, turning their attention to more profitable quarters. About the middle of the seventeenth century the French made great efforts to form colonial settlements in this part of the world, the King of France having taken into his own hands the management of the factories at Madagascar, and Bishop Estienne being then employed with a large staff of missionaries in erecting a monastery near Port Dauphin. The French had also occupied Mascarenhas, which they termed Bourbon. Clearly, therefore, the Dutch ought to increase their influence in Mauritius if they wished to keep their hold upon these waters; and in June 1664 a Dutch expedition under Jacobus van Nieuwland landed on the island. It was governed thenceforward as a dependency of the Cape, and every year a vessel sailed from Table Bay with supplies, bringing back ebony logs.1 A few burghers and thirty or forty men were its only white inhabi- tants, and there was scarcely a semblance of administration in the island. The Dutch authorities were so dependent upon the Cape that they could not carry out their sentences until
1 Theal's History of Sottth Africa, p. 159. 240
Mauritius 24 1
reviewed by the Council of Justice at the Cape. Very little, therefore, came of the Dutch occupation of Mauritius.
At the time of the revocation of the Edict of Nantes (1685), whilst Mauritius was still under Dutch influence, an attempt was made to colonise the neighbouring island of Rodriguez with French Huguenot refugees — an immigration that reminds us of the planting, about the same time, of the French Huguenots at the Cape of Good Hope. An account of the expedition is given by Frangois Leguat, one of the passengers, who dedicated his work to Henri de Grey, Marquis et Comte de Kent, Pair de la Grand' Bretagne (1708). In his work there is a map of Rodriguez, * decouverte par les Portugais sous le Roi Jen iv., Tan 1645, et depuis habite'e pendant 1'espace de deux ans et 20 jours par Frangois Leguat, Jaq. de la Case, Jean Testard, Isaac Boyer, Jean de la Haye, Robert Anselin, et Pi. Thomas, Frangois Protestans, fugitifs pour leur re- ligion.' Frangois Leguat was a refugee of noble blood who was originally sent out to inspect and report upon the island of Bourbon, where the Marquis du Quene proposed to estab- lish a colony under the protection of the States-General and the East India Company of the Netherlands — an object which is fully described in the Cape archives. The captain of the ship passed by Bourbon — or Eden, as the refugees had called it — and set the party on shore on the island of Rodriguez. From Rodriguez he passed over to the Mauritius.
In 1721 Mauritius fell an easy prey to the French, and its name was changed to the Isle of France, which it retained till 1 8 10. In the Isle of France French colonisation was, as in the province of Quebec, fairly successful. The pictures of colonial life as shown in Bernardin de St. -Pierre's narrative are almost as attractive as those of Acadia in Nova Scotia — in both cases there are scenes of pastoral and natural wealth. In the valleys of Grand Pr£ and within sight of Grand Blomidon the peasantry live on their fat dyked pastures and beneath their happy Acadian orchards ; in Mauritius they live in the land of the badamier, the mango, the avocatier.
Q
242 British Colonisation
Labourdonnais, a native of St. Malo, and one of the best colonial governors France has ever produced, did a great deal for Mauritius, establishing sugar-works and creating that industry which has since made Mauritius so prosperous. He also encouraged cotton and indigo manufactories, and put down the maroons or runaway slaves of the country. The policy of Labourdonnais (1741) was to make Mauritius a station which might serve as a basis of operations against rival Europeans in the Eastern seas and a depot of French trade. This policy was in its main features opposed entirely to the ideas of St. Pierre, who in 1773 criticised the Eastern policy of France. To use his own words : ' I thought in the first place to render an essential service to my country by demonstrating that this island, which was filled with troops, was in no respect fit either to be the mart or the citadel of the commerce of France with the East Indies, from which it is 1500 leagues distant. This position I proved by the events of former wars, in which Pondicheri was always taken by the enemy, though the Isle of France swarmed with troops.' For his expressed theories St. Pierre incurred great unpopularity.
However, it was as abase of privateering raids against English commerce that Mauritius and Bourbon were at the beginning of this century most useful to France. When the Republican navy was shattered by England in one desperate encounter after another, and resistance by open sea rendered impossible, French India having been lost once and for all, daring French privateers hailing from the northern ports of France — as daring and brave in their way as our Devon worthies of the sixteenth century — sallied forth upon the Indian waters, and carried on for a time a most destructive campaign upon British com- merce. In the years 1793-4, we are told, French privateers captured no fewer than 788 English merchantmen, whilst we only took 151 prizes. 'The merchants of Calcutta and Madras stood aghast. Commerce was at a standstill, our cruisers were outwitted, and on more than one occasion, in spite of their heavier metal, had been compelled to haul down
Mauritius 243
their flags to the pygmy privateers hailing from the" port of St. Malo. . . . The history of Surcouf, the daring Malouine privateer, is not flattering to our national vanity, but it teaches us a lesson which should not be lost upon our naval adminis- trators. Leaving Isle of France in September 1795 in a little craft of 180 tons, with a crew of thirty Bretons and an armament of four six-pounders, he commenced a career which for daring and sagacity has rarely been equalled, even in our own annals. Sailing northward, Surcouf coasted the Burmese coasts and captured the Penguin, an Indiaman of 600 tons burthen ; in January at the mouth of the Hooghly he sighted two full-rigged ships, both of which he captured, sending them to the Isle of France; shortly afterwards he captured the Diana, 850 tons, laden with rice, and the next day he boarded and captured an Indiaman, the Triton, carrying 26 guns and 150 men.' In 1799 Surcouf fitted out the Clarisse from France, and again sought Eastern waters. On the way out he captured two full-rigged merchantmen, and pursued an extraordinary career. Amongst other exploits he 'took in September 1800 one American and two English traders; and on the 7th of October, after a desperate combat, in which, having shown even more than usual address and gallantry, he carried, by boarding, the Kent, a fine Indiaman of 820 tons, 27 guns, having on board 437 Englishmen, of whom 120 were soldiers.' In 1806 he appears in Indian waters again in command of the Ravenant, and such was the terror of his name that the merchants of Hindustan offered a reward of ;£io,ooo for his capture. 'Reaching his destination, Surcouf sailed to the Malabar coast, and on the 26th of September captured the Trafalgar, 12, and the Mangles, 14, both carry- ing cargoes of rice ; and in the course of the next few days five more vessels, the Admiral Aplin, Susanna, Hunter, For- tune, and Success, were captured, and in November the New Endeavour and the Micawby were placed under prize-crews and despatched to the Isle of France.' The career of Surcouf, after whom a French ship is now named, was emulated by
244 BritisJi Colonisation
Frangois Lememe, another Malouine, who in the space of ten months captured fifteen vessels and realised ^82,000. Dutertre, another Malouine, captured in October 1798 no less than six English merchantmen — the Surprise, Princess Royal, Thomas, Lord Hobart, Governor North, and Wellesley. These privateering raids are worth recalling to memory, as in the future, if ever war breaks out between France and England, they may possibly be repeated on a greater and, for ourselves, more disastrous scale.
In 1809 a force was sent from Bombay to take possession of Rodriguez, the refuge formerly of Frangois Leguat, the Protestant exile. Bourbon surrendered in 1810, and in the same year, after a stiff resistance, the British troops under General Abercrombie succeeded in landing on the north coast of Mauritius and capturing it. Articles of capitulation were signed by which the Creoles, or French colonists born in the country, were secured in the enjoyment of their pro- perty, religion, laws, and customs. By the Treaty of Paris, 1814, the Isle of France, henceforward to be called Mauritius, was to remain a British colony, together with the Seychelles and other small islands. Bourbon or Reunion was to be restored to France.
It is somewhat extraordinary to think that the conquest of the French islands of Bourbon and the Isle of France was ever regarded by statesmen as an event only second in importance to the battle of Trafalgar. Yet such was the case in 1811. By the capture of the Isle of France, England cut off a nursery for training sea-officers and narrowed the means of raising seamen. The Isle of France was also the spot from which the spirit of revolt and disobedience against British rule was most sedulously kept alive amongst the Mahrattas and other powers of Hindustan. It was full of adventurers eager for the prizes of guerilla warfare ; it supplied arms and ammunition, together with officers to teach the use of them, to the disaffected in Persia. French commercial agents found their way to Muscat and Bussorah from the Isle of France.
Mauritius 245
The permanent settled population of Europeans is greater in Mauritius than in any other tropical colony, and many of them are descendants of the old French nobility. The term ' Creole' is applied to all those who, whether white or coloured, are born on the island, and therefore carries no stigma with it. The island produces hardly anything for its own consumption, but exports sugar, spice, and other tropical products to every quarter of the globe. It imports its breadstuffs from India, its oxen from Madagascar, dried fish from South Africa, and sheep from Australia.
Occasionally the island is visited by terrible cyclones, which create havoc amongst the sugar-canes. The most disastrous cyclone ever known visited the island on ' Black Friday,' April 29, 1892. At 3 P.M. on that eventful day the velocity of the wind is said to have reached 1 2 1 miles an hour. One- third of the city of Port Louis lay in ruins, 1500 houses were totally destroyed and 20,000 people rendered homeless. Out of 62 churches 50 were destroyed, and the dead were lying everywhere. The loss of property must be reckoned by millions of francs. From this visitation Mauritius must take some time to recover.1
1 For facts and figures see Appendix X.
References : —
Grant's History of Mauritius, 1801. Captain Norman's Colonial France (1886). St. -Pierre's Paul and Virginia. Pike's Siibtropical Rambles, 1873.
CHAPTER XIV
HONG KONG
HONG KONG, first ceded to Great Britain in January 1841, and finally acknowledged as a British possession by the Treaty of Nankin, 1842, provides us with an unparalleled example of the growth of British trade. The island commands a most im- portant position in the China Sea at the mouth of the Canton River, distant about forty miles from the Portuguese colony of Macao, and ninety miles from Canton, the southern capital of China. The length of the island is about eleven miles, with a breadth of from two to three miles, consisting of a broken ridge of lofty hills, the highest being Victoria Peak, 1890 feet above the level of the sea. The great feature of the island is its magnificent harbour, almost equal to that of Sydney, with an area of ten square miles. From a strategic point of view it may be called the Gibraltar of the East. Several small islets are included in the colony of Hong Kong ; and jutting into its harbour is a peninsula of the mainland of China, known as British Kowloon, four square miles in area, but a very im- portant addition, secured to the colony by Sir Harry Parkes during the Chinese War of 1856.
Hong Kong, now that Port Hamilton in Quaelpaert (Corea) has been abandoned, is the most easterly British possession. Thence to Yokohama is a voyage of seven days, and from Yokohama to Vancouver is a voyage of fourteen days. To travel from Vancouver to Liverpool by rail and steamer takes another fortnight, roughly speaking ; so that in five weeks it is possible to reach Hong Kong, our furthest eastern possession,
246
Hong Kong 247
by going west across the North Atlantic, the Canadian Dominion, and the North Pacific. Half of the trade of Hong Kong is with China, and a third with India, mainly in tea, silk, and opium.
Hong Kong owes a great deal to the discovery of gold in Australia, which attracted crowds of Chinese emigrants to the fields through its port. Upon what was a bare and desolate island, inhabited by a few fishermen, and separated from the mainland by a narrow strait only half a mile across, has arisen the magnificent city of Victoria, a most striking monument of the Victorian age, containing a population of 200,000 people. The trade of Hong Kong has grown in direct proportion as China has opened her gates to Western influences and external commerce. It is in telegraphic communication with the world by a cable to Shanghai and two cables to Singapore, via Saigon and Hue respectively. There is an imperial garrison of about 1300 men, towards which the colony contributes ^20,000 annually, which, considering the position of the port and its enormous trade, is a comparatively trifling sum. Sir William des Vceux has recently stated that the capacity of vessels entered and cleared at the port of Hong Kong con- siderably exceeded 13,000,000 tons in 1890, being more than the tonnage either of New York, London, or Liverpool.
It is not necessary to enter here upon the causes of the Chinese War of 1857-60. For generations China, entrenched behind her defences, had manifested a resolve to have little or nothing to do with foreigners. The opium question was pushed to the forefront as the casus belli, and, undoubtedly, opinions must vary on the morality or immorality of the opium traffic ; but we must not lose sight of the main point, for what was really settled by the war of 1857-60 was whether China should retain or not her peculiar position among nations. At times, indeed, her officials seemed, from their attitude and uncompromising character, to do violence to the comity of nations. But barriers have been broken down, and the Chinese people have, upon the whole, profited by their
248 British Colonisation
intercourse with the rest of the world. For the British the tangible results of the war were the opening of the Yang-tsze to navigation, with four trading ports upon it, as well as the coast ports of Chefoo, Tientsin, and Tewchwang in North China, the island of Formosa, and ports in the south, all of which have become closely associated with Hong Kong in a growing trade. This trade, we are informed by those most capable of knowing, ' will still greatly expand as restrictions to commerce are further removed by the Chinese, and as the navigation of the rivers of the empire by steamers is per- mitted, and railways and improved means of locomotion and transport generally are introduced in the country.' 1
The British occupation of Hong Kong has been very far- reaching in its effects. Springing up so quickly on the flank of the Chinese empire, and in spite of all opposition making its way to the front as a great emporium of Eastern trade, Hong Kong has been an object-lesson to Japan. The story also of the destruction of the Summer Palace of the Chinese Emperors conveyed to them the truth that England's power was paramount along the Eastern seas. Thus it was that Japan first awoke from her long sleep, welcomed Europeans, and adapted herself to European ways and customs.
From another point of view Hong Kong has been ex- tremely useful. It has performed the office of a vast Chinese emigration bureau, and has been the means of dispersing Chinese labour all over the world. At the same time the Hong Kong authorities, by their special emigration ordinances, which provided that Chinese should be well cared for both going and returning, won a reputation for justice and probity, and inspired the Chinese nation with confidence in British rule. The emigrants themselves, emerging from their isolation and going out to all parts of the world as labourers in every department, learned much and profited much from the great world outside, which they had always been taught to despise.
1 Paper by Mr. William Keswick, Proceedings of the Royal Colonial Institute, 1889-90.
Hong Kong 249
Each of them became, upon his return home, a kind of news- agent to his fellows, reporting upon the government, customs, and, generally speaking, just administration of the Europeans. Not unfrequently the emigrant from the Celestial Empire reversed the phrase ' Spoliis orientis onustusj and returned with the spoils of the West. A large number of Chinese have gone also through Hong Kong to the nearer and more accessible Straits Settlements, as well as to the Dutch possessions of Java and Sumatra.
Hong Kong is admirably suited to be a distributing centre, and no more marvellous development has taken place than that of the native junk trade. The public works of this vast emporium are on a scale commensurate with its importance. There are docks and large engineering works, so that the largest vessel afloat can be refitted and repaired. Janus-like, it looks both ways, east and west, and is at once a depot, arsenal, mart, emigration centre, and the meeting-place of all nations.
The European population is about 3000, consisting mainly of merchants and officials. British rule is popular with the Chinese, although the task of government has been often con- ducted under singularly embarrassing circumstances. The administration of law in an island close to China, where official life is so stereotyped in itself and so utterly different from our own, has often been beset with difficulties. Hong Kong is so accessible and easy a refuge that it has been almost impossible to prevent it becoming a kind of Alsatia for the Chinese criminals ; the population itself is of a migratory character, and therefore it has been out of the question to depend much upon a permanent public opinion amongst Chinese residents themselves in favour of British law. The police force of 750 men, consists of British — chiefly Scotsmen, Sikhs, and Chinamen ; and, notwithstanding all the difficul- ties in the way, it cannot but be considered a triumph of administration that this migratory population of nearly 200,000 are kept so easily in order.1
1 For facts and figures see Appendix XI.
250 British Colonisation
THE STRAITS SETTLEMENTS.
At one time the trade to be carried on in Further India and amongst the islands of the Malay Archipelago attracted the attention of Europeans more than the trade of the great Indian peninsula. Whilst Englishmen were barely able to feel their way at Surat, Agra, and the domain of the Great Mogul, they had developed a fairly lucrative business in Borneo, Sumatra, and Java. In the reign of James i. English mer- chant-venturers traded with several ports in those seas ; and the experience learned here enabled them to prosecute their efforts along the banks of the Hooghly, thus laying the foundations of the great city of Calcutta. It is said that the wreck of a Portuguese Indiaman on the English coast, the Mother of God, a vessel of 1600 tons, found to contain a cargo of Eastern produce worth ;£i 50,000 when towed into Dartmouth, first turned the attention of British merchants to a direct trade with Further India.
On the last day of the sixteenth century Queen Elizabeth granted a charter to George, Earl of Cumberland, and two hundred and fifteen knights, aldermen, and merchants to set forth to the East Indies ' at their own cost and charges.' The voyage of Captain Lancaster and the establishment of British factories at Acheen and Bantam were its first-fruits.
There was a long struggle for supremacy in the Spice Islands — viz. Amboyna and the Moluccas — between English and Dutch. The Dutch had supplanted the Spaniards and Portuguese in Eastern waters, and in 1620 they drove us from the Spice Islands, and in 1683 from Bantam and Jakatra in Java. The Dutch used to proclaim themselves ' Lords of the Southern Seas/ a fact alluded to by Pepys in his Diary (February 15, 1663-4): 'showing scorn to the English,' and even beating them out of Surat, ' our only factory there.' The notable Amboyna massacre (1623) has already been alluded to, and it continued to be a source of irritation against the Dutch the greater part of the seventeenth century.
The Straits Settlements 251
Expelled from Bantam, Englishmen succeeded in establishing themselves in Bencoolen in 1685, their 'sole and humble object being to secure a share in the pepper trade.' It was at Bencoolen that William Dampier remained for some time in 1690, acting as gunner of the English fort there.
Little by little England asserted her influence in these waters, the power of Holland being on the wane. Penang was occupied, by orders of the Indian Government, under Sir John Macpherson, in 1786; Malacca was taken from the Dutch by an expedition sent from India in 1795 > Singapore was acquired by cession from the Malays in 1819 by Sir Stamford Raffles, acting under the authority of the Marquis of Hastings, Governor-General of India. It will be seen, there- fore, that the Straits Settlements grew, in the first place, out of our Indian empire ; in fact, they were all Indian colonies, and until April i, 1867, were administered from Calcutta and supported for years by the Indian taxpayer.
It may be noted that at the beginning of this century, during the occupation of the Netherlands by the French, the Dutch colonies fell into our hands, and a British fleet under Lord Minto took Java and its dependencies. The result of Napoleonic campaigns in Europe was to strengthen and extend our rule in many outlying parts of the world. The Cape fell into our hands very much for the same reasons as Java and the Dutch settlements in Further India.
During the present century British power has been destined to grow. Just as the corollary of our success in India has been the acquisition, little by little, of coigns of vantage in Further India, to the exclusion of other nations, so these coigns of vantage have led up to spheres of territorial influ- ence— protected States in the Malay Peninsula and in Borneo. England might have swept Holland out of these seas alto- gether at the beginning of this century, after the Napoleonic wars, had she so wished it ; but, knowing that the extension of her Eastern trade was essential to Holland's position in Europe as an European Power, she restored to her what she had
252 British Colonisation
already taken. But Holland has been unable to grow like England. British influence is spreading far beyond the limits of the actual trade centres. A few facts will prove how it has grown. Here, as elsewhere, the Pax Britannica has worked marvels.
In 1872-3 civil wars were going on both in Perak and Selangor, the cause of dispute being the collection of re- venue derivable from the tin-mines. In Perak there was a further complication between the Chinese factions, who were fighting for the mines of Larut. The time came for active British interference, and, acting under the instructions of Lord Kimberley, Sir Andrew Clarke took steps to put a stop to the existing confusion. So little opposition was there on the part of the Malays that the Sultans of Perak and Selangor asked in 1874 that British residents might be associated with them in the government of their respective States.
In 1875 Sungei Ujong, a small State to the south of Selan- gor, possessing a rather unmanageable Chinese element, accepted a British resident.
In 1883 Governor Sir Frederick Weld induced the group of small States lying between Sungei Ujong, Pahang, Malacca, and Johor (called the Negri Sembilan, or the Nine States) to confederate, and to conduct their government under the advice and with the assistance of a British officer.
In 1888, in pursuance of an agreement between Sir Cecil Clementi Smith, the present Governor of the Straits Settle- ments, and the Sultan, Pahang, a large State on the east coast of the peninsula, was added to the number of the protected States, and its administration assisted by the appointment of a British resident. British influence does not stop here, but is gradually being spread over the whole Malay Peninsula.
Such are the steps by which England has extended her influence in Further India. Her present position is not the result of a preconceived policy, the original intention of the
The Straits Settlements 253
Indian Governor-Generals having been to limit rather than to extend her sway. In 1837 an Indian official wrote to Lord Auckland on the subject of the * Strait Settlement,' as it was called : * These details may appear to your Lordship to be petty ; but then everything connected with these Settlements is petty, except their annual surplus cost to the Government of India.'
Apropos of this depreciatory statement, Mr. Maxwell remarked in a paper read before the Royal Colonial Insti- tute in December 1891 : 'It is amusing to recall an official remark of this kind now in 1891, when the colony of the Straits Settlements, with a history of twenty-four years of independent existence as a Crown Colony, may, in spite of recent temporary reverses, fairly claim to be the most pro- sperous of all the Crown colonies, having a revenue of four and a half million dollars, surplus assets at the begin- ning of 1891 of two and a half million dollars, and no public debt.'
There is no doubt that the acquisition of Hong Kong and the influence England has been able to bring to bear upon the Chinese, who are met with everywhere, has greatly strengthened our position in the whole of the Malay Peninsula, Borneo, and elsewhere. The Chinese have come to under- stand and appreciate our methods of trade, our government, and our customs. Much as the Chinese despise all barbarians, they appear at any rate to mix with their general contempt a certain feeling of respect for England and England's methods. Perhaps there is no nation in the world that could have broken down Chinese prejudices better than England — no nation on the whole more conciliatory and regardful of Chinese prejudices, saving and excepting certain blots.
England's methods of trade are more open and generous than those of other nations. As already pointed out, the junk trade has developed quickly under the system of free ports. It is a curious thing that the Dutch up to recent times should have failed altogether to conciliate the Acheen
254 British Colonisation
native power. The French have had a fair start in Chinese waters, and hold territorially a large empire in close proximity to our own.
The French were associated with ourselves in the Chinese War, and indirectly'we have reaped from their presence a good many of our trade advantages. The greater the extent of French dominion, the more, apparently, the British thrive. It is with Hong Kong and Singapore that the French colony has its principal trade, and the more complete the pacification of Annam and Tonquin the greater the prospects of the English ports. Certainly the French endeavour to force an exclusively French trade upon their dependencies by differ- ential duties ; but this policy is, according to some, detrimental to their own best interests, and ' does more to keep the people estranged from their new rulers than even the presence of much that reminds them of their old sovereigns.'
Captain Norman, in his work on Colonial France, has remarked that 'of the imports from France a very large proportion consisted in 1882 of articles for the use and sub- sistence of the troops, of munitions of war, or material for the construction of public works — in fact, Government goods. Of the exports, which have now reached the respectable total of two million one hundred thousand pounds, rice formed the major portion — upwards of one and a half million pounds' worth of that commodity having been exported. Here again we find France and the French colonies aiding little in the commercial development of Cochin China — the \ total value of rice sent to French possessions amounting only to ^1749, whilst the British colony of Hong Kong imported ^"1,248,260 worth.'
The British administration of the Indian peninsula has rightly called forth the enthusiastic appreciation of the world ; and the machinery of government there is a most wonderful study. Less is known, and less is said, of the administration of Further India and the Malay Archipelago ; yet here, too, Englishmen can point to triumphs and successes.
The Straits Settlements 255
Administrators like Sir Hugh Low, who had won great success in dealing with the Malay races in Sarawak under Rajah Brooke, and in Labuan, have, by the honourable fulfil- ment of their duties as residents in the Malay Peninsula, quieted down disturbances — such, indeed, as arose after the murder of Mr. Birch — and introduced law and order into the country. One example of this will suffice. Under Sir Hugh Low the revenue of Perak advanced from 312,000 dollars in 1877 to 1,435,000 dollars in 1884. Thaiping is the principal town of Perak, and is the centre of a rich tin-mining district. Here law and order are preserved by a well-drilled Malay police force, and by a magnificent Sikh force of infantry artillery with mountain-guns and a few cavalry. This Sikh force is very popular in India, and might be indefinitely enlarged. Indians also swarm to the Straits Settlements, as they do to every place where the British flag flies or where the appeal to English justice lies.
Speaking more particularly, the Straits Settlements consist of: (i) Singapore; (2) the island of Penang, with part of the mainland covering an area of 270 square miles; (3) the Bindings, with the island of Pangkor; (4) Malacca; (5) Christmas Island, situated in the Indian Ocean, in lat. 10° 30' S., long. 105° 40' E.
The city of Singapore or Singapura, ' the City of the Lion,' has a long history, being founded in 1160. De Barros alludes to it as a resort of navigators from India, Siam, China, and of the many thousand islands that lie towards the east. It seems, however to have fallen into decay until taken over by Sir Stamford Raffles in 1819. Since then a city of about 150,000 has arisen, of which more than 90,000 are Chinese, 24,000 Malay, 13,000 Indian, about 3000 Europeans and Americans, with a military force.1 There are twenty-five nationalities enumerated in the census. As a coaling centre Singapore is of the very highest importance, fully 300,000 tons being kept there,
i Paper by Sir Frederick Weld, Governor of the Straits Settlements, read before the Fellows of the Royal Colonial Institute, 1883-4.
256 British Colonisation
with plenty of hands to coal. The colony is said by Sir Frederick Weld to have an ample revenue and large surplus assets, is unencumbered by debt, and is free from vexatious frontier wars. The exports and imports are about ^"40,000,000, and Singapore is a depot for the outlying islands ; for although Java lies half way, yet, owing to the restrictive policy of the Dutch colony, whilst Singapore has free trade, the English merchant is able to carry his commerce far afield and supply countries as far as Tonquin on the north and Australia on the south. Here as elsewhere the Chinese are the great labour pioneers of the country. According to some close observers, it is certain that the Chinese will in course of time fill Tonquin, Cochin China, and overrun the Malay Peninsula. In the Straits Settlements they are book-keepers, clerks, and labourers, and they can work in any climate. They will probably effect what the Malay Rajahs have not yet done for Malaya, i.e. clear the jungle, exploit the mines, and open up the whole country. Singapore has been described as the centre of a sea area over which passes British trade to the value of some 250 millions sterling. Yet, until quite recently, both Singapore and Hong Kong were comparatively defenceless. Had a war broken out six or eight years ago enormous interests might have been imperilled. Here, however, matters have been placed on a more satisfactory footing. The colony itself has been called upon to contribute ^"100,000 a year for military defences, together with ^60,000 for barracks. The annual contribution is at the rate of 33. 6d. per head of the population, whilst in the United Kingdom the charge is i6s. per head. The colonists, therefore, of the Straits Settlements cannot be said to be unfairly taxed.1 Considering the number of the European population, which is only about 3000 or 4000, the revenue, which in 1888 amounted to nearly four million dollars, or ^800,000, is proportionately large.
Penang, or ' Pulau Pinang,' the equivalent for ' Betel-nut Island,' is situated 360 miles north of Singapore, and is next
i See Lord Brassey's speech in the House of Lords, July 24, 1891.
The Straits Settlements 257
to it in importance. Formerly it was occupied in 1786 by Captain Light. The capital of the island of Penang is Georgetown. Facing the mainland is the province of Wellesley, separated by a strait about two miles in width. Penang carries on a brisk trade with Perak and other native States, and also with Sumatra ; but the Acheenese War and the restrictive policy of the Netherlands Indian Government hinder its trade with the Dutch colony.
. The Bindings territory, lying south of Penang, includes the island of Pankor and part of the continent. Geographically it forms part of Perak, and the Superintendent acts under the Resident of this country. Here also is a magnificent harbour, with a population of about 2000. It produces tin, timber, and ebony.
For a Power which, like Great Britain, holds the command of the ocean, these islands, such as Hong Kong, off China, Singapore, Penang, and Pankor, off the Malay Peninsula, are obviously most valuable possessions. They are placed most advantageously for offence and defence as strategic points, whilst for the purposes of commerce and trade they fulfil for the Eastern seas what Venice of old did for Europe.
Malacca is the third province of the colony proper, and is also under a Resident Councillor. This part of the Straits Settlements is less busy than Singapore or Penang, and is the centre of a quiet Malay life. Malacca has a long history. It was founded shortly after the fall of old Singapore by a Javanese Rajah, who had usurped the throne of Singapura. It rose quickly to a considerable prosperity, but was conquered in 1511 by the Portuguese. When Albuquerque was there, it is said that the Sultan, Mahomed Shah, brought an army of 60,000 men against him. Large fleets and reinforcements came over from Acheen, and the Portuguese authority never seems to have extended far beyond the limits of the settlement. The Dutch took Malacca from the Portuguese in 1641, and the English took it from the Dutch in 1795. It was returned, however, by England to Holland in 1818, and was finally ceded to us by
R
258 British Colonisation
treaty in 1824 in exchange for our Sumatra possessions. Malacca is described as a quaint old town, where the remains of the Jesuit Church of Santa Maria della Monte, defaced by the Dutch and called St. Paul's, are an interesting object to the visitor. Within it lay for a time the remains of St. Francis Xavier before they were taken to Goa.1
BRITISH NORTH BORNEO.
The success attending the colonies of Hong Kong and the Straits Settlements prompted the idea that portions of Borneo, which forms the largest of the whole group of islands stretch- ing from the Philippines to Australia, over 40° of longitude, might be brought under British influence. The value of this country had long been known, and Captain Daniel Blackman, in his account of his voyage to Borneo in 1714, alludes to the existence of a flourishing trade with China. At the initiative, therefore, of some energetic Englishmen, the task of Borneo colonisation was seriously taken up, and the British North Borneo Company formed in November 1881. The area ac- quired extends over 30,000 square miles, and, as all the islands are included, Borneo occupies an important position in the China seas. According to the best authorities, this protectorate may be developed best by means of Chinese labour. Both Americans and Australians have agreed to exclude the Chinese from their shores as being unwelcome competitors in the labour market ; but there appears to be no reason why the Mongolians should not be employed to develop the resources of such a land as Borneo, lying close to their doors. Sir Richard Temple has stated that, man for man, the Chinaman is 50 per cent, better than the Indiaman as a labourer. Such auxiliaries, therefore, may be impressed into the service of the Borneo Company with advantage. Already the nucleus of a small police force has been formed, the Sultan of Brunei may possibly come under the British protectorate, and, as the i For facts and figures see Appendix XII.
Borneo and Labuan 259
present Governor of British North Borneo is also Consul- General of Sarawak and Acting Consul of Labuan, a consolida- tion of British interests may not unreasonably be expected to take place. The progress of North Borneo deserves to be watched narrowly, as here too is a possible germ of British power.1
LABUAN.
Labuan is a very insignificant British colony, and is an island situated about six miles off the north-west coast of Borneo, distant about thirty miles from Brunei, the capital of Borneo proper. The island was ceded by the Sultan of Borneo in 1847, being then uninhabited. The first Governor was Sir James Brooke. The island was believed to possess profitable coal-mines, but this has been discovered not to be the case.2
From the few sketches given above of the British Colonies some idea may be gained of their history, resources, and general character. Not the least interesting part of the story is to understand how we first gained a foot-hold in each place, and how we either conquered or succeeded to the great heri- tage. Collectively this heritage may be termed ' our second colonial empire,' and it provides us with a wonderfully diver- sified record of enterprise and adventure in every conceivable part of the globe. At one time we seem to be following the footsteps of our explorers, pioneers, and backwoodsmen in the snowy wastes of the great North-West of Canada ; at another to the dark, remote sources of a great river like the fabled Orinoco, mysterious Nile, or Niger ; at another over the burning Sahara-like wastes of Australia ; at another to the Alpine solitudes of some Antipodean mountain ; at another to the deep forest solitudes, such as those of British Honduras or Burmah or Borneo : men venturing both life and limb, and on hopes more forlorn at times than those of the ' deadly, immi- nent breach.' No matter where the land is, or what the climate 1 For facts and figures see Appendix XIII. See Appendix XIV.
260 British Colonisation
is, there the British explorer and hunter is found. Surely he has for generations encompassed the ends of the world, seen its limits, and laid bare its most hidden secrets. Then, if we follow the course of those who have gone down to the sea in ships and have occupied their business in great waters, we seem to picture our sailors, now in the tumbling ice-fields of the North in Hudson or in Baffin Bay, seeking the El Dorados of the East by the North- West Passage ; now fishing off the stormy banks of Newfoundland ; now in the Antipodes following the huge whales of the South on either side of the South American continent, and calling forth by their exploits the wonder and admiration of the great Burke ; now coasting along the sultry coasts of Guinea ; now in the South Pacific, anchoring off palm-fringed tropic islands ; now in the Far East, as buccaneers or traders following in the wake of Spaniard, Frenchman, and ' Portingals,' and ending by driving all these competitors from these marts, and making the highways of ocean their own. Ever and always there is the picture of the British tar holding aloft the flag of successful enterprise.
It has been said that the epics of adventure are over, and that the prose work of administration and settlement has begun ; but what pages of national daring and hardihood to brood over, what thrilling episodes to remember, what tales to unfold ! It must be a callous breast that is unmoved by the recital of England's great exploits by sea and land. Yet we often forget what the result of all this is. It is England's second colonial empire. This empire is the climax of our struggles, the sum and crown of our endeavours, the chief boast of patriots, the prop of our wealth, without which England would sink into insignificance. Nevertheless, it is certain that the popular imagination does not apprehend, in any adequate degree, the immmsa majestas of this British colonial empire ; its story is neglected, its glories are hidden, its trophies are as unknown as the waters in which they have been won. The very story of exploration is left unexplored by the callous legatees of the priceless heritage.
Conclusion 261
Still, the trophies must remain and be a national glory, especially the trophies of successful native administration. In the West Indies, on the coasts of West Africa, in Kaffraria, in British Borneo, in Malaya, and in many Pacific islands, British administration has been humane, enlightened, and a signal success. No proud proconsuls of former days have ever won for Rome more enduring laurels than the numerous English governors and administrators have won for England, who, clad in broadcloth and undistinguished by pomp and ceremony, and to look at simple, unassuming English gentle- men, wield the rod of empire. West Africans, Kaffirs, Chinese, Japanese, Malays, all recognise their sway and bend before their words.
Together with the Pax Britannica, England introduces the Lex Britannica and the Lingua Britannica, and the passport of an Englishman takes him further now than ever.
Can England rest from her world-wide task, and pause in her cfareer? It would seem that this is impossible. What, in the first place, would become of those native races in Africa and Asia and elsewhere who, whilst they have received from us the arts of peace, have forgotten the arts of war ? At one time Kaffirs and Malays could dare to resist all comers ; Eng- land has broken down their opposition, and must now protect them. Otherwise they will be the easy prey of the 'first enemy. If England pacifies, she must to a certain extent emasculate.
It is clear to the most casual observer that England's empire, lying athwart the world in both hemispheres, is open at many places to hostile attack. To organise and to defend must be her duty. Come what will, she must hold command of the sea, in conjunction, it may be hoped, with all loyal and patriotic colonists. In the future it must be clear that the most important questions for England will be colonial ques- tions, and a study of these is imperatively necessary for a generation that has stepped into this wonderful heritage of 'a second colonial empire.'
Imperial Federation is the question of the hour. Far from
262 British Colonisation
being exhausted, this attractive theme grows more interesting day by day. We are really only in limine ipso of the whole discussion. What the ultimate form, politically speaking, of a confederated British empire may be matters not at present. Out of a carefully nourished sentiment co-operation may come, and out of the co-operation of England and her colonies a consolidated empire — strong, if may be hoped, for the extension of peace and liberty alone — may arise, which will be the greatest as it is the most widely spread that the world has yet seen.
APPENDICES
References : —
The Colonial Office List, 1891.
The Australian Handbook, 1891 (Gordon and Gotch).
The Seven Colonies of Australasia. By T. A. Coghlan, Government
Statistician of New South Wales. 1892. Her Majesty's Colonies, 1886. A series of original papers issued
under the Royal Commission (Colonial and Indian Exhibition). Proceedings of the Royal Colonial Institute, passim. Report of the Director of the Census of the Cape of Good Hope, 1891. Census of Canada, 1891. Issued by the Department of Agriculture,
Ottawa. Bulletin No. I. and following. Special Edition of the Year- Book of New South Wales. Prepared for
the New South Wales Government. 1892. Statistical Register of Victoria, 1890. Synopsis of the Tariffs and Trade of the British Empire, by Sir
R. W. Rawson. Sequel to the Synopsis. By the same Author,
APPENDICES
FACTS AND FIGURES
I.— THE WEST INDIES.
SECTION A.— JAMAICA.
Area. — 4193 square miles, being 144 miles in length and 49 in breadth.
Divisions. — The island is divided into (i) the county of Surrey, with the parishes of Kingston, St. Andrew, St. Thomas, Portland ; (2) Middlesex, with the parishes of St. Catherine, St. Mary, Clar- endon, St. Anne, Manchester ; (3) Cornwall, with the parishes of St. Elizabeth, Trelawny, St. James, Hanover, Westmoreland.
Physical Features. — Jamaica is very mountainous, especially on the east side, where the Blue Mountains rise to more than 7000 feet. Water is very abundant in the island, and the largest rivers are the Black River, the Rio Grande, the Plantain Garden River, the Martha, and the Cobre. In their general character they are rapid and turbulent, flowing quickly into the sea, and none are navigable. The coast-line is greatly broken up, and the two main harbours are Old Harbour and Kingston Harbour. Jamaica has a great variety of climate, the lowlands being warm but the highlands cool and healthy.
Population. — 1881, 508,804; 1891, 639,491.
Chief Towns. — Kingston, the capital, with Port-Royal, the naval station (48,504) ; Spanish Town (8000) ; Linstead ; Mandeville, in Manchester ; Newcastle, the military headquarters ; Falmouth ; Montego.
Government. — As it now stands, the Governor, nominated in England, is assisted by a Privy Council not to exceed eight, and by a Legislative Council of nine elected members, four ex officio members, and five nominated members in addition to the Governor. The total number of voters is about 25,000. The colony has passed through four systems of government : (i) that of military rule,
265
266 British Colonisation
1655 ; (2) the period of General Assemblies, lasting with modifi- cations for 200 years ; (3) Crown government, beginning after the servile wars, 1866, the Legislature consisting entirely of official and nominated members ; (4) in 1884, the mixed system of official and elected members, such as is now in force.
Trade. — Total imports (1891-92), .£1,759,890. Exports, ,£1,722,096. 'With regard to the distribution of trade, Jamaica imported (1872-86) 53 per cent, from the United Kingdom. It exported 5 5 per cent, to foreign countries and 38 per cent, to the United Kingdom. The trade with the other West Indies, Mauri- tius, the East Indies, and Australasia amounted to 14 per cent, of the imports and 7 per cent, of the exports.' *
Products. — Sugar and rum represent nearly 50 per cent, of the products. Coffee, cocoa, pimento (the all-spice tree), tobacco, ginger, arrowroot, such fruits as bananas, coco-nuts, oranges, are grown largely and with profit.
Revenue.— 1891-92, ^778,615. Expenditure, ,£781,883.
Public Debt. — In 1891 the public debt was ^1,520,087.
Public Works. — The harbours of Jamaica are the greatest of the public works. There are 74^ miles of railway. The main line runs from Kingston westward to Porus, with a branch running north to Ewarton. There are good roads everywhere. Telegraph stations and post-offices are established in every town and nearly every village of importance.
Defence Forces. — An Imperial garrison at Up Park Camp of 950 men, and a station at Port-Royal. There is also a volunteer militia force of 600 officers and men and a constabulary of 693 sub-officers and men. The West India Regiment has already been noticed.
Communication. — Distance from England is 5000 miles, the length of voyage 17 days. Jamaica is 540 miles from Colon and the Isthmus of Panama, a position that would enhance its value in case the Panama Canal were opened.
SECTION B.— BARBADOS.
Area.— 166 square miles, being 21 miles long and 14 broad.
Divisions. — The island is divided into eleven parishes : (i) St. Lucy's, (2) St. Peter's, (3) St. James's, (4) St. Michael's, (5) St.
1 Sequel to Tariffs and Trade of the British Empire, by Sir R. W. Rawson. In 1891, imports from United Kingdom ^862, 345 ; exports to, £562,913.
Appendices 267
Philip's, (6) Christchurch, (7) St. George's, (8) St. John's, (9) St. Thomas's, (10) St. Joseph's, (11) St. Andrew's.
Physical Features. — The island is almost entirely surrounded by coral reefs. There are no very high mountains, the highest being Mount Hillaby, 1104 feet. The prevailing wind is the north-east, which brings moisture and turns the windmills. The soil is porous, and as the ground has been carefully cultivated for generations there is no miasma.
Population.— 1881, 171,860; 1891, 182,322.
Chief Towns.— Bridgetown (the capital), 21,000; Speighstown.
Government.— As it now stands, the government is carried on by (i) a Governor; (2) a Legislative Council, consisting of nine members appointed by the Queen ; (3) a House of Assembly of twenty-four members, elected annually on the basis of a moderate franchise. Barbados, which was governed at one time in connec- tion with the Windward Islands, became a separate colony in 1885.
Trade.— Total imports, 1891, ,£1,067,617. Exports, £814,254. 'With regard to the distribution of its trade, Barbados took (1872- 1886) 35 per cent, of imports from the United Kingdom, 22 per cent, from British possessions, chiefly North America, India, British West Indies, and Guiana, and 43 per cent, from foreign countries. It exported 34 per cent, to the United Kingdom, 27 per cent, to British possessions, chiefly British North America, West Indies, and British Guiana, and 39 per cent, to foreign countries, almost exclusively to the United States.' x
Products. — Sugar is the chief product. There are also a few plantations and some maize fields. In former days indigo, ginger, and aloes were grown.
Revenue. — 1891, ^163,905. Expenditure, ^176,800.
Public Debt.— 1 89 1 , £30, 100.
Defence Forces. — Barbados is the headquarters of the military force in the West Indies. The Imperial garrison consists of 43 officers and 765 non-commissioned officers and men.
Communication. — Barbados is the first port of call from England, being 3635 miles distant. The voyage takes 12 to 13 days.
SECTION C. — TRINIDAD.
Area. — 1754 square miles.
Divisions. — The island is divided into eight counties : (i) St. 1 In 1891, imports from United Kingdom .£432,636 ; exports to, £ 74,605.
268 British Colonisation
George, (2) St. David, (3) Caroni, (4) St. Andrew, (5) Victoria, (6) Nariva, (7) St. Patrick, (8) Mayaro.
Population. — 1891, 200,028.
Chief Towns. — Port of Spain (31,858), San Fernando (6335), Princestown, Arima.
Government. — Trinidad, with which is included Tobago, is a Crown colony. The Governor is assisted by an Executive Council of three members. The Legislative Council numbers eighteen, eight being officials, and the rest nominated by the Crown for a period of five years.
Trade. — Imports (1891), ,£2,096,797. Exports, ,£2,058,761. 1 With regard to the distribution of her trade, Trinidad imported (1872-86) 29 per cent, from the United Kingdom, n per cent.'from British possessions — viz. Canada, West Indies, Guiana, and the East Indies — and 60 per cent, from foreign countries, chiefly Venezuela and France. The colony exported 53 per cent, to the United Kingdom, only 2 per cent, to the West Indies and British Guiana, and 45 per cent, to foreign countries, of which more than half went to the United States and the remainder chiefly to Vene- zuela and France.' 1
Products. — Sugar, the most important ; cocoa, said to be the best in the world ; tobacco, a very old industry in Trinidad ; asphalt from the Pitch Lake at La Brea ; Angostura bitters ; and fruit, much of which is shipped to New York.
Revenue. — 1891, ,£488,219. Expenditure, ,£490,422.
Public Debt. — 1891, ,£520,420.
Public Works. — Railways, in all 54^ miles, connecting Port of Spain with Arima and the east and with Claxton Bay via St. Joseph and the south. There are 63 miles of telegraph.
Communication. — Between Port of Spain and San Fernando, the two principal ports, distance 32 miles by water and 42 by road, there is excellent communication by steamer and railway.
SECTION D.— TOBAGO. Area. — 114 square miles. Population.— 1891, 18,387. Chief Towns. — Scarborough (1370), Plymouth. Government. — Tobago is represented in the Council of Trinidad by one official and one unofficial member.
1 In 1891, imports from United Kingdom ,£777, 658 ; exports to, ^728,998.
Appendices 269
Trade. — Imports (1891), .£23,945. Exports, ^24,241. 'Tobago imported (1872-86) 53 per cent, from the United Kingdom and 46 per cent, from Barbados. It exported 69 per cent, to the United Kingdom, 16 per cent, to Barbados, and 15 per cent, to the United States and French West Indies.' l
Products. — Sugar is the main article of export. Cocoa, arrow- root, coffee, sisal hemp, tobacco.
Revenue. — 1890, £8730. Expenditure, £8783.
Communication. — There is no telegraph cable. Plymouth, the port, is reached from Bridgetown, Barbados.
SECTION E.— BRITISH GUIANA.
Area. — About 109,000 square miles, but when the boundary dispute with Venezuela is settled it will probably extend over 1 20,000 square miles.
Divisions. — The colony is divided into the counties of (i) Deme- rara, (2) Essequibo, (3) Berbice.
Physical Features. — There are two great parallel mountain sys- tems crossing the colony fiom west to east, the greater being that of the Pacaraima and Merume Mountains, and the lesser the Canucu, Camucumu, and Coratamung Mountains. The chief rivers are the Essequibo, the Demerara, the Berbice, the Maza- runi, Cuyuni, and Corentyn. The upper course of the Demerara is unknown. There is much to explore in British Guiana. For twenty miles inland there is a succession of sandhills, and the coasts are covered with mangrove and courida bushes.
Population. — 1891, 278,328, of whom one-third were Indian immigrants.
Chief Towns. — Georgetown (47,816), New Amsterdam (8907).
Government.— A Governor and a Court of Policy of fifteen members, seven official and eight elected by the colonists. This Court of Policy is an unique institution, being inherited from the Dutch. Its functions correspond to those of the Legislative Councils in the other West Indian colonies. But it has no power of taxation. This power rests with the Combined Court, which is the Court of Policy plus six financial representatives elected by the people. The Roman-Dutch law still survives in the colony. Both at the Cape and Ceylon the Dutch law, Courts of Policy, 1 The 1891 returns not available.
270 British Colonisation
fiscals, etc., were found, but they disappeared, to a great extent, with British occupation.
Trade.— Imports (1891), £1,707,770. Exports, .£2,532,554. 1 With regard to the distribution of trade, British Guiana imported (1872-86) 49 per cent, from the United Kingdom, 23 per cent, from British possessions — of which more than half was from the East Indies, the rest from Canada and the West Indies — and 28 per cent, from foreign countries, chiefly the United States. It exported 72 per cent, to the United Kingdom, 5 per cent, to the West Indies and Canada, and 23 per cent, chiefly to the United States and foreign West Indies, with a small quantity to Portugal and Holland.3 1
Products. — Sugar, which forms 82 per cent, of the whole exports. Out of 94,000 acres in cultivation, 79,000 are given to sugar. Rum, molasses, coffee, cocoa-nut, timber, and gold are also produced.
Revenue.— 1890 to March 1891,^522,767. Expenditure, ,£508,108.
Public Debt.— 1891, £735,429.
Public Works. — A line of railway, 21 miles in length, from Georgetown to Mahaica. There are 260 miles of telegraphs.
Communication. — Georgetown is 4coo miles distant from South- ampton. The voyage takes 1 3 to 15 days.
SECTION F.— BRITISH HONDURAS.
Area.— 7562 square miles.
Divisions. — The colony is divided into five districts : (i) Belize, (2) the northern, combining Corosal and Orange Walk, (3) the Cayo, (4) Stann Creek, (5) Toledo.
Physical Features. — Along the coast are large swamp- lands ; beyond are the terraces known as Pine Ridge, Cohune Ridge — so called from the Cohune palm — and Broken Ridge. The hills rise from 500 to 4000 feet on the west. The rivers are the Belize, Hondo, and New River.
Population. — 1891, 31,471.
Chief Towns.— Belize (5767), Orange Walk, Stann Creek, Punta Gorda.
Government. — British Honduras is a Crown colony administered
by a Governor and a Legislative Council consisting of five official
and not less than four unofficial members. It may be noted that
1 In 1891, imports from United Kingdom ^927, 397 ; exports to, ,£1,220,518.
Appendices 27 1
the first settlers from 1638 to 1786 managed their own affairs, and their customs were ratified and known as ' Burnaby's Laws ' (1756), Admiral Burnaby having been sent out to the colony, together with the celebrated Captain Cook of Pacific fame, to examine and report upon the state of the country.
Trade.— Imports, 1891, £272,355. Exports, .£280,521. 'Be- tween 1872-86 the colony imported 43 per cent, from the United Kingdom and 57 per cent, from foreign countries, chiefly United States, Central America, and Mexico. It exported 58 per cent, to the United Kingdom and 42 per cent, to foreign countries.' 1
Products. — Mahogany, logwood, sugar, cedar, rosewood, fruit.
Revenue.— 1891, ,£52,528. Expenditure, ^45,270.
Ptiblic Debt. — 1891, £17,000.
Communication. — The principal communication between Europe and British Honduras is vid New Orleans, from which place it is 600 miles distant. There is no submarine cable connecting the colony with the outside world, nor are there any railways.
SECTION G.— THE LEEWARD ISLANDS.
Area. — 704 square miles. Divisions. — Five presidencies.
I. Dominica.
Area. — 291 square miles.
Physical Features. — Very mountainous. It is the loftiest of the Lesser Antilles. From the sea its aspect is very striking : bold headlands in the foreground, alternating with deep ravines or open valleys ; at the back, irregular masses of dark-wooded mountains reaching up to the clouds. The highest peak is Morne Diabloten (5314 feet). The coast-line is deeply indented. The rainfall of the island is high, averaging 75 inches annually.
Population.— 1881, 28,211 ; 1891, 26,841.
Chief Towns. — Roseau, the capital, on the south-west ; St. Joseph.
Government. — The local Government is administered by a Presi- dent and a Legislative Assembly of fourteen members, seven nomi- nated and seven elected. The President has a casting vote. This
1 In 1891, imports from United Kingdom £119,257; exports to, £154,619.
272 British Colonisation
local Government is subordinate to the Federal or General Legis- lature.
Trade.— Imports (1891), ,£60,780. Exports, ,£38,910. 'Domi- nica imported (1872-86) about equal quantities from the United Kingdom and foreign countries, chiefly the United States and French West Indies, and 23 per cent, from the West Indies, chiefly Barbados. It exported 25 per cent, to the United Kingdom and 72 per cent, to the United States. In 1891 Dominica imported ,£28,368 from United Kingdom, and exported to it £2 1,094.
Products. — Cocoa, sugar, coffee, maize, cotton, tobacco, molasses, rum, lime-juice, fruit, woods.
Revenue. — 1891, .£21,533. Expenditure, £24,937.
Public Debt. — 1891, £40,900.
Communication. — Roseau has an open roadstead, and is 4000 miles from London. It is visited by the ' Royal Mail ' and other steamers. A good deal of the traffic of the island is carried on by means of boats. Until lately the roads of the interior have been in a bad state, but ^30,000 has been expended on bridges and repairs.
II. Montserrat.
Area. — 47 square miles.
Physical Features. — The surface is broken up into rocky hills and ridges culminating in several high peaks not exceeding 3000 feet. It is of volcanic origin. The higher slopes are covered with thick forests.
Population.-— i^i, 10,087; '891, 11,762.
Chief Town. — Plymouth, 1400.
Government. — A President and Council of six, all nominated, and half sitting ex officio.
Trade. — Imports (1891), ,£25,846. Exports, .£24,339. ' In 1872-1886 Montserrat imported a third from the United Kingdom, 55 per cent, from Canada and other West Indian islands, chiefly Antigua, St. Kitts, and Barbados, and 12 per cent, from foreign countries, chiefly the United States. It exported 22 per cent, to the United Kingdom, 8 per cent, to British possessions, and 70 per cent, to foreign countries, chiefly the United States.' 1
Products. — Sugar, limes, lime-juice, arrowroot, banana, coffee, cacao.
Revenue. — 1891, £6526. Expenditure, £7303.
Public Debt. — 1891, ^8300.
1 In 1891, imports from United Kingdom £9396 ; exports to, £10,779.
Appendices 273
III. Antigua.
Area. — 108 square miles.
Divisions. — The Presidency of Antigua consists of (i) Antigua ; (2) Barbuda, an island of 62 square miles, and producing salt and phosphate of lime ; (3) Redonda, a bold rocky islet, about a mile long, rising 1000 feet, and noted for its phosphate of alumina.
Physical Features. — Compared with Dominica, the surface is comparatively flat, the hills not reaching 2000 feet. The highlands are dry and uncultivated, the lowlands are covered with cane-fields. The Antigua soils are nowhere very deep, but are very fertile. The annual rainfall is about 45 inches, about one-half of that of Dominica.
Population.— 1881, 34,964 ; 1891, 36,699.
Chief Towns— St. John (10,000), the capital ; Falmouth, on the south coast ; Parham, on the north-east.
Government. — Antigua is the seat of the Federal Government, which consists of a Central Council of twenty members, ten of whom are elected by the unofficial members of the local legislative bodies, four are ex officio members, and six others are nominated by the Crown. With regard to the local Legislature, there is a Legislative Council of twenty-four members, of whom twelve are elected and twelve nominees of the Crown.
Trade. — Imports (189 1), ,£167,110. Exports, ,£157,463. 'Antigua imported equal quantities from the United Kingdom and foreign countries, chiefly the United States, with 14 per cent, from British North America and the West Indies. It exported 17 per cent, to the United Kingdom, 16 per cent, to Canada and the West Indies, and 67 per cent, to foreign countries, chiefly the United States.' J
Products. — The chief product is sugar — about 102 estates turn out annually 12,000 hogsheads — rum, molasses, pine-apples, and fruits and vegetables. About one-third of the island is under cultivation.
Revenue.— 1891, ^43)5°5- Expenditure >
Public Debt.—\fy\, £35,371.
IV. The Presidency of St Kitts, Nevis, Anguilla. St. Kitts.
Area. — 68 square miles, the total length being about 23 miles. Physical Features. — The island is mountainous, Mount Misery, 1 In 1891 imports from United Kingdom ,£75,396; exports to, £2572.
3
274 British Colonisation
3711 feet high, occupying the centre. The Vale of Basseterre is said to be extremely rich.
Population.— 1891, 47,662.
Chief Town. — Basseterre, 9097.
Nevis.
Area. — 50 square miles.
Physical Features. — The island consists of a single mountain, of a circular form, rising 3200 feet above the sea. A narrow strait of two miles divides it from St. Kitts.
Population.— 1891, 13,087.
Chief Town. — Charlestown.
Anguilla.
Area. — 35 square miles. It is distant 60 miles north-west from St. Kitts. The population is 3699.
Government. — The Presidency of St. Kitts-Nevis, with Anguilla, is governed by a President, an Executive Council, and a legislative body called the Legislative Council, consisting of ten official and ten nominated unofficial members.
Trade.— Imports (1891), ,£161,105. Exports, ^187,455. 'The colony imported (1872-86) 42 per cent, from the United Kingdom, 12 per cent, from Canada, the British West Indies, and British Guiana, and 46 per. cent, from foreign countries, chiefly the United States. It exported 27 per cent, to the United Kingdom, 5 per cent, to Canada and the West Indies, and 68 per cent, to foreign countries, chiefly the United States, with a small quantity to the French West Indies and Italy.' l
Products. — Sugar, rum, molasses are the chief products. In St. Kitts the China and Seville orange is cultivated ; also the lime and the shaddock, a fruit said to have been introduced from Guinea by Captain Shaddock.
Revenue.— 1891, £38,209. Expenditure, ,£45,220.
Public Debt.— 1891, ;£ 30,400.
V. The Virgin Islands.
Area. — 58 square miles. •
Physical Features. — The Virgin Islands are a number of islands to the north-west of St. Kitts, some of them, thirty-two in number, 1 In 1891, imports from United Kingdom £66,653 ; exports to, £i7-986-
Appendices 275
belonging to the British and some to Denmark. Occasionally they rise to a considerable height. Tortola, Virgin Gorda, Ane- gada, Jost van Dyke, Salt Island, and St. Peters are best known. Between Virgin Gorda and Tortola is a deep channel known as ' Drake's Channel,' after Sir Francis Drake, who passed through in 1595.
Population. — 1891, 4639.
Chief Town. — Roadtown (400), in Tortola.
Government.— The Virgin Islands are governed by an Adminis- trator, an Executive Council, and a Legislative Council consisting of the Colonial Secretary, Colonial Treasurer, and not more than three unofficial members nominated by the Administrator.
Trade. — Imports (1891), ^4446. Exports, ^4633. 'The Virgin Islands had the smallest trade amongst the whole of the British possessions. It was carried on (1872-86) exclusively with the United States. ' 1
Revenue. — 1891, ,£1512. Expendititre, £2219.
SECTION H.— THE WINDWARD ISLANDS. I. Grenada and the Grenadines.
Area. — 133 square miles.
Divisions. — The island is divided into the following parishes : (i) St. George, (2) St. David, (3) St. Andrew, (4) St. Patrick, (5) St. Mark, (6) St. John.
Physical Features. — The island is traversed by a mountain range, the highest point of which is St. Catherine, 2500 feet. There are several sulphurous springs. Lake Antoine is a remark- able feature, and is the source of many streams.
Population. — 1891, 53,209, including the Grenadines, of whom 2 per cent, only are Europeans.
Chief Towns.— St. George, Charlotte Town, St. Patrick, Gren- ville, Hillsborough, in Carriacou.
Government. — The island was once governed by a Legislative Council and Legislative Assembly, but it is now governed by an Administrator and a Council consisting of six official members and seven official members nominated by the Crown. At the same time Grenada is, together with St. Lucia and St. Vincent, under a Governor-in-Chief.
1 Jn 1891, imports from United Kingdom £317; exports not given.
276 British Colonisation
Trade.— Imports (1891), £176,929. Exports, £236,643. 'With regard to the distribution of trade, Grenada imported (1872-86) 13 per cent, from foreign countries, chiefly the United States, 46 per cent, from the United Kingdom, and 41 per cent, from British possessions, chiefly Barbados and Trinidad. It exported 89 per cent, to the United Kingdom.' In 1891, imports from United Kingdom £97,895 ; exports to, £218,600.
Products. — Cocoa is the chief product. Sugar, coffee, fruit, and timber are also exported. Nutmeg cultivation is also being de- veloped. Turtles and whales are found in the Grenadines.
Revenue. — 1891, £54,018. Expenditure, £56,450.
Public Debt. — 1891, £44,475.
II. St. Lucia.
Area. — 243 square miles.
Physical Features. — St. Lucia is a mountainous island of volcanic origin, the ranges running north and south, the highest peak being Piton des Canaries, 3000 feet high. Deep forests clothe the moun- tain sides, and the soil is very rich at a high elevation.
Population. — 1891, 41,713, of whom 2000 are imported coolies.
Chief Towns.— Castries (6686), Souffriere (2000).
Government. — St. Lucia is a Crown colony. It is governed by an Administrator, who is subordinate to the Governor-in-Chief of the Windward Islands, assisted by a Legislative Council of ten, five being official and five unofficial.
Trade.— Imports (1891), £222,178. Exports, £181,503. 'With regard to the distribution of trade, St. Lucia drew (1872-86) about an equal proportion of its imports from the United Kingdom and foreign countries, chiefly the United States and France, and 13 per cent, from the British West Indies, chiefly Barbados. It exported 53 per cent, to the United Kingdom and 45 per cent, to foreign countries, chiefly the United States, France, and the French West Indies.'1
Products. — Sugar, coffee, cocoa and maize, logwood. St. Lucia is noted for its central sugar factories or usines.
Revenue. — 1891, £49,326. Expenditure^ £53,906.
Public Debt. — 1891, £140,770.
Communication. — There are three principal roads in the island :
1 In 1891, imports from United Kingdom £138,019; exports to, £37,177.
Appendices 277
one from Castries to Vieux Fort on the extreme south, a second from Castries to the eastern parts of the island, and a third from Castries to Gros Islet and the extreme north. Many steamers, both French and British, call at Port Castries.
III. St. Vincent.
Area. — 140 square miles. Bequia, one of the Grenadines, has an area of 6 square miles. This islet, as well as others, is included under St. Vincent.
Physical Features. — St. Vincent is an oval-shaped island of vol- canic origin, with high and thickly wooded mountains. The chief harbour is Kingstown Bay, on the south-west.
Population. — 1891, 41,054.
Chief Towns. — Kingstown (5593), Georgetown on the east.
Government. — The island is governed by an Administrator and a Legislative Council of eight, and, like the rest of the Windward Islands, is under a Governor-in-Chief.
T^rade. — Imports (1891), .£97,839. Exports, £98,672. 'With regard to the distribution of its trade, St. Vincent imported (1872-86) nine-tenths of its imports in nearly equal proportions from the United Kingdom and British West Indies, probably Bar- bados, with 12 per cent, from foreign countries, chiefly the United States. It exported 39 per cent, to the United Kingdom and 54 per cent, to foreign countries, chiefly the United States.' x
Products. — Sugar, molasses, rum, cocoa, coffee, cotton, and arrowroot.
Revenue.— 1891, £27,649. Expenditure, £2 8, 51 6. Debt,£ 14, 370.
SECTION I.— THE BAHAMAS.
Area. — 4500 square miles. The principal islands are New Providence, Abaco, Harbour Island, Eleuthera, Inagua, Ragged Island, Rum Cay, Exuina, Long Island, Long Cay, Great Bahama, Cat Island, Watling's Island (San Salvador), Andros Island.
Physical Features. — Great Bahama Bank and Little Bahama Bank are two coral banks on which the islands and rocks are situated, Providence Channels dividing the two. The banks are said to be formed of the deposits carried down by the Mississippi
1 In 1891, imports from United Kingdom ,£44,447 ; exports to, £39,848.
278 British Colonisation
and other rivers into the Gulf of Mexico, and drifted eastward by the Gulf Stream. No island exceeds 14 miles in breadth.
Population. — 1891, 47,565.
Chief Towns. — Nassau, on New Providence (12,000) ; Harbour Island, a health resort.
Government. — The Bahamas constitute a single colony adminis- tered by a Governor, an Executive Council of nine members, a Legislative Council of nine members, and a Representative Assembly of twenty-nine members.
Trade. — Imports (1891), ,£190,670. Exports, ,£128,010. Sir R. W. Rawson observes that both import and export trade were carried on chiefly with foreign countries, mainly with the United States, viz. 77 and 87 per cent, respectively. The trade with British possessions did not amount to 2 per cent.
Products. — Fruit trade with the United States is the chief in- dustry. Sponge-fishing employs many seamen, the sponges being brought to the surface by diving or by hooked poles. The fibre industry is a rising one. Pink pearls, salt, guano, tortoise-shell, and cameos are minor products.
Revenue.— 1891, ,£52,813. Expenditure, ,£55,804.
Public Debt.— 1891, ,£81,126.
Communication. — Regular mail communication between the Bahamas and New York, monthly in summer and fortnightly in winter. Nassau, the capital, is 310 miles from Havana, 660 from Kingston Harbour, Jamaica.
SECTION K. — THE BERMUDAS.
Area. — 41 square miles.
Parishes. — Sandys, Southampton, Warwick, Paget, Pembroke, Devonshire, Smithe, Hamilton, St. George's.
Physical Features. — The largest island, Main Island, contains about 9000 acres, the highest point being 240 feet. The group of islands form an oval ring about 22 miles in length and 10 miles in width. The marked feature is the continuous reefs of coral. The soil is poor in quality.
Population. — 1891, 15,013, of whom 5690 are white.
Chief Towns.— Hamilton, St. George. Ireland Island is the naval depot and dockyard. Here is a permanent garrison of Imperial troops numbering 1400, and the mean number of the Admiralty establishment is 1200.
Appendices 279
Government. — The Bermudas constitute a single colony ad- ministered by a Governor, assisted by a Legislative Council of nine, three of whom are official and six unofficial, and a House of Assembly of thirty-six members, four from each of the nine parishes.
Trade. — Imports from the United Kingdom (1891), ,£325,976. Exports, £ 1 29,803. * Bermuda drew 6 1 per cent, of its imports (1872- 1886) from foreign countries, chiefly from the United States, to which country it sent the greater part of its exports. The remainder of its imports were from the United Kingdom and British West Indies. The amount of its exports to the United Kingdom was insignificant.' l
Products. — Vegetables and fruit, which are sent to New York. The whole population is dependent upon food supplies from abroad.
Revenue.— 1*91, £33,5V- Expenditure, .£32,029.
Public Debt. —1891, .£8600.
Communication. — Hamilton is 3000 miles from England, and the passage takes from 14 to 15 days.
Chronology.
1492. Columbus discovered San Salvador in the Bahamas, also
Cuba, Tortuga, Hispaniola (Hayti).
1493. On a second voyage Columbus discovered the Leeward
Islands, Porto Rico, Jamaica. 1498. On a third voyage Columbus discovered Trinidad, Tobago,
Grenada, and the mainland of America on the Gulf of Paria. 1516. Cabot and Pert touch at Hispaniola. First appearance of
English vessels in West Indies. 1520. First sugar plantation in St. Domingo. 1528. The French in the West Indies.
1562. Sir John Hawkins landed a slave cargo in Hispaniola. 1580. The Dutch in Guiana. 1 596. Sir W. Ralegh at Trinidad. 1609. Gates and Somers at the Bermudas.
1612. First emigrants at the Bermudas.
1613. The French at Cayenne. Harcourt's grant of Guiana.
1617. Sir W. Ralegh's last voyage up the Orinoco. 1623. Settlement at St. Kitts by Warner.
1 In 1891, imports from United Kingdom .£85,775; exports to, ,£1794.
280 British Colonisation
1624-5. Settlement of Barbados.
1626. The French Company of the Islands of America.
1627. The. Carlisle grant of the Caribbean Islands. The Guiana Company.
1628. The Montgomery grant.
1630. Colonisation of Mosquito Coast by royal patent.
1638. Settlement of Belize, British Honduras, by Willis.
1640. Sugar first manufactured at Barbados.
1647. Lord Willoughby takes the Carlisle patent.
1651. The first Act of Navigation.
1655. Occupation of Jamaica by Penn and Venables.
1660. Establishment of representative government in Jamaica.
1663. Tax of 4| per cent, levied on Barbadians.
1670. Treaty of Madrid by which British occupation of Jamaica
was confirmed. 1674. Christopher Codrington at Antigua.
Treaty of Westminster.
1675-6. Dampier at Campechd Bay as a buccaneer. 1689. Commission to Christopher Codrington. 1692. The great earthquake at Jamaica. 1694. Jamaica attacked by the French.
1697. Tieaty of Ryswick.
1698. The Scotch Colony at Darien. 1702. Admiral Benbow's death.
1713. Treaty of Utrecht. The Assiento.
1729. Bishop Berkeley sailed for America.
1733-38. Maroon wars in Jamaica.
1742. Occupation of the Mosquito Shore.
1748. Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle.
1760. Slave insurrection in Jamaica.
1763. Peace of Paris.
1765. Captain Cook at British Honduras.
1778. War between England and France.
1782. Rodney's victory off Dominica.
1783. Peace of Versailles.
1788. The Otaheite cane introduced into Martinique.
1789. The French Revolution. 1795. Last Maroon war in Jamaica.
1796-7. Abercromby and Sir J. Moore in the West Indies. 1798. British Honduras conquered by the Bay men.
Appendices 281
1802. Peace of Amiens.
1807. Abolition of the slave trade.
1814. Treaty of Paris.
1830-50. The era of England's financial reforms.
1834. Abolition of slavery.
1838. Abolition of 4^ per cent, tax, Barbados.
1841. Mr. Baring's Budget and the sugar duties.
1845. Mr. Gladstone's speech on equalisation of duties.
1850. Fall of the old mercantile system.
1865. The great rebellion in Jamaica.
1866. Formation of new Government in Jamaica. 1884. The present Constitution of Jamaica. 1890-1. The Jamaica Exhibition.
II.— NEWFOUNDLAND, WITH LABRADOR.
Area. — 40,200 square miles, having an average breadth of about 130 miles, and a length from north to south of 350 miles.
Divisions. — The island is divided into ten electoral districts : — In the centre, (i) District of St. John's, (2) Ferryland ; in the north, (3) Conception Bay, (4) Trinity Bay, (5) Bonavista Bay, (6) Twillingate and Fogo ; in the south, (7) Placentia, (8) Burin, (9) Fortune Bay, (10) Burgeo and Lapoile.
Physical Features. — The 'great feature of Newfoundland geo- graphy is its broken coast-line, with an infinite number of bays and promontories. The interior is not much developed. It is covered with deep forests, varied here and there by open spaces called Barrens. There are a few isolated mountains, called Tolts, rising generally 2000 feet. The chief rivers are the H umber and the Exploits. There are innumerable lakes or ponds in the island. The climate is rough but bracing. The fogs do not extend far inland.
Population. — In 1881, 179,509 ; in 1891, 197,934.
Chief Towns. — St. John's, 31,142, the capital; Harbour Grace, 7054 ; Fogo and Twillingate, 4777 ; Bonavista, 3463 ; Carbonear, 3756. There are a large number of fishing towns and villages along the coast.
Government. — Responsible government, established in 1855, consisting of a Governor aided by an Executive Council of seven
282 British Colonisation
members, a Legislative Council of fifteen members, and a House of Assembly of thirty-six members.
Trade.— The imports (1891) were ,£1,431,137. Exports (1891), ,£1,549,408. According to Sir R. W. Rawson, the import trade of Newfoundland (1872-86) was nearly divided between the United Kingdom, Canada, and the United States. The re- mainder was almost confined to the British West Indies, Spain, and Portugal. The exports were differently distributed : viz. 36 per cent, to the United States, 10 per cent, to Canada and British West Indies, and 54 per cent, to foreign countries, chiefly Portugal and Brazil. In 1891 the value of imports from United Kingdom was ,£487,855 ; of exports to the United Kingdom, ,£409,913.
Products. — The products of the island come almost entirely from the sea, and consist of cod-fish, cod and seal oil, sealskins, tinned lobsters, herring, trout, and salmon. There is also mineral wealth, chiefly copper.
Revenue.— 1891, ,£379,1 59- Expenditure, 1891, ,£341,909.
Public Debt.— 1891, ,£1,088,201.
Public Works. — A railway from St. John's to Harbour Grace, 84 miles ; also a branch line to Placentia. There are about 1000 miles of telegraph open. At Heart's Content is the shore end of the first submarine cable between the Old and New World. There are also 750 miles of postal and 1700 miles of district roads. The dry dock at St. John's is a most important work, capable of hold- ing the largest vessel afloat.
Communication. — The harbour of St. John's is less than 1650 miles from the coast of Ireland. A railway from St. John's across the island to St. George's Bay is contemplated. If this were com- pleted and communication opened up with Shippegan on the Ameri- can continent, the length of the voyage between Ireland and America could be reduced to four days. At present there is a fortnightly service between St. John's and Liverpool, excepting during January, February, March. In the summer there is a fortnightly service between St. John's and Labrador.
Chief Dates.
1497. Discovery of Labrador and Newfoundland by Cabot. 1500. Voyage of Cortereal to Newfoundland. 1527. Expedition of Captain Rut to St. John's. 1536. Expedition of Hore.
Appendices 283
1 583. Proclamation of Sir H. Gilbert at St. John's.
1615. Commission and voyage of Captain Whitbourne.
1620. French settlement at Placentia.
1623. Settlement of Lord Baltimore at Ferryland.
1634. Irish colonists sent over.
1660. Declaration of Star Chamber.
1697. Treaty of Ryswick.
1702. French conquests.
1713. Treaty of Utrecht. Acknowledgment of British sovereignty.
1770. First Moravian Mission in Labrador.
1783. Treaty of Versailles.
1814. Treaty of Paris.
1838. Declaration of Lord Palmerston on fisheries rights.
1853. Marine survey of the Atlantic bed.
1855. Responsible government.
1866. First Atlantic cable landed at Heart's Content.
1876. Labrador included in the colony.
1891. Census.
1892. Great fire at St. John's.
With regard to LABRADOR, it should be noted that it is a de- pendency of Newfoundland, although it belonged for some years — 1773-1809 — to Quebec. Tt is chiefly a summer resort of fishermen. It has an area of about 120,000 square miles, and a coast-line of 600 miles. The country is very bleak, and has only about 5000 permanent inhabitants, of whom 1700 are Eskimo. The only official who visits the county is a J.P. and collector of customs, who comes there annually in a revenue cutter. The chief places of resort are Battle Harbour on the Strait of Belle Isle, and the Moravian Mission stations at Hopedale, Nain, Okkak, Hebron.
III.— THE DOMINION OF CANADA.
Aiea. — 3,470,000 square miles.
Provinces. — (i) Quebec, (2) Ontario, (3) Nova Scotia, (4) New Brunswick, (5) Prince Edward Island, (6) Manitoba, (7) British Columbia. To these must be added the North-East Territories, lying around Hudson's Bay and due north of Quebec and Ontario, and the North-West Territories, with the districts of
284 British Colonisation
Assiniboia, Saskatchewan, Alberta, and Athabasca. In due course of time these districts may become provinces.
Physical Features.
Mountains.— In the province of Quebec : (i) the Laurentian, (2) the Alleghany systems. (3) The Rocky Mountains are the most important, dividing the province of British Columbia from Alberta and Athabasca. In British Columbia, a very mountainous province, there are : (4) the Selkirks, subsidiary to the Rockies ; (5) the Cascades, running parallel with the Pacific coast.
Rivers. — There are four chief river systems : (i) the St. Lawrence, with its tributaries the Ottawa and Saguenay, flowing into the North Atlantic ; (2) the East Main, Albany, Red River, Assiniboine, Saskatchewan, Nelson, and Churchill Rivers, flowing into Hudson's Bay ; (3) the Coppermine and Mackenzie, flowing north into the Polar Sea ; (4) the Fraser River, with its tributaries in British Columbia, flowing into the Pacific Ocean.
Lakes.— There are three chief lake systems: (i) Ontario, Erie, Huron, Superior, draining into the Atlantic ; (2) Winnipeg, Winnipegosis, and Manitoba into Hudson's Bay ; (3) Reindeer, Athabasca, Great Slave, and Great Bear into the Polar Sea.
Prairies. — The prairie levels begin from the longitude of the Red River, and extend westwards to the Rocky Mountains, covering immense areas in the centre of the Dominion. These prairie levels or plateaux are three in number : the first, with an average elevation of 800 feet, extending 52 miles in width ; the second, with an average elevation of 1600 feet, extending 250 miles ; the third, with an average elevation of 2000 feet, extending 465 miles up to the * Rockies.'
Forests. — The Dominion of Canada is noted for its magnificent forests, more than half the area of British Columbia being covered with them. The king of the pines is the Douglas fir, Canada is called the land of the maple.
Population. — In 1881, 4,324,810; in 1891, 4,829,411 — a com- paratively small increase. The urban population of Canada is, according to the last census, 1,394,259, an increase of 384,146 upon the census of 1881, and equal to an increase of 38.1 per cent. In 1891 there were 47 cities with a population of over 5000, as against 35 in 1881, an increase of 12. In 1891 there were 45
Appendices 285
towns with a population from 3000 to 5000, as against 37 in 1881, an increase of 7. In 1891 there were 91 villages with a population from 1500 to 3000, as against 55 in 1 88 1, an increase of 36. 1
Chief Towns. — Montreal, 1891, 216,650, increasing from 155,237 in 1 88 1, or 39.5 per cent. Toronto, 181,220, increasing from 96,196 in 1 88 1, or 88.4 per cent. Quebec, 63,090, increasing from 62,446, or i.o per cent. Hamilton, 48,980, increasing from 35,960 in 1881, or 36 per cent. Ottawa, 44,154, increasing from 31,307 in 1881, or 41.0 per cent. St. Jean, 39,179, decreasing from 41,353 in 1881, or 5.2 per cent. Halifax, 38,556, increasing from 36,100 in 1881, or 6.8 per cent. London, 31,977, increasing from 26,266 in 1881, or 21.7 per cent. Winnipeg, 25,642, increasing from 7985 in 1881, or 22 1. 1 per cent. Kingston, 19,264, increasing from 14,091, or 36.7 per cent. Victoria, British Columbia, 16,841, increasing from 5925, or 184 per cent. Vancouver, 13,685, a new city altogether. St. Henri, 13,415, increasing from 6415 in 1881, or 109 per cent. Brantford, 12,753, increasing from 9616 in 1881, or 32.6 per cent. Charlottetown, 11,374, decreasing from 11,485 in 1881, or 0.9 per cent. Hull, 11,265, increasing from 6890 in 1881, or 63 per cent. Guelph, 10,539, increasing from 9890 in 1881, or 6.5 per cent. St. Thomas, 10,370, increasing from 8367 in 1881, or 23.9 per cent. Windsor, 10,322, increasing from 6561 in 1 88 1, or 57.9 per cent. Sherbrooke, 10,110, increasing from 7227 in 1881, or 39.9 per cent. The population of New Westminster has sprung from 1500 in 1881 to 6641 in 1891, an increase of 342.9 per cent.
These figures prove that the urban population in Canada is in- creasing more quickly than the rural, a fact noticeable almost everywhere. It may be noted, also, that whilst Charlottetown in Prince Edward Island, St. Jean, and Quebec are almost stationary, some of the cities and towns in Ontario, the prairie provinces, and British Columbia show the greatest increase. Westward the course of migration takes its way. Winnipeg and New West- minster are two of the most striking instances of urban develop- ment. In the eastern maritime provinces, the population increased barely 1.2 per cent, upon that of 1881. Families are becoming smaller, and there is an aversion to agriculture. '•*
With regard to religion, the Roman Catholics composed 4 1.46 per cent, of the whole population in 1891, the Methodists 17.65 per
1 Bulletin No. i . Census of Canada, Department of Agriculture, Ottawa.
2 Ibid. No. 3.
286 British Colonisation
cent., the Presbyterians 15.73 per cent., the Church of England 13.41 per cent, the Baptists 6.33 per cent. Two of the denomina- tions have increased their strength in every province of the Dominion — the Roman Catholics and the Methodists. The Church of England has decreased in New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island. The Presbyterians have decreased in New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward Island, but increased remarkably in Manitoba. The Church of England has increased even more remarkably in British Columbia.
Out of the 854,842 inhabited houses in the Dominion, 1891, 697,356 were built of wood, 131,522 of brick, and only 25,964 of stone.
Government. — The provinces and districts of Canada have been confederated under the British Crown ; and, whilst each province has its own Legislature, undertaking all local and provincial affairs, it is nevertheless under the control, in certain matters, of the Central or Federal Government sitting at Ottawa.
In the Provincial Legislatures there are, in the case of Quebec, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island, two houses — (a) the Legislative Council, (b] the Legislative Assembly. In the case of Ontario, Manitoba, British Columbia there is the Legislative Assembly only. The Provincial Legislature is presided over by a Lieutenant-Governor. The supreme legislative power is invested in a Parliament consisting of — (a) the Queen ; (&) a Senate of 80 members nominated for life by the Governor-General ; (c) a House of Commons consisting of 215 members, of whom 92 are elected from Ontario, 65 from Quebec, 21 from Nova Scotia, i6from New Brunswick, 5 from Manitoba, 6 from British Columbia, 6 from Prince Edward Island, 4 from the Territories. The repre- sentative of the Queen is the Governor-General, appointed for five years, who chooses and summons a Privy Council.
Trade. — The imports for the year ending June 3oth, 1891, were valued at ^24,650,884, of which ^8,639,903 came from the United Kingdom. The exports for the same year amounted to ^20,222,732, of which ^10,126,204 was sent to the United Kingdom.
Products.— The chief products of Canada, arranged in the order of their value, are : (i) those of the farm and dairy, (2) the forests, (3) the sea and lake fisheries, (4) the mines, (5) manufactures. Coal is found principally in Nova Scotia, Alberta, and British Columbia. British Columbia is famed also for its gold-mines ; the
Appendices 287
timber trade belongs more especially to the province of Quebec ; dairy farming and agriculture generally are at their best in the province of Ontario. At Sudbury, in Ontario, the deposits of nickel are the richest in the world, and in this province petroleum is produced in large quantities. Sea-fishing and the tinning (ex- port) trade belong more especially to British Columbia and Nova Scotia. The total number of industrial establishments was 49,923 in 1 88 1, and 75,765 in 1891, showing an increase of nearly 52 per cent. The development of manufactures from 1881 to 1891 has added nearly ninety million dollars a year to the wealth of the country, as against thirty-three million dollars a year for the previous decade, 1871-81.
Revenue. — 1891, ^7,927,256. Expenditure, ,£7,467,856.
Public Debt. — July i, 1891, ,£59,568,335.
Pitblic Works. — The greatest public work of Canada is the Canadian Pacific Railway, which connects Montreal and Van- couver, a distance of 2906 miles. The whole system has a length of 4973 miles. The time occupied in constructing the C.P.R. was four years six months, at the rate of more than two miles a day. The mileage of all the Canadian railways is over 13,000. The most famous canals are: (i) the Lachine, 9 miles long; (2) the Welland, connecting Lake Erie with Lake Ontario, 26| miles long ; (3) the Rideau Canal, by which the inland waters of Lake Ontario were connected with those of the St. Lawrence. By means of canals the extremity of Lake Superior can be reached, 1400 miles above Montreal. A canal is being constructed past the Sault Ste. Marie on the Canadian side. The most famous bridge is the Victoria tubular bridge across the St. Lawrence.
Defence Forces. — There are two Imperial naval stations— one at Halifax, the other at Esquimault (Squimo). The navy and mer- cantile marine of Canada rank fourth in the world. There are more than 30,000 able-bodied seamen. Canada undertakes her own internal defence. The active militia numbers 38,000 men ; the reserve militia numbers over 700,000, consisting of all males between eighteen and sixty.
Chief Dates.
1497. Cabot sights the mainland of North America.
1500. Cortereal reaches Labrador.
1524. Verrazano explores the coasts of North America.
288 British Colonisation
1534. Jacques Cartier ascends the Gulf of St. Lawrence. 1608. Champlain founds Quebec.
1628. Richelieu organises 'The Company of a Hundred Asso- ciates.'
1642. Montreal built by Maisonneuve. 1666. Father Marquette sails for Canada. 1682. La Salle discovers the mouth of the Mississippi. 1689. De Frontenac Governor of Canada. 1696 D'Iberville in Hudson's Bay. 1697. Treaty of Ryswick. 1699. D'Iberville in Louisiana. 1713. Treaty of Utrecht. 1742. Verendrye sights the Rockies. 1756. Montcalm in Canada. 1759. Quebec taken by Wolfe. 1763. Treaty of Paris.
Canada a British Colony.
1763. Proclamation of George ill. offering lands to emigrants.
1774. Quebec Act passed.
1775. The Americans attack Canada. 1777. Burgoyne's defeat.
1783. Treaty of Paris.
1783. United Empire loyalists colonise New Brunswick and Nova
Scotia.
1784. Emigration of United Empire loyalists to Upper Canada. 1789. Alexander Mackenzie navigates the Mackenzie River. 1791. Upper Canada separated from Lower Canada.
1793. Alexander Mackenzie crosses the Rockies to Pacific.
1803. Lord Selkirk leads a colony to Prince Edward Island.
1806. The Berlin Decrees.
1807. Orders in Council.
1812. Selkirk settlers on the Red River.
1812-15. War between Canada and the United States.
1837. Lord Durham in Canada.
1841. The union of Upper and Lower Canada.
1842. The Ashburton Treaty settling Maine frontier.
1866. Fenian invasion of Canada,
1867. Confederation Act passed. 1871. June i, Dominion Day.
Appendices 289
1872. The boundary of 49° settled between Canada and United States.
1885. Louis Kiel executed.
1886. The Canadian Pacific Railway finished. 1891. Census of the Dominion.
IV.— THE WEST AFRICAN SETTLEMENTS. SECTION A.— THE GAMBIA.
Area. — 69 square miles.
Divisions. — The settlement consists of (i) the island of St. Mary, (2) British Combo ; (3) Albreda, (4) the Ceded Mile, (5) Macarthy's Island.
Physical Features. — The Gambia is one of the largest rivers of Western Africa, and falls into the Atlantic by a large estuary nearly twenty-seven miles across. This river forms sandbank and islands, which are low-lying, swampy, and unhealthy.
Population. — In 1881 there were only about forty white inhabi- tants. Now there is a police force of 1 10, and a detachment of the West India Regiment. The whole population, white and coloured, was (1891) 14,266.
Chief Town.— Bathurst (6000).
Government. — The Gambia is a Crown colony governed by an Administrator, aided by an Executive Council and by a Legislative Council of six.
Trade.— Imports (1891), ,£172,118. Exports, ,£180,052. 'Gambia drew [1872-86] a fourth of its imports from Sierra Leone, only 38 per cent, from the United Kingdom, and 35 per cent, from West African ports, the United States, and France. It exported 8 per cent, to the United Kingdom, and 88 per cent, to foreign countries, of which the greater portion went to France, and the remainder to West African ports, Madeira, the United States, and Italy, with a trifle to Sierra Leone and Gibraltar.' 1
Products. — Ground nuts, hides, beeswax, rice, cotton, india- rubber, cola nuts. The ground nut is the staple product from which oil is extracted.
Revenue. — 1891, £31,038. Expenditure ', ,£27,697.
1 In 1891, imports from United Kingdom, £84,798 ; exports to, .£37,522,
T
290 British Colonisation
Defence. — A police force and a detachment of the West India Regiment, as above stated.
Communication. — There are no railroads, but Bathurst is in communication with Europe by means of four telegraph cables. Liverpool steamers call every fortnight. The river is the main highway.
Chief Dates.
1588. The Elizabethan Charter. 1618. Formation of a West African Company. 1821. Annexed to Sierra Leone. 1843. Created a colony. 1866. Absorbed under the general government of West African
Settlements. 1 888. Finally separated.
SECTION B.— SIERRA LEONE.
Area. — 4000 square miles.
Physical Features. — Sierra Leone proper is a peninsula of an area of 300 square miles. It is mountainous, and very picturesque. The coast-line from the Skarcies River on the north to the Mannah River on the south, is malarious and unhealthy, extending for 180 miles. There are several islands, notably Sherbro' Island, and many rivers. The harbour of Freetown is the only good harbour on the West Coast of Africa between Cape Verde Islands and Fernando Po.
Population. — 1891, 174,835, of whom only 210 are resident Europeans.
Chief Town. — Freetown (30,033).
Government. — Sierra Leone is a Crown colony, administered by a Governor and an Executive of five, and a Legislative Council, the latter being composed of the former, with the addition of three unofficial members nominated by the Crown.
Trade.— Imports (1891), ,£453,375- Exports, ,£477,656. With i egard to the distribution of trade, ' Sierra Leone drew a larger proportion of its imports from the United Kingdom than either of its sister colonies, viz. 70 per cent (1872-86). The balance was drawn chiefly from the United States, Germany, France, and West African ports. Of the exports 37 per cent, were shipped to the United Kingdom. In 1891, imports from the United Kingdom were (^345,°3I ; exports 10^218,294.
Appendices 29 1
Products. — Palm oil, palm kernels, rubber, gum, camwood, benni-seed, and ground nuts.
Revenue.— 1891, ,£89,869. Expenditure, ,£77,965.
Public Debt.— 1891,^50,000.
Public Works. — As British influence is confined mainly to the littoral, there are no public works of importance, although the route to the plateaux of the interior is shorter here than elsewhere.
Defence. — Freetown harbour has been strongly fortified, and is a coaling-station for the Royal Navy.
Communication. — Liverpool is the mart where Sierra Leone produce is chiefly taken. It is 3000 miles distant, and the voyage takes about 15 to 16 days.
Chief Dates.
1787. Ceded to England by native chiefs. 1791. Charter of Sierra Leone Company. 1807. Sierra Leone transferred to the Crown. 1821. Incorporated as part of 'Colony of West African Settle- ments.'
1862. British Kwaia and Sherbro' annexed. 1879. Skarcies River annexed. 1884. Mannah River annexed.
LIBERIA.
In connection with Sierra Leone the United States of Liberia, recognised by the European Powers, deserve a short notice. It is a negro republic, first founded by the American Philanthropic Colonisation Society in 1820, whither liberated slaves were sent. The names of Freetown in Sierra Leone, and Liberia itself, indi- cate the original purpose of the British colony and of the American settlement. It was to find a place in their own country for the emancipated negroes. Monrovia, the chief town of Liberia, was so called after the celebrated American President. From the beginning the principle of self-government has been fully acknow- ledged. In 1833 and 1835 a Quaker colony came to Liberia from Pennsylvania, the new arrivals landing in Grand Bassa.
The area of Liberia is about 35,000 square miles, with 700 miles of coast, along which there are many openings for British trade. The population is said to be 18,000 to 20,000 civilised negroes, and
292 British Colonisation
more than 100,000 African natives. The climate is said to be the hottest in the world. The country towards the interior rises in two main terraces. The second terrace is known as the Kong Mountains. Here gold mines are reported to exist. The native products are chiefly palm oil, camwood, ivory, and gold dust. Liberian coffee is well known. Liberian influence extends many hundred miles towards the interior. Here, then, is an opportunity for the extension of British influence.
SECTION C.— THE GOLD COAST.
Area. — 38,665 square miles.
Physical Features.—1 The littoral of the Gold Coast, with the exception of a semi-desert patch near Akkra, is of the same moist, equatorial character in its climate and scenery as might be pre- sumed from its position. The typical West African forest country ends, however, on the northern frontiers of Ashanti, and the characteristic park-like grass land scenery of Central Africa begins in the plains through which the Upper Volta flows.' The length of the coast-line is about 350 miles. There is no good harbour, and goods and passengers are landed in surf boats.
Population. — 1891, 1,500,000, of whom about 150 are Europeans.
Chief Towns. — The most important trading ports and settle- ments are Newtown, Axim, Dixcove, Secondee, Elmina, Cape Coast Castle, Anamaboe, Salt Pond, Winnebah, Akkra (the seat of government), Addah, Quettah.
Government. — The Gold Coast is administered by a Governor, aided by an Executive and Legislative Council, all nominated by the Crown.
Trade. — Imports, 1891, ,£665,781. Exports, ,£684,305. As to the distribution of trade (1872-86), 'the Gold Coast imported 63 per cent, from the United Kingdom, and exported 48 per cent. Its chief foreign trade was with the United States, but it exported largely to Germany.' *•
Products. — Palm oil and palm kernels are the staple products. Gold, india-rubber, monkey-skins, ivory, copra, gum copal, cam- wood, and benni-seed are also exported. The natives work gold ornaments, such as rings, and weave cloth.
Revenue. — 1891,^1 86,02 2 . Expenditure, £ 1 3 3,407,
Public Works. — There is no railway, and hardly any roads.
1 In 1891, imports from United Kingdom, £483,393] exports to, ,£545,493.
Appendices 293
There are about 200 miles of telegraph in the colony connecting posts along the coast-line.
Defence. — A garrison of 200 men and officers of the West India Regiment stationed at Cape Coast. There is also a constabulary of 800 men.
Communication. — Liverpool is the chief mart, distant 3900 miles. The route is vid Madeira. Length of passage, 20 or 30 days.
Chief Dates.
1471. Elmina discovered by Portuguese.
1672. Royal African Company.
1750. African Company of Merchants.
1821. African Company dissolved.
1824. Ashanti War.
1831. Peace between English, Fantis, and Ashantis.
1850. Akkra, Addah purchased from Denmark.
1872. Ashanti War.
1 88 1. Death of King Coffee.
SECTION D.— LAGOS.
Area. — 1071 square miles. Lagos Island has an area of 3! square miles.
Physical Features. — * Lagos has few natural advantages to boast of. Its dangerous and shallow bar makes the entrance to its capital impracticable to any but small river steamers. It has a certain amount of natural canals, a network of creeks running right through the colony at a short distance from the coast ; but there is no other place on its littoral between the French boundary at Appa and the River Benin (where the colony is supposed to terminate on the east) where a landing can be safely effected on account of the heavy surf.' l
Population. — 85,607, of whom about 100 are Europeans.
Chief Town. — Lagos, termed the ' Liverpool of West Africa,3 with a population of 60,000, is the largest town on the West African coast.
Government. — Lagos is a Crown colony, administered by a Governor, aided by an Executive and Legislative Council, the latter including three non-official officers.
Trade.— Imports, 1891, ^650,392. Exports, ^717,643. As to 1 H. H. Johnston.
294 British Colonisation
the distribution of its trade (1872-86), ' Lagos drew 54 per cent, of imports from the United Kingdom, and 46 per cent, from foreign countries. It exported 32 per cent, to the United Kingdom, and 68 per cent, to foreign countries. Germany was its chief market for both imports and exports, to which were added France and West African French possessions for exports.3 1
Products. — Palm oil and palm kernels are the staple products.
Revenue. — 1891, ,£78,625. Expenditure, £66,388.
Communication. — Liverpool is the chief mart, from which Lagos is distant 4279 miles. It is 1203 miles from Freetown, 315 from Cape Coast. There are no railways or telegraphs in the interior, but Lagos Island is in telegraphic communication with Congo South Africa on the south, and with the Gold Coast and Europe on the north. Internal communication is along the numerous lagoons.
Chief Dates.
1851. First British interference.
1866. Lagos part of ' Colony of West African Settlements.'
1874. Lagos part of Gold Coast Colony.
1886. Lagos made a separate colony.
SECTION E. — THE NIGER PROTECTORATE.
There are no accurate statistics available to show the precise area, population, trade, etc., of the Niger Protectorate. The Com- pany is said to possess no less than 1 50 factories. As regards administration, the native chiefs are interfered with as little as possible. British consuls, acting under the Secretary of State, exercise a great deal of influence. Palm oil, kernels, ivory, india- rubber, shea-butter, and benni-seed are the chief expoits. Tele- graphic communication is via Lagos. Consular jurisdiction is exercised at the chief ports along the rivers. Steamers navigate the Niger 460 miles from the sea, and for 450 miles up the Benue.
i In 1891, imports from United Kingdom, £435,388 ; exports to, £285,822.
Appendices 295
V.— THE SOUTH AFRICAN COLONIES, SETTLE- MENTS, AND ISLANDS.
The present possessions of Great Britain in South Africa are (i) the Cape Colony, (2) Natal, (3) Basutoland, (4) British Bechu- analand, (5) Zululand, (6) Mashonaland. In the following districts and countries her influence, although not exercised in the task of direct administration, is supreme : viz. Pondoland, Amatongaland, Swazieland, the Bechuanaland Protectorate. In addition, Great Britain has residents at the kraals of Lobengula, King of the Mata- bele, and Gungunhana, King of Gazaland, the two most powerful chiefs now left in Africa south of the Zambesi.
SECTION A.— THE CAPE COLONY.
Area.— 221,311 square miles.
Divisions. — The colony is divided into eight electoral provinces : (i) the Western, (2) North- Western, (3) South- Western, (4) Mid- land, (5) South-Eastern, (6) North-Eastern, (7) Eastern, (8) the Diamond Fields, or Griqualand West.
Physical Features. — The land rises from the sea in distinct terraces till the interior plateaux are reached, which are high and healthy. Water is scarce, and no mountain rises to the height of eternal snow. The great plains of the interior are called * karroos.' The Kalihari Desert is a notable feature on the west.
Population. — 1891, 1,525,739, of whom 376,812 were European, 847,542 aboriginal, 301,385 coloured.
With regard to the distribution of races in urban and rural areas, it has been ascertained (1891) to be as follows : —
Urban Rural Total
Areas. Areas. Population.
Europeans. . . 154,541 222,274 376,812 Aboriginal. . . 49,763 797,779 847,542
All others coloured . 114,473 186,912 301,385
318,777 1,206,965 1,525,739
Nearly all the aboriginal or Kaffir race live in the rural areas, nearly half the Europeans in the urban areas, proving that cen- tralisation goes on in South Africa as elsewhere.
296 British Colonisation
According to a census of religious sects in 1891, the
Dutch Reformed Church counted 297,983 persons. Church of England „ 139,058 „
Wesleyan Methodists „ 106,132 „
Roman Catholics ,, 17,219 „
Moravians „ 16,297 „
The Congregationalists, Independents, and London Missionary Society counted 65,737 ; the Presbyterians and United Presby- terians numbered 33,000. Fully 750,000 persons, white and coloured, professed no religion at all.
Chief Towns. — Cape Town, 51,083; Port Elizabeth, 23,052; Kimberley, 28,643 ; Grahamstown, 10,436 ; East London, 6858.
Government.— The Cape Colony enjoys responsible govern- ment. The Governor is the representative of the Queen, and holds also the office of High Commissioner of South Africa. The Cape Legislature consists of the Legislative Council of 22 members, the Legislative Assembly of 76 members representing the above- mentioned electoral provinces, both Houses being elected by same voters.
Trade.— Total imports, 1891, ,£8,582,776. Exports, .£11,131,024. 'The trade of the Cape (1872-86) was chiefly with the United Kingdom, viz. 78 per cent, of imports and 94 per cent, of exports. Its imports from British possessions were 14 per cent., and exports to them only i per cent. Its foreign trade amounted to 9 and 4 per cent, of imports and exports respectively. After the United Kingdom the chief imports were from Natal, South Australia, Brazil, and the United States' (the articles imported being chiefly flour and wheat from South Australia, coffee from Brazil, and agricultural machinery from the United States). 'The exports to any single country except the United Kingdom were insignificant.' 1 Products. — Diamonds, wool, copper ore, angora hair, ostrich feathers, skins, wine, fruit. The gold exported through Cape ports comes from the Transvaal. The annual value of diamonds exported is about ,£4,000,000 worth, the gold more than ,£2,500,000. More than three-quarters of Cape exports must be put to the account of minerals and gems.
Revenue.— 1891, ^4,143,876. Expenditure, ,£4,308,762. Public Debt.—M^ to December 31, 1891, .£24,832,767. Public Works.— Railways, 1 599 miles. Telegraphs, 1 1,325 miles. 1 In 1891, imports from the United Kingdom, £7,030,503 ; exports to, £10,690,810.
Appendices 297
Harbours at Table Bay and East London constructed at vast ex- pense. Roads and bridges connect all parts of the colony together.
Defence. — Cape Mounted Rifles, 819 ; Cape police, 704. A sum of about ;£i 50,000 is voted annually for colonial defence purposes, including defence of Table Bay. There are also thirty volunteer corps, numbering between 4000 and 5000 men. The Burghers con- stitute third line of defence, and correspond to the reserve militia of Canada. The Imperial garrison at Cape Town and Wynberg musters about 1300.
Communication. — Table Bay is 6000 miles distant from Ply- mouth. The time occupied is twenty days, sometimes seventeen days. The Scot has done the voyage in fifteen days. The two lines are the Union Steamship Company and the Castle Line, both possessing a magnificent fleet of steamers whose passages have been remarkable for their safety and punctuality.
Chief Dates.
1486. Discovery of the Cape. 1620. Proclamation of British authority by Shillinge and Fitz-
herbert.
1651. Dutch occupation. 1687. Immigration of French refugees. 1795. First British occupation. 1802. Peace of Amiens.
1806. Second British occupation.
1 807. Abolition of the slave trade.
1820. The English settlers land at Algoa Bay.
1819. Kaffir War.
1834. Slave emancipation.
1834. Kaffir War.
1846-53. Kaffir Wars. The ' War of the Axe.'
1852. First Transvaal Republic founded.
1854. The Orange Free State founded.
1857. Kaffir War.
1867. Discovery of diamonds.
1871. The Diamond Fields proclaimed a colony.
1872. Introduction of responsible government.
1877. Sir Bartle Frere Governor of the Cape.
1878. Kaffir War.
1879. Basuto War.
1881-1889. Governorship of Sir Hercules Robinson.
298 British Colonisation
SECTION B.— NATAL.
Area. — 20,461 square miles.
Divisions. — The colony is divided into eight counties : (i) Pieter- maritzburg, (2) Durban, (3) Victoria, (4) Umvoti, (5) Klip River, (6) Weenen, (7) Alfred, (8) Alexandra.
Physical Features. — The land rises in terraces to the interior. The chief mountain range runs parallel with the coast. The rivers are numerous and flooded in the summer. There are no natural harbours along the coast.
Population. — 1891, 543,983, of whom 46,788 are white, 41,142 Indians, 455,913 Kaffirs.
Chief Towns. — Durban, 9000; Pietermaritzburg, 9251.
Government. — Natal is administered by a Governor, aided by an Executive Council and a Legislative Assembly of thirty-one mem- bers, twenty-four of whom are elected by the colonists, five are ex ojficio, and two nominated by the Government.
Trade. — Imports, 1891, ,£3,647,494. Exports, ,£1,458,082. ' Natal resembles the Cape of Good Hope in the character of its trade (1872-86). It drew 81 per cent, of imports from the United Kingdom, and sent thither 79 per cent, of its exports. It shipped, however, a considerable amount to the Cape. Its foreign trade was of small amount, 7 per cent, and 4 per cent, respectively.' *
Products. — Wool, coal, gold, sugar, angora hair, and skins.
Revenue.— 1891, ^1,318,769. Expenditure, .£1,393,896.
Public Zte£/.— 1891, ^7,170,354.
Public Works. — There are 340 miles of railway. Telegraph wires connect every place of importance. The harbour works at Port Natal are a most important public work.
Defence. — There are about 1 500 colonists, volunteers and others, enlisted for the purposes of defence. There is generally a garrison of 1200 Imperial troops at Pietermaritzburg. The port of Durban is strongly fortified.
Communication. — Natal is 845 miles distant from Cape Town, which is about 6000 miles from Plymouth, and is, therefore, two or three days further from England than Cape Town. The colony is 300 miles from Delagoa Bay and 1 770 from Zanzibar. The Eastern Submarine Telegraph Cable is landed on Natal shores, connecting with the East and with Europe.
1 In 1891, imports from the United Kingdom, £2,789,130 > exports to, £1,193.581.
Appendices 299
Chief Dates.
1497. Natal discovered by Vasco da Gama.
1837. Boer settlement.
1843. English rule proclaimed.
1856. Natal a separate colony.
1887. Zululand a British colony.
1891-2. Agitation for responsible government.
SECTION C.— BASUTOLAND.
Area. — 10,293 square miles.
Divisions. — (i) Maseru, (2) Mafeting, (3) Leribe.
Physical Features. — Mountainous. Basutoland has been called the Switzerland of South Africa.
Population. — 1891, 218,324 natives ; 578 Europeans.
Chief Town. — Maseru (763).
Government. — Basutoland is administered by a Resident Com- missioner, acting under the High Commissioner. The Basutos have a certain amount of local government.
Trade. — The Basutos are large purchasers of manufactures.
Products. — Basutoland is a great cattle-rearing and grain- producing country.
Revenue. — 1 890, ^41,784. Expenditure, ^40,825.
Communication. — Basutoland is 7668 miles from London. It is reached best through the Cape Colony.
Chief Dates.
1818. The Basutos formed into a nation.
1852. Basuto War with British.
1856. Basuto War with the Orange Free State.
1868. Basutoland taken under the British Crown.
1871. Basutoland annexed to the Cape.
1879. Moirosis WTar.
1 880. Basuto War with the Cape Colony.
1884. Basutoland again taken under the British Crown.
SECTION D.— BRITISH BECHUANALAND.
Area. — 60,000 square miles, the Bechuanaland Protectorate being 162,000 square miles.
3OO British Colonisation
Physical Features. — British Bechuanaland lies at a high eleva- tion— about 4000 feet to 500x3 feet above the level of the sea. The scenery is monotonous, the feature of the landscape being broad, open, mimosa-clad plains. The rivers are swollen in winter, but soon dry up. Thunder-storms and dust-storms are frequent in their season — the former in summer and the latter in winter. The climate is dry and healthy.
Population. — 1600 Europeans, 43,985 natives.
Towns. — Vryburg, Mafeking, Taungs.
Government. — British Bechuanaland is governed by an Adminis- trator under the High Commissioner of South Africa.
Trade. — The imports, which come almost entirely from the Cape, are textiles, hardware, alcohol. The exports go to the Kimberley market, and consist of mealies, wool, hides, wood.
Products. — Maize, or mealies, and cattle are the chief products.
Revenue. — 1891, ^52,029 ; Parliamentary grant, ;£n5599i- Expenditure, ^153,902.
Defence. — The Bechuanaland Border Police, of 500 men.
Communication. — The railway is extended from Kimberley, in the Cape Colony, to Vryburg and Mafeking ; the telegraph (over- land) wire passes through British Bechuanaland to Matabeleland and Mashonaland. The colony is easily reached from Kimberley. On the 30th September 1885, British Bechuanaland was declared to be a British colony. With regard to Khama's country, or the Bechuanaland Protectorate, it resembles, generally speaking, British Bechuanaland. England's influence is paramount over these immense areas up to the Zambesi.
SECTION E.— ZULULAND.
Area. — 8900 square miles.
Physical Features. — Much of the land on the east, and along the coast, consists of broad, grassy, undulating plains. In the interior are deep forests.
Population.— 400,000. There are 300 troops at Etshowe.
Government. — The colony is administered by a Resident Com- missioner at Etshowe, under the Governor of Natal.
Products. — Cattle and mealies chiefly.
Revenue.— \ 890, £4 1 ,674. Expenditure, ,£29,732.
Appendices 301
Chief Dates.
1800. Beginning of the Zulu nation.
1828. Accession of Dingaan.
1839. Panda set up by the Dutch.
1861. Cetywayo chosen as regent by the English.
1873. Cetywayo succeeds as king.
1879. Zulu War, and Cetywayo deposed.
1883. Cetywayo restored.
1884. Death of Cetywayo. 1887. Zululand a British colony.
SECTION F.— SWAZIELAND.
A tract of country, with an area of 8000 square miles, lying to the east of the Transvaal, with a native population of about 60,000, and 500 European settlers. The Europeans are partly Boer graziers from the Transvaal, and partly British and other adven- turers who have gained mining and other concessions from the Swazie chiefs. The country has wooded districts and long stretches of arable ground. It is also well watered, some of the rivers being the Komati, the Black and White Umvolosi, the Great and Little Usuto. It has been ascertained that there is much gold in Swazieland. Concessions for farming, mining, and grazing rights are given for fifty years. The Swazies are old allies of the English, and are a brave Kaffir race. Swazieland is under a dual control of Boers and British for a provisional period, ending May 1893. The Swazieland Convention, dated August 2, 1890, was made for three years. According to this Convention the Transvaal Republic was empowered to construct a railway, if they wished, to Kosi Bay through Amatongaland, subject to certain reservations. Amatongaland itself is a small tract of country north of Zululand, adjoining the sea. In June 1887 the country was taken under British protection. The Tongas are industrious people, and migrate in large numbers to the gold- and diamond- fields for work.
SECTION G.— MASHONALAND.
The area of Mashonaland proper is not clearly defined, and it comes within the wide scope of the British South Africa Company. It consists chiefly of the highlands to the east of Matabeleland to a
3O2 British Colonisation
point within 300 miles of the Indian Ocean. The chief posts are simply forts, e.g. Forts Tuli, Charter, Salisbury. The population consists of a police force of 500 men, many miners and settlers, and emigrants from the colonies on the south. The country is being opened up, under British protection, by the British South Africa Company, with a capital of .£1,000,000. The products of the country are agricultural and mineral. It is expected that gold will be the staple industry. Public works are rapidly being taken in hand. Already the country is being connected by post and telegraph. Communication is carried on either vtd Bechuanaland or Port Beira on the east coast. A railway will shortly be con- structed between Port Beira and Fort Salisbury. Mashonaland is the most recent sphere of British colonisation in South Africa, properly so called.
SECTION H.— NORTH ZAMBESIA, NYASSALAND, LAKE TANGAN- YIKA, THE BRITISH IMPERIAL SOUTH AFRICAN COMPANY, AND UGANDA.
North Zambesia must be spoken of in connection with South Zambesia and Mashonaland. Sena, Tete, and Zumbo, stations on the Zambesi, and centres of an ancient traffic, draw their wealth from northern parts. Zumbo, at the junction of the Aroanga, or Loangwa, with the Zambesi, is the station chosen as a residence by Mr. H. H. Johnston, Her Majesty's accredited envoy in this part of the world, and acting as intermediary between the Portu- guese on the east and the British South Africa Company. The Zambesi is at once a terminus and a starting-place. At present it seems to bound the enterprises of the Mashonaland pioneers ; but the Shire River, the northern affluent of the Zambesi, con- ducts the colonist to new regions— first to Lake Nyassa, then by the Stevenson Road to Lake Tanganyika, and thence to the Victoria Nyanza and the equatorial regions of Central Africa. The lakes lying in deep troughs or depressions along several degrees of latitude are a natural water-way destined to open up Africa from the Zambesi to the Nile. Commerce will find its way along this passage, and may be deflected eastwards as it is tapped by rail- ways such as that contemplated by the British Imperial East Africa Company from Mombassa. A long line of explorers, as Livingstone, Cameron, Speke, Grant, Stanley, and others, have
Appendices 303
won triumphs for England in Eastern and Central Africa. Also, there has been no lack of earnest and determined mission workers on the part of the Church Missionary Society, the London Mis- sionary Society, the Universities Mission, to supplement the work of exploration. These agencies furnish good title-deeds to our spheres of influence, now defined by international agreements.
Nyassaland.
The Nyassaland Protectorate includes the country to the south and along the west shores of Lake Nyassa. In the southern por- tion of it the Shire highlands, Mount Zomba, and Blantyre are best known. On Mount Zomba coffee, sugar, and cinchona have been grown with success. The Universities Mission set to work in Nyassaland in 1860. The African Lakes Company began in 1878, and its first field of operations was between Lake Nyassa and the sea. The Company has introduced steam navigation, and has refused to sanction the liquor traffic. According to recent agree- ments in the Anglo- Portuguese Convention, the Zambesi and its affluents are a free water-way to all nations. In 1882 a complete survey was made of Lake Nyassa by Mr. J. Stewart.
Tanganyika.
Lake Tanganyika is connected with Lake Nyassa by a road or portage called the Stevenson Road, after Mr. James Stevenson of Largs, who has helped the development of Nyassaland. The lake has been described as a beautiful inland sea, lying 2624 feet above the level of the sea, 400 miles long, 1 5 to 50 miles wide, with a coast line of 1000 miles, and a surface of 13,000 square miles. On the east shore is Ujiji, really the name of a large tribal territory, long the depot for Oriental colonists, travellers, and Arab mer- chants. For variety of races Ujiji has been described as 'a little Egypt.' The Arabs practically rule the settlement. The ordinary route to Tanganyika is from Zanzibar, a walking distance of 836 English statute miles. The hottest time of the year is in November and February, and the coldest in July. The lake lies between 9° and 3° South latitude. On the east is the German sphere of influ- ence, reaching half-way up to the shores of the Victoria Nyanza. In course of time there must be regular communication between Lake Tanganyika and Lake Victoria Nyanza. Mr. E. Coode
304 British Colonisation
Hore, resident for eleven years in Central Africa, has described Lake Tanganyika as a geographical, ethnological, and political centre which may well be termed ' the heart of Africa.' He has thus pictured the lake : — ' Owing to the immense evaporation, the opposite shores, even where only fifteen miles distant, are visible only in the rainy season ; then, sailing down the centre of the lake, one realises its trough-like character, but coasting in-shore there is a great variety of scenery. Here, for 30 miles at a stretch, you sail in deep water close alongside the mountains, which rise steeply to over i oco feet, showing broad patches of rock amongst miles of beautiful trees ; again, in a few places, shallow flats only permit access to the shore by poling in canoes. Steep rocky islands, with dry soil, set out in the lake so as to be always ventilated, supply sites for residence ; and many fine natural harbours give facility for navigation.3 x Could this region, as well as the shores of Vic- toria Nyanza, be brought into speedy communication with the Indian Ocean, huge areas would at once be at the disposal of Europeans, if not for actual occupation, still for commercial and agricultural enterprises, carried out through the aid of a vast native population.
The British Imperial East Africa Company.
This Company arose originally from a concession given on May 24, 1887, to Sir W. Mackinnon by the Sultan of Zanzibar. The coast-line includes the important harbours of Mombassa and Kilifi. The zone of British influence extends to the Hinterland for 360 miles to the shores of the Victoria Nyanza. To the south is the German sphere of influence, along a line that includes Mount Kilimanjaro and touches the Victoria Nyanza about the centre of the eastern shore. Within the territory of the British Imperial East Africa Company is Mount Kenia, lying on the equator, and reaching a height of 18,045 feet- English influence extends past the Victoria Nyanza to the Albert Edward Nyanza and the Albert Nyanza. The region known as Uganda lies on the north-west coast of the Victoria Nyanza. This lake is 3300 feet above the level of the sea, has a length of 210 miles, a breadth of 225 miles, and covers an area of 26,900 square miles. The Albert Nyanza has a breadth of 20 miles and a length of 100 miles, and covers an
l Tanganyika, p. 139, by Edward Coode Hore,
Appendices 305
area of 1800 square miles. This lake is 2300 feet above the level of the sea. These vast sheets of water provide safe and easy commu- nication with areas of rich country. The advantages of a railway of 300 or 400 miles from Mombassa to the eastern shores of Albert Nyanza are obvious at a glance. First , it will enable travellers to pass quickly through the malarious belts of the coast, and thus save human life ; secondly •, it will open up commercial posts along a long coast-line, and lead to quick developments by steamboat and portages ; thirdly, it will enable Europe to crush the slave trade by cutting off communication from the interior ; fourthly, it will enable a complete and accurate survey to be made of all parts of Equatorial Africa, of the most hidden fountains of the Nile, and open up better communication with the Congo on the west and Egypt on the north ; fifthly, it will be of immense aid to mission work. The Church Missionary Society has had a station at Mombassa since 1844, and at Uganda since 1877.
SECTION I.— SOUTH ATLANTIC ISLANDS. St. Helena.
Area. — 47 square miles.
Physical Features. — The island, being of volcanic origin, is rugged and mountainous, the highest peak rising to the height of 2700 feet. The island lies in the track of the south-east trade winds, and is healthy.
Population. — 1891,4116.
Chief Town. — James Town, 2233.
Government. — The government of the island is administered by a Governor, aided by an Executive Council of five members.
Trad?.— Imports, 1891, ,£27,382. Exports, ,£3126.
Products. — There are no products worth mentioning.
Revenue.— 1 89 1 , .£6874. Expenditure, ,£8288.
Public Debt.— 1891, .£5408.
Public Works. — ' Munden's Battery ' is the chief public work, to which access is gained by the well-known ' Ladder,' or steps cut up the cliffs.
Defence. — The Imperial garrison has been reduced to thirty- three men. A local militia exists.
Communication. — The island is 1140 miles from Africa, 1800 miles from South America, and 760 miles south-east of Ascension. The Cape steamers call every three or five weeks.
U
306 British Colonisation
Chief Dates.
1502. St. Helena discovered.
1588. Cavendish sights it.
1673. Munden captures it.
1815. Napoleon imprisoned here.
1821. Death of Napoleon.
1834. St. Helena becomes a Crown colony.
Tristan d'Acunha.
Tristan d'Acunha and Gough Island are the chief of a group of islands in the South Atlantic out of the track of steamers. In 1815 they were taken possession of by the British, having been dis- covered in 1 506 by a Portuguese admiral named Tristan d'Acunha. Inaccessible Island is a lofty rock about two miles in length. The Nightingale Islands are three in number, rising in peaks above the sea.
Ascension.
Area. — 38 square miles.
Physical Features. — The island is a mere rock of volcanic origin, its highest peak being 2820 feet. It lies in the track of the south- east trades.
Population. — 166, consisting of officers, marines, and kroomen.
Chief Town. — George Town.
Government. — The island is under the Board of Admiralty, and is managed in all respects as if it were a man-of-war, the captain being in charge.
Products. — The chief product is the sea-turtle, no less than 150 being sometimes turned in the season, i.e. from January to May. Their weight is from 500 to 800 pounds each, and their value between £2 and ^3.
Communication. — The island is 3417 miles from Plymouth, 760 from St. Helena, and 900 from Cape Palmas on the African coast.
Chief Dates.
1501. Discovered by the Portuguese. 1815. Occupied by the British.
Appendices 307
SECTION K.— THE FALKLAND ISLANDS AND SOUTH GEORGIA.
Lying about 200 to 300 miles to the east of the Straits of Magellan, these islands belong to the South American continent, and were very important in early times when the way to the Eastern Pacific lay along the Cape Horn route. Bourgainville, the great French explorer, settled a few French emigrants here in 1764 from Acadia and from France. The islands were called once Les Isles Malouines. The Spaniards, however, were jealous of this occupation, as well as that of the British later on, and en- deavoured to establish themselves at Port Solidad. Great Britain finally occupied them in December 20, 1832. The Buenos Ayres Republic had occupied them just previously, but were compelled to abandon them. The area of these islands is : East Falkland, 3000 square miles ; West Falkland, 2000 square miles ; adjacent islands, 1 500 square miles ; South Georgia, 1000 square miles — a total of 7500 square miles.
The population, of which the majority are Scotch, number (1891) 1789. The only town is Stanley (725). There is a small hamlet called Darwin. The island is very healthy. Sheep and cattle flourish well on it, and a long grass called tussac grass is very nutritious. The island is administered by a Governor and an Executive and Legislative Council, There is mail communication twelve times a year.
VI.— THE AUSTRALASIAN COLONIES.
SECTION A. — NEW SOUTH WALES.
Area. — 310,700 square miles, its greatest length from north to south being 680 miles, its greatest breadth 760 miles, with a coast- line of 700 miles.1
Divisions. — The colony is divided into thirteen pastoral dis- tricts, viz. : (i) Monaro, (2) Murrumbidgee, (3) Lachlan, (4) Wellington, (5) Bligh, (6) Liverpool Plains, (7) Gwydir, (8) New England, (9) Macleay, (10) Clarence, (11) Darling, (12) Albert, (13) Warrego. It is also divided into 141 counties for electoral purposes, known as the old or proclaimed counties and the new.
Physical Features. — The surface of New South Wales may be 1 See The Seven Colonies of Australasia, by T. A. Coghlan, p. 6.
308 British Colonisation
divided into three clearly marked areas : (i) the coast district, a narrow strip with an average width of 60 or 70 miles ; (2) the table-lands, traversing the entire length of the country, and extend- ing up to 14 ist meridian ; (3) the plains of the interior, forming the chief pasture-lands of New South Wales.
The chief mountains are : (i) the interior ranges ; (2) the great dividing chain ; (3) the coast ranges. The Blue Mountain range is one of the spurs of the great dividing chain, its highest point being Mount Boomarang, 4100 feet. Of these ranges Mount Kosciusko is loftiest with an elevation of 7308 feet, being about 700 feet below the line of perpetual snow. The rivers on the western watershed are the Darling, the Lachlan, the Murrum- bidgee, and the Murray. All these unite with the Murray and flow into Lake Alexandrina in South Australia. The rivers on the eastern watershed are the Hawkesbury, Hunter, Clarence, and Macleay.
The plains of New South Wales are the Liverpool Plains, Monaro Plains or Brisbane Downs, South Park and Patrick's Plains on the Hunter River.
Population. — In 1861, 350,860; in 1871, 503,981; in 1881, 751,468; in 1891, 1,132,234. In 1891 there were 8280 aborigines in New South Wales, and 14,156 Chinese.
Chief Towns. — Sydney, 383,386, forming 34. 1 1 per cent, of the whole population ; Newcastle, 51,561 ; Broken Hill, 19,789 ; Parramatta, 11,677; Goulburn, 10,916; Maitland, 10,214; Ba- thurst, 9162 ; Wollongong, 8803 ; Albany, 5447 ; Orange, 5064.
Government. — The Government of New South Wales is of the 'responsible3 kind (18 and 19 Viet. cap. 54), and consists of (i) a Governor appointed by the Crown ; (2) a Legislative Council of 60 members appointed by the Crown for life ; and (3) a Legisla- tive Assembly of 141 members, representing 74 electoral districts, and elected by all male subjects of Her Majesty of full age of twenty-one years, with certain exceptions. Members of the Assembly receive ^300 per annum. Voting is by ballot. Triennial Parliaments.
Trade. — The value of imports from countries outside Australasia,
1890, was ,£11,633,283 ; exports, ^10,761,197 — giving a total value
of ^22,394,480, equivalent to .£20, 6s. 6d. per head. The value of
total — i.e. external and inter-colonial — trade was i1 1890, imports,
1 In 1891, total imports, ^25,383,397 ; exports, ^"25,944,020.
Appendices 309
£22,61 5,004 ; exports, £22,045,937— giving a trade of £44,660,94 1.1 With regard to the distribution of trade, the import and export trade of New South Wales with the United Kingdom, 1890, was valued at £i 5,25 1,428. The trade with France, Germany, Belgium, and other countries amounted to £5,805,516. The import and ex- port trade with the Australasian colonies amounted to £22,266,460. This is exclusive of the trade with Norfolk Island, Fiji, and New Guinea, so that nearly eight-ninths of the total trade of New South Wales is under the British flag.2
Proditcts. — Wool is the chief product of New South Wales, the value of the wool exported direct from the colony, 1890, being £5,873,764, and that exported by way of the other colonies being £3,081,798, representing a total value of £8,955,562, i.e. 44 per cent, of the whole export of Australasia.
In 1890, New South Wales had 333,233 acres under wheat, pro- ducing 3,649,216 bushels, and not sufficient for home consumption. The average production of wheat per acre for 1881-90 was 13.3 bushels. The colony imported, 1890, 1,798,042 bushels of wheat and flour.
Maize is also a very important crop, the yield in 1890 being 5,713,205 bushels, or 64.2 per cent, of the whole Australasian yield. The crop of oats was 256,659 bushels, averaging 21.9 bushels per acre, and representing only 1.6 per cent, of the whole Australasian yield. Barley grown was 81,383 bushels, averaging 19.4 bushels per acre, and representing 2.9 per cent, of the whole yield. Of potatoes the colony produced 52,791 tons, at an average of 2.7 tons per acre, representing 9*4 per cent, of the whole yield, which is not enough for her own consumption. In 1890 she imported 39,523 tons. The area under hay was 175,242 acres, averaging 1.3 tons per acre, and representing 16.6 per cent, of the whole yield. New South Wales also produced 842,181 gallons of wine and 3355 tons of table grapes. It may be noted that New South Wales raised 26,533 tons °f sugar in 1890, which is not enough for her own consumption.
With regard to minerals, New South Wales raised, 1890, 3,060,876 tons of coal, valued at £1,279,089, and representing 70. i per cent, of the whole Australasian output. The amount of gold raised was 127,761 oz., valued at £460,285, representing 7.7
1 In 1891, imports from United Kingdom, £10,580,230 ; exports to, £8,855,465.
2 See Coghlan's Seven Colonies of Australia, p. 49.
3io British Colonisation
per cent, of the whole Australasian yield. New South Wales is noted especially for its silver and silver-lead ore, the total value of which, 1890, was ,£2,762,554, equivalent to 96 per cent, of the total value raised in Australasia. She also produced ,£84,107 worth of copper, representing 26.4 per cent, of the whole Austra- lasian yield. New South Wales produced mineral wealth, 1890, to the value of £4, IDS. lod. per inhabitant.
Revenue. — For year ending December 1891,^10,047,152. Ex- penditure, ,£10,378,603. With regard to this revenue, ,£2,168,264 was raised from customs, ^3,439,283 from railways, ,£648,553 from post and telegraphs, ^2,266,612 from lands. With regard to ex- penditure, ,£2,357,372 was spent on railways, post and telegraphs cost ^693,473, public instruction ,£756,868, interest on public debt ,£1,905,636.
The Public Debt, 1891, was £ 5 2,498, 533.
It may be noted that in 1891 the total of private wealth in New South Wales was calculated by the Government statistician to be ^407,405,000, the public wealth ,£172,805,000, municipal pro- perty ,£6,400,000, giving a total of ,£586,700,000. It has been further calculated that the private wealth equals ,£363 per head of the population, and the public wealth ^154, or, together, ,£517 per head. In 1881 the private wealth was calculated to be ,£215 per head; thus, within ten years, 1881-91, the private wealth has nearly doubled itself.
SECTION B.— TASMANIA.
Area. — 26,215 square miles ; the greatest length from north to south being 210 miles, the greatest breadth 200 miles. The prin- cipal islands are the Furneaux group (including Flinders Island), with an area of 513,000 acres, off the north-east coast, famed for their seals, snakes, and thousands of mutton-birds (petrels) ; Cape Barren Island, 1 10,000 acres ; at the west end of Bass Straits are King's Island, 272,000 acres (notorious for its shipwrecks), Robin's Island, and Hunter's Island. On the south, opposite Hobart, are North Bruni and South Bruni Islands, where the last Tasmanian aborigines were located, with an area of 90,000 acres.
Divisions. — Tasmania is divided into eighteen counties, viz. Dorset, Cornwall, Devon, Wellington, Russell, Montagu, Lincoln, Westmoreland, Somerset, Glamorgan, Pembroke, Monmouth, Cumberland, Franklin, Montgomery, Arthur, Buckingham, Kent.
Appendices 3 1 1
Physical Features. — Tasmania has been described as an island of mountains, forests, and lakes of remarkable beauty. The Australian Alps on one side of Bass Straits and the Tasmanian peaks on the other form two groups of mountains furnishing a most distinctive feature of the geography of these latitudes. On the continent the highest elevation is about 7000 feet ; on the island the loftiest peaks are Cradle Mount, 5069 feet, Ben Lomond, 5010 feet. There are also Mounts Olympus and Ida, a Ben Nevis, 3910 feet, and a Rough Tor, not far from a river Tamar, reminding us of Cornwall and the Cornish Rough Tor in the Mother-country. The principal rivers are the Derwent, 130 miles in length ; the Huon, 100 miles ; the Tamar, the Davey, the Pie- man. There are numerous fresh-water lakes on the table-lands, the largest being the Great Lake, 3822 feet above sea-level, with an area of 28,000 acres. Tasmania is also noted for its forests. The climate being tempered by the sea breezes, the island is used as a sanatorium by Australians, and is wonderfully adapted to the European constitution. It also excels as a fruit-growing country.
Population.— -In 1861, 90,211; in 1871, 101,785; in 1881, 115,705; in 1891, 152,619. There are no aborigines, but 839 Chinese.
Chief Towns. — City of Hobart, 33,450 ; Launceston, 17,208 ; Georgetown, Longford. There is less centralisation in Tasmania than in the continental colonies, there being a longer stretch of coast-line and a greater choice of bays and harbours. The Der- went on the south affords easy access to the centre of the island.
Government. — The Government of Tasmania is of the * respon- sible' kind (18 Viet. No. 17), and consists of (i) a Governor appointed by the Crown ; (2) a Legislative Council of 18 members, elected by the colonists on a higher franchise than the Assembly, and holding their seats for six years ; (3) a Legislative Assembly of 36 members, representing 28 electoral districts. Election is by ballot. Members are not paid.
Trade. — The value of imports from countries outside Australasia, 1890, ,£743,276 ; exports, £323,799— giving a total value of £1,067,075, equivalent to £7, 8s. 5d. per head. The value of total — i.e. external and inter-colonial — trade was : 1890, imports, £1,897,512 ; exports, £1,486,992— giving a trade of £3,384, 504.' i In 1891, imports, £2,051,964 ; exports, £3,492,782.
312 British Colonisation
Products. — Wool is the chief product of Tasmania, although it is the only Australasian colony in which there has been a decrease of flocks. Tasmania is noted for its stud merinos, which are ex- ported to other colonies. The value of the wool exported direct from the colony, 1890, was ,£307,949, and that exported by way of the other colonies ,£1 1 1,224, representing a total value of ^419,173, i.e. 2.0 per cent, of the whole export of Australasia.
In 1890 Tasmania had 39,452 acres under wheat, producing 642,980 bushels, and not sufficient for home consumption. The average yield of wheat per acre for 1881-90 was 18.3 bushels. The colony imported, 1890, 234,826 bushels of wheat and flour.
Tasmania does not produce maize ; but in 1890 she grew 519,395 bushels of oats, averaging 26.8 bushels per acre, and representing 3.3 per cent, of the whole Australasian yield. Barley'was 99,842 bushels, averaging 24. i bushels per acre, and representing 3.6 of the whole Australasian yield. Of potatoes this colony grew 73,158 tons, at an average of 4.0 tons per acre, representing 13.0 per cent, of the whole yield, leaving a surplus of 33,374 tons for export. The area under hay, 1890, was 45,381 acres, averaging 1.2 tons per acre, and representing 4.0 per cent, of the whole Australasian yield. Tasmania is not classed as a wine-producing colony.
With regard to minerals, Tasmania raised, 1890, 53,812 tons of coal, valued at ,£24,215, and representing 1*3 per cent, of the whole Australasian yield. The amount of gold raised was 23,451 oz., valued at ,£87,114, representing 1.5 of the whole Australasian yield. Tasmania also produced ,£26,487 worth of silver and silver- lead. Her greatest mineral export, however, was tin, of which she raised ,£219,868 worth, representing more than a third of the whole Australasian yield. Tasmania produced mineral wealth, 1 890, to the value of ,£2, 93. 9d. per inhabitant.
Revenue. — For the year ending December 1890, ,£758,100. Expenditure. £722,746. With regard to the revenue of Tas- mania, ^329,067 was raised from customs, ,£102,642 from rail- ways, ;£6o,ioi from post and telegraphs, ,£79,965 from public lands. With regard to expenditure, ;£i 10,227 was taken for railways, ,£67,754 for post and telegraphs, ,£41,458 for public instruction, ,£223,652 for interest and charges on public debt. In 1891, revenue, ,£883,198 ; expenditure, ,£851,559.
Public Debt. — June 30, 1891, ,£6,718,950.
Appendices 3 1 3
SECTION C.— VICTORIA.
Area. — 87,884 square miles ; its greatest distance from east to west 480 miles, from north to south 300 miles. The coast-line is about 600 miles.
Divisions. — Victoria is divided intoTour districts : (i) Gippsland, (2) the Murray, (3) Wimmera, (4) Loddon. It is also divided into thirty-seven counties.
Physical Features. — A range of mountains traverses the entire length of the colony, the highest peaks being Bogong, 6508 feet ; Feathertop, 6393 feet ; Hotham, 6100 feet, at a distance of 60 or 70 miles from the sea-coast. This is called the dividing range, and all the Victorian rivers have their sources here : those to the north running to the Murray, and those on the south emptying into the sea. With the exception of the Murray, the Goulburn, and Yarra-Yarra, none of the Victorian rivers are navigable. The smaller rivers in Australia are called creeks, and dwindle down in dry weather ; in winter time they become torrents. The climate of Melbourne is healthy, and resembles that of Marseilles. The thermometer rarely falls below freezing point, and ' a cloudless sky, a bright sun, and refreshing breeze are characteristic of the greater number of days in each of the seasons.3 Occasionally the heat is very great at Melbourne.
Population. — In 1861, 540,322; in 1871, 731,528; in 1881, 862,346; in 1891, 1,140,405. In 1891 there were 565 aborigines and 8489 Chinese.
Chief Towns. — Melbourne, 490,902, forming 43.09 of the whole population ; Ballarat, 46,033 ; Bendigo, 37,238 ; Geelong, 24,210 ; Castlemaine, 6802 ; Stawell, 5191.
Government. — The Government of Victoria is of the 'responsible ' kind (18 and 19 Viet. cap. 55), and consists of: (i) a Governor appointed by the Crown ; (2) a Legislative Council of 48 members, elected for 14 provinces, each member retiring in rotation and holding office for six years ; (3) a Legislative Assembly of 95, representing 84 electoral districts. The Council is elected by voters with property qualifications ; the Assembly by manhood suffrage. Members of the Council are not paid ; members of the Assembly are paid ^300 per annum. The Council resembles our House of Lords in many of its functions. Money bills may be accepted or rejected. The Council cannot be dissolved by the Governor. Voting is by ballot. Triennial Parliaments.
314 British Colonisation
Trade. — The value of imports from countries outside Australasia, 1890, was .£14,428,256 ; exports, ,£9,202,1 16 — giving a total value of ,£23,630,372, equivalent to ,£21, 2s. 7d. per head. The value of the total — external and inter-colonial — trade was : 1890, imports, ,£22,954,01 5 ; exports, ,£13,266,222— giving a trade 0^36,220,237.* Products. — Wool is the chief product of Victoria, the value of the wool exported direct from the colony, 1890, being ,£2,671,802, that exported by way of the other colonies ,£71,562, representing a total value of ,£2,743,364, i.e. 13.5 per cent, of the whole export of Australasia.
Victoria is, together with Queensland, an important gold-pro- ducing colony, the amount of gold raised, 1890, being 610,587 ounces, valued at ,£2,354,244, or 39.2 per cent, of the whole Australasian yield. The production of gold in Victoria from 1851, the first discovery, to 1890 has been calculated to be worth ,£227,482,296, which represents 66.5 of the whole Australasian yield.2 In 1890 there were, in Victoria, 1,145,163 acres under wheat, producing 12,751,295 bushels, equivalent to 38.8 per cent, of the whole Australasian yield, more than sufficient for home consump- tion. In 1890 the colony exported 2,297,872 bushels. The average production of wheat per acre for 1881-1890 was 10. i bushels.
Maize is not an important crop in Victoria, the yield in 1890 being only 574,083 bushels, or 6.4 per cent, of the whole Australasian yield. The crop of oats was, 1890, 4,919,325 bushels, averaging 22.6 bushels per acre, and representing 31.1 of the whole yield. Barley was 1,571,599 bushels, averaging 18.6 bushels per acre, and representing 56.4 per cent, of the whole yield.
Of potatoes the colony produced 204,155 tons, at an average of 3.7 tons per acre, representing 36.3 per cent, of the whole Australasian yield, and enabling her to export, 1890, 1635 tons. The area under hay was 413,052 acres, averaging 1.2 tons per acre, and representing 44.3 per cent, of the whole yield. Victoria also produced 2,008,493 gallons of wine and 3177 tons of table grapes. On comparison, therefore, it will be seen that Victoria, with an area of only about one-fourth of that of New South Wales, pro- duces far larger quantities of wheat, oats, barley, hay, potatoes, and wine.3 It is, therefore, infinitely richer in its food supply and necessaries of life.
1 In 1891, imports, ^£21, 111,608 ; exports, ^37,718,351.
2 See The Seven Colonies of Australasia, p. 129, by T. A. Coghlan, 1892.
3 Ibid, passim.
Appendices 3 1 5
The silver production of Victoria is small — its value, 1890, being ,£4869, representing only 0.2 per cent. Her coal supply is also very limited, the production for the same year being only 57,962 tons, valued at ^53,655, equivalent to 0.2 per cent, of the whole Australasian yield. New South Wales is far richer in coal and silver. Victoria produced mineral wealth, 1890, to the value of £2, 2s. 8d. per inhabitant.
Revenue. — For the year ending June 1891, ^8,343,588. Ex- penditure, ,£9,128,699. With regard to the revenue of Victoria, ,£2,525,572 was raised from customs, ^3,306,580 from railways, .£499,506 from post and telegraphs, ,£613,068 from public lands. With regard to expenditure, £2,469,800 was taken for railways, ,£744,096 for post and telegraphs, ^775,124 for public instruction, /i, 646,884 for interest and charges on public debt.
The Public Debt, June 30, 1891, was ,£43,482,797.
SECTION D.— WESTERN AUSTRALIA.
Area. — 1,057,250 square miles, extending 1280 miles from north to south and 800 miles from east to west. This is the largest of the Australasian colonies. It is nearest to India, Singapore, and Batavia. Its coast-line is 3000 miles.
Divisions. — The colony is divided into six land districts : (r) the South- Western Division, (2) Gascoyne, (3) North-Western Division, (4) Kimberley, (5) Eucla, (6) Eastern Division. There are also twenty-six counties in the settled parts.
Physical Features. — The colony of Western Australia has been termed the giant skeleton of a colony, thinly inhabited, and stretching over vast expanses of country. It is thus described by a late Governor, Sir F. A. Weld : ' The whole country, from north to south, excepting the spots cleared for cultivation, may be described as one vast forest in the sense of being heavily timbered : sometimes, but comparatively seldom, the traveller comes across an open, sandy plain covered with shrubs and flowering plants in infinite variety and exquisite beauty, and often, especially in the northern and eastern districts, low, scrubby trees and bushes fill the place of timber ; but — taking the word * forest ' in its widest sense, as wild, woody, and bushy country — Western Australia, as far as I have seen, is covered with one vast forest stretching far away into regions yet unexplored.'
316 British Colonisation
Population.— In 1861, 15,691 ; in 1871, 25,353 5 in l88l> 29,708 ; in 1891, 49,782. In 1891 there were 6245 aborigines in Western Australia and 917 Chinese.
Chief Towns. — Perth, 8447 ; Fremantle, 5607 ; both these towns containing about one-third of the whole population. Other towns are : Albany, Geraldton, York, Bunbury, Guildford, Northampton.
Government. — The Government of Western Australia is of the 'responsible' kind (53 and 54 Viet. cap. 26), and has come into existence very recently. It consists of (i) a Governor appointed by the Crown ; (2) a Legislative Council of 1 5 members nominated by the Crown ; (3) a Legislative Assembly of 30 members.
Trade. — The value of imports from countries outside Australasia,
1890, was ,£512,608; exports, ,£483,380— giving a total value of ,£995,988, equivalent to .£21, 2s. 2d. per head. The value of total — i.e. external and inter-colonial — trade was : 1890, imports, .£874,447; exports, .£671,813— giving a 'trade of ,£1,546,260. In
1891, imports, ,£1,280,093 ; exports, ,£799,466.
Products. — The wool exported direct was ^248,137, and that exported by way of the other colonies ,£13,215, representing a total value of ^261,352, i.e. 1.3 per cent, of the whole export of Australasia. In 1890 Western Australia had 33,820 acres under wheat, producing 465,025 bushels — not enough for home consump- tion. The average production of wheat per acre for 1881-1890 was 1 1.8 bushels. The colony imported, 1890, 136,725 bushels of wheat and flour.
Western Australia grows very little maize, unlike Queensland and New South Wales. The crop of oats was only 37,713 bushels, the colony importing 100,136 bushels. Barley was 87,813 bushels, averaging 14.8 bushels per acre, and representing only 3.1 of the whole yield. Of potatoes the colony only produced 1655 tons, at an average of 2.9 tons per acre, representing 0.3 per cent, of the whole yield, and not enough for her own consumption. In 1890 she imported 936 tons. The area under hay was 23,183 acres, averaging i.o ton per acre, representing 2.1 of the whole yield. Western Australia also produced 194,465 gallons of wine.
With regard to minerals, Western Australia is not a coal-pro- ducing colony. The amount of gold raised in 1890 was 22,256 ounces, valued at ,£86,664, representing 1.4 of the whole Australasian yield. Western Australia is not a silver-producing colony ; and her copper-mines produced, 1890, ,£140,000 worth of metal, repre-
Appendices 3 1 7
senting only 0.5 of whole yield. Still, Western Australia produced, 1890, minerals to the value of £2 for each inhabitant.
Revenue.— Yor the year ending December 1891, ^497,670. Expenditure •, .£435,623. With regard to the revenue, .£237,697 was raised from customs, ,£65,710 from railways, ,£31,336 from post and telegraphs, ;£ 101,981 from lands. With regard to expenditure, ,£68,348 was spent on railways, £4 1,2 43 on post and telegraphs, ,£12,486 on puhlic instruction, ,£76,772 as interest on public debt.
The Public Debt in 1891 was ,£1,613,594.
SECTION E. — SOUTH AUSTRALIA.
A rea.-— 380,070 square miles ; its greatest length from north to south being 1850 miles, and the width 650 miles, with a coast-line of 2000 miles.
Divisions. — The colony is divided into four pastoral districts : (i) the Eastern, with an area of 4840 square miles ; (2) the Western, 15,641 square miles; (3) the Northern, 123,853 square miles; (4) the North-eastern, 28,126 square miles. It is also divided into thirty-nine counties, including an area of 66,558 square miles. It is also divided into * hundreds ' and district councils : the former being blocks of country thrown open for agricultural settlement on annual leases, the latter being areas of what may be described as municipal jurisdiction. The northern territory seems to be a mere appendage to the old settlements of the south, separated by a vast desert, and connected only by the telegraph wire.
Physical Features. — There are three ranges of mountains :
(1) Mount Lofty, 2334 feet, almost overshadowing Adelaide ;
(2) the Flinders Range, extending for hundreds of miles north- wards from Spencer's Gulf, the highest points being Mount Remarkable, 3100 feet, and Mount Brown, 3100 feet; (3) the Hummocks, extending northwards from St. Vincent's Gulf. The chief rivers are the Murray, navigable from beyond Albany in New South Wales, emptying into Lake Alexandrina, and thence into the sea by the Murray mouth ; the Torrens ; and in the northern territory the Roper, navigable for nearly 100 miles from the Gulf of Carpentaria. The largest island is Kangaroo Island, 85 miles long and 30 miles broad, at the mouth of Gulf St. Vincent. Lake Torrens is a vast inland salt lake ; Lakes Eyre and Gardner are also salt lakes. There are also several curious volcanic fresh-
318 British Colonisation
water lakes, such as Blue Lake. The interior is a vast Sahara, traversed with difficulty.
Population.— In 1861, 126,830; in 1871, 185,626; in 1881, 279,865 ; in 1891, 320,431. In 1891 there were 23,789 aborigines and 3676 Chinese.
Chief Towns. — Adelaide, 133,252, representing 41.58 per cent, of the whole population ; also Port Adelaide, 15,976 ; Gawler, on the Gawler River ; Kapunda, the site of the copper-mines ; Kooringa, 1 01 miles from Adelaide ; Mount Gambier, the largest of the eastern towns, close to the extinct volcano, and the centre of what is termed the Garden of the Colony ; Petersburg ; Port Victor, near Encounter Bay ; and Wollaroo, the seaport of a mining district.
Government. — The Government of South Australia is of the 'responsible' kind (13 and 14 Viet. cap. 59), and consists of (i) a Governor appointed by the Crown ; (2) a Legislative Council of 24 members, retiring in rotation after certain intervals, and elected on a higher franchise than the members of the Assembly ; and (3) a Legislative Assembly of 52 members, elected by all male subjects of Her Majesty of full age of twenty-one years, a natural-born or naturalised subject. Members both of the Council and Assembly are paid. Voting is by ballot. Triennial parlia- ments.
Trade. — The value of imports from countries outside Australasia was, 1890, ,£3,500,013 ; exports, £$,333,729— giving a total value of ,£8,833,742, equivalent to £27, 145. 8d. per head.
The value of total — external and inter-colonial — trade was : 1890, imports, .£8,333,783; exports, £8,961,982— giving a trade of £17,295,765. In 1891, imports, £9,956,542 ; exports, £10,512,049.
It may be observed that the enormous impetus given to South Australian trade since 1881 is one of the marked features of Australasian statistics. Some of it, however, can be traced to the development of the Barrier district of New South Wales, of which South Australia is the natural outlet.
Products. — Wool stands second in value amongst the products of South Australia, the value of wool exported direct from the colony, 1890, being £1,075,255, and that exported by way of the other colonies £220,496, representing a total value of £1,295,751, i.e. 6.4 per cent, of the whole export of Australasia.
In 1890 South Australia had 1,673,573 acres under wheat, pro-
Appendices 319
ducing 9,399,389 bushels, enabling her to export 10,959,102 bushels, a most important article of export, at 45. 3d. per bushel, and exceed- ing the value of the wool export. The average production of wheat per acre for 1881-90 was 6.0 bushels. Maize is not returned as a product of South Australia, and the crop of oats for 1890 was only 116,229 bushels, averaging n.6 bushels per acre, and repre- senting only 0.8 per cent, of the whole Australasian yield. The barley grown was 175,583 bushels, averaging 12.4 bushels per acre, and representing 6.3 per cent, of the whole yield. Of potatoes the colony produced 23,963 tons, at an average of 3.5 tons per acre, representing 4.3 per cent, of the whole yield, which is not enough for her own consumption, as she imported 2783 tons in 1890. The area under hay was 345,150 acres, averaging i.o ton per acre, representing 24.2 per cent, of the whole yield. South Australia produced 762,776 gallons of wine and 5631 tons of table grapes. With regard to minerals, South Australia does not produce coal, and her production of gold was only 26,086 oz., valued at ,£101,577, representing 1.7 of the whole Australasian yield. Of silver she produced an amount to the value of ,£12,819, representing 0.4 of the whole yield. South Australia is the great copper-producing colony, and in 1890 she was credited with ,£231,592 worth of this mineral, representing 72.7 per cent, of the whole Australasian out- put. Up to 1890 she had produced .£19,751,450 worth. The colony produced mineral wealth, 1890, to the value of £it 35. iid. per inhabitant.
Revenue. — For year ending June 1891, ,£2,732,222. Expendi- ture, ,£2,603,498. With regard to this revenue, ,£615,266 was raised from customs, .£1,198,157 from railways, ,£214,027 from post and telegraphs, ,£245,513 from lands. With regard to the expendi- ture, ,£620,229 was spent on railways, ,£188,327 on post and tele- graphs, ,£136,482 on public instruction, .£827,993 on interest on public debt.
Public Debt. — 1891, ,£21,776,032.
SECTION F.— QUEENSLAND.
Area. — 668,497 square miles ; its greatest length from north to south being 1300 miles, the breadth 800 miles, with a coast-line of 2550 miles.
Divisions. — Queensland is divided into twelve large districts : (i) Moreton, (2) Darling Downs, (3) Burnett, (4) Port Curtis,
320 British Colonisation
(5) Maranoa, (6) Leichhardt, (7) Kennedy, (8) Mitchell, (9) War- rego, (10) Gregory, (u) Burke, (12) Cook. It is also divided into financial districts, (i) the southern, (2) the central, '(3) the northern.
It has been proposed recently to divide Queensland into two separate colonies : the line of demarcation running west from Cape Palmerston on the east coast in South latitude 21° 30' to the eastern boundary of South Australia. The area would be 249,000 square miles ; population, 50,000.
Physical Features. — Off the east coast the great Barrier Reefs, running parallel with the coast at a distance of 10 to 100 miles, are a peculiar feature, very dangerous to early navigators. A coast range of mountains runs from York Peninsula nearly to Brisbane at an average distance of 50 miles from the coast. The main range or great dividing range runs inland of the coast range, and is a continuation of the Cordillera of New South Wales and Victoria, extending north to latitude 21° and thence west. Cape York Peninsula, which runs up in the form of a pyramid into the waters of Torres Straits, is a notable feature. There are many harbours, of which Moreton Harbour is the chief, receiving the waters of six rivers. The surface of Queensland may be divided into three portions : (i) a coast district, consisting of a narrow strip lying along the coast, traversed by numerous rivers ; (2) a highland region, including the spurs of the coast range ; (3) level tracts ex- tending westward to the South Australian boundary line. The conditions of Queensland are those of a colony lying partly in a tropical and partly in a sub-tropical zone. This implies a variation of products and industries practically unknown in the other Aus- tralian colonies, although, of course, South and West Australia have tropical provinces.
Population. — In 1861, 30,059; in 1871, 120,104; m 1881, 213,525 ; in 1891, 393,718, representing a quicker increase since 1 86 1 than any other Australasian colony. In 1891 there were said to be over 70,000 natives in Queensland and 8574 Chinese. There are also said to be 9000 or 10,000 kanakas, or Polynesian labourers, coming under indentures from the Pacific Islands to the sugar estates.
Chief Towns. — Brisbane, 101,564, forming 25.80 per cent, of the whole population; Rockhampton, 13,380; Maryborough, 8700; Townsville, 8564 ; Gympie, 8449 ; Ipswich, 7625 ; Toowoomba, 7007.
Government. — The Government of Queensland is of the 'respon-
Appendices 321
sible' kind (June 1859), and consists of: (i) a Governor; (2) a Legislative Council of 39 members nominated by the Governor, and holding office for life ; (3) a Legislative Assembly of .72 members, representing 60 electoral districts, and elected by all male sub- jects of Her Majesty of full age of twenty-one years, after a six months' residence in one locality. The terms of the electoral franchise are high, necessitating, inter alia^ a freehold qualification of .£100 per annum or a receipt of ,£100 per annum salary. Mem- bers receive .£300 per annum. Voting is by ballot. Quinquennial Parliaments.
Trade. — The value of imports from countries outside Australasia, 1890, was .£2,502,008 ; exports, ,£2,449,658— giving a total value of ^4,95 1,666, equivalent to .£12, 145. nd. per head. The value of total — i.e. external and inter-colonial — trade was : 1890, imports, ,£5,066,700; exports, ,£8,554,512— giving a trade of ^13,621,212. In 1891, imports, .£5,079,004 ; exports, ,£8,305,387.
Products. — The value of the wool exported direct from the colony was ,£1,821,988, and that exported by way of the other colonies being ,£702,754, representing a total value of .£2,524,742, i.e. 12.4 per cent, of the whole export of Australasia.
In 1890 Queensland had only 10,390 acres under wheat, producing 207,990 bushels, and totally insufficient for home consumption. The average production of wheat per acre for 1881-1890 was 10.5 bushels. The colony imported no less than 2,295,459 bushels of wheat and flour. Maize is the principal crop grown in Queens- land, the yield in 1890 being 2,373,803 bushels, or 23.4 per cent, of the whole Australasian yield. The crop of oats was only 8967 bushels, that of barley only 12,673 bushels. Of potatoes the colony produced 28,810 tons, averaging 3.1 tons per acre, representing 5.1 per cent, of the whole yield, not sufficient for her own consump- tion. In 1890 she imported 15,01 1 tons. The area under hay was 31,106 acres, averaging 1.7 tons per acre, representing only 3.9 of the whole yield. Queensland also produced 189,274 gallons of wine and 1074 tons of table grapes.
The sugar industry is peculiar to Queensland, together with New South Wales. In 1890 there were in the former colony 50,922 acres planted, producing 69,983 tons. Queensland was enabled to export, 1890, 40,521 tons, valued at ,£695,892.
With regard to minerals, Queensland raised, 1890, 338,344 tons of coal, valued at ,£157,077, and representing 8.6 of the whole Aus-
x
322 British Colonisation
tralasian output, and ranking with New South Wales and New Zealand as a coal-producing colony. The amount of gold raised was 610,587 oz., valued at ,£2,137,054, representing 35.6 of the whole Australasian yield, and placing Queensland next only to Victoria as a gold-producing colony. Queensland also produced ^56,639 worth of silver, representing 2.0 per cent, of the whole yield. Queensland produced, 1890, mineral wealth to the value of ;£6, gs. 8d. per inhabitant, the highest average of all the Australasian colonies.
Revenue. — For year ending June 1891, ^3,350,223. Expendi- ture, ,£3,684,655. With regard to this revenue, ^1,261,757 was raised from customs, ,£882,762 from railways, .£218,801 from post and telegraphs, ,£534,342 from public lands. With regard to expenditure, .£639,597 was spent on railways, ^333,048 on post and telegraphs, .£266,304 on public instruction, whilst ;£ 1,139,034 was taken for the charges on the public debt.
Public Debt.— 1891, .£29,578,384.
SECTION G.— NEW GUINEA.
In November 1884 the British protectorate was proclaimed over the south coast of New Guinea to the eastward of I4ist meridian of E. longitude. In 1882 the Queensland Government had sent Captain Chester to annex it, but the act was disallowed at home. In December 1884 a German squadron hoisted the German flag on the north coast of New Guinea, from the I4ist meridian to Huon Gulf, and in Admiralty, Hermit, Anchorite, New Britain, and New Ireland groups, the latter being named King William's Land. The discovery of New Guinea dates back to 1526, when the island was sighted by Don George de Menesis, a Portuguese sailor, who was driven out of his course in voyaging from Malacca to the Moluccas. He called it Papua. In 1643 Abel Tasman explored part of the coast, and in 1699 Dampier circumnavigated the island. In 1770 Cook sailed along the coast, and in 1792 Dentrecasteaux visited it. In 1846-50 Captain Owen Stanley sur- veyed a portion of the coast. The earliest attempt at settlement by Europeans was made by a Dutchman, Captain Steenboem, in 1828 ; but the establishment of the London Missionary Society in 1871 resulted in throwing most light upon the island. In 1873 Captain Moresby discovered and named Port Moresby on the south-east coast. The British authorities were induced to annex
Appendices 323
South-East Guinea, from the fear lest any European Power should plant itself there as a menace to Australia, or convert any portion of it into a penal settlement, as France has converted New Cale- donia.
Area of New Guinea. — 305,900 square miles, of which it is calculated 86,360 are British, 68,785 German, and 150,755 Dutch. It is 1400 miles in length, and 450 miles in breadth.
Physical Features.— 'An extended map of New Guinea looks much like a dromedary. The head rises from Geelvink Bay on the north, and the throat is formed by the M'Clure inlet on the west. Then eastward from Geelvink Bay the island increases in bulk until you come to the broadest part, about 450 miles, narrow- ing again until you reach the peninsula, which is most mountain- ous. In some places, on both the north and south-east coasts, the mountains rise precipitous from the sea, and end in the east in the two prongs, between which is Sir John Milne Bay.'1 It is con- jectured that there are about 460,000 natives in British New Guinea. Around the mouth of the Fly River are found large native houses. In the swamps, streets of houses are built on piles, and in the Motu district are several villages built in the sea. Yams, sago, the sugar-cane are grown. The island is fertile, though unhealthy. There are forty-two mission stations, chiefly conducted by Polynesian native teachers. There has been great mortality amongst these teachers — no fewer than 103 having died out of 201 imported since 1871. Comparatively little is known of the interior of this vast tropical island, although only 90 miles dis- tant from Australia. It is not fitted to be a home of European immigrants. From its geographical situation it is more closely connected with Queensland than any other colony. Murray Island, which lies midway between Queensland and New Guinea, has been joined to Queensland. In a certain sense British New Guinea may be regarded as an annexe of Queensland.
SECTION H.— NEW ZEALAND.
Area. — 104,471 square miles. The North Island has a length of about 515 miles, and a breadth of about 250 miles, with a coast- line of 2200 miles. The South Island, or, as it is officially called,
1 Paper by Mr. Chalmers, Proceedings of the Royal Colonial Institute, vol. xviii.
324 British Colonisation
the Middle Island, has a length of about 525 miles, and a breadth of about 1 80, with a coast-line of 2000 miles. Amongst the islands of New Zealand are Stewart Island, with an area of 665 square miles, the Chatham, the Auckland, the Campbell, the Bounty Islands.
Divisions. — New Zealand is divided into nine provincial dis- tricts : Auckland, Taranaki, Wellington, Nelson, Canterbury, Otago, Hawke's Bay, Marlborough, Southland. It is also divided into sixty-three counties.
Physical Features. — The most striking feature of New Zealand geography is a mountain range running the whole length of the two islands in the direction of south-west to north-east. Amongst the highest peaks are Mount Cook, 12,349 feet ; Mount Hoch- stetter, 11,200 feet; Mount Egmont, 8300 feet; Tongariro, an active volcano, 6500 feet. In the South Island are the Southern Alps, stretching along a distance of 200 miles. The Canterbury Plains, the largest in New Zealand, are also a notable feature. The two islands are separated from one another by Cook Strait. By the nearest line, from point to point, New Zealand is 1175 miles from New South Wales.
Population— In 1861, 99,021; in 1871, 256,393; in 1881, 489,933 ; in 1891, 626,658. In 1891 there were 41,523 Maoris, and 4292 Chinese.
Chief Towns.— Auckland, 51,127; Christchurch, 47,846; Dun- edin, 45,865 ; Wellington, 33,224 ; Invercargill, 8551 ; Napier, 8341 ; Nelson, 6626 ; Oamaru, 5621 ; Wanganui, 5011. In New Zealand the population is more evenly distributed than in the other Australasian colonies.
Government. — The Government of New Zealand is of the ' re- sponsible' kind (1852), and consists of (i) a Governor appointed by the Crown ; (2) a Legislative Council of 40 members appointed by the Crown for life ; (3) a House of Representatives of 74 members, including 4 Maoris, elected by adult males on the six months residential qualification. Members of the Council receive £100 for every session, if resident more than three miles from the Assembly Buildings ; and members of the House of Representa- tives receive £100 for every session. Triennial Parliaments.
Trade. — The value of the imports from countries outside Aus- tralasia was ,£5,172,932 ; exports, £8,177,472 — giving a total value of £13,350,404, equivalent to £21, 95. lod. per head. The value of
Appendices 325
total — i.e. external and inter-colonial — trade was : 1890, imports, £6,260,525; exports, ,£9,811,720— giving a trade of ^16,072,245. In 1891, imports, ,£6,503,849 ; exports, £9,06,397-
Products. — The wool exported direct, 1890, was worth ,£4,139,924, and that exported by way of other colonies ,£9465, representing a total value of ,£4,149,389, i.e. 20.4 per cent, of the whole export of Australasia.
In 1890 New Zealand had 301,460 acres under wheat, producing 5,723,610 bushels — more than enough for home consumption. The average production of wheat per acre for 1881-90 was 24.5 bushels. The colony exported 4,943,652 bushels in 1890. The maize crop yielded 238,864 bushels, and the crop of oats was 9,947,036, averaging 31.0 bushels per acre, and representing 62.9 per cent, of the whole Australasian yield. The barley grown was 758,833 bushels, averaging 27.8 bushels per acre, and representing 27.2 per cent, of the whole yield. Of potatoes, the colony produced 178,121 tons, at an average of 5.2 tons per acre, representing 31.6 per cent, of the whole yield, and allowing her to export 28,872 tons. It will therefore be seen that for wheat, oats, barley, and potatoes the yield per acre is higher than in any other colony. The area under hay was 44,045 acres, averaging 1.4 tons per acre, and representing 4.9 of the whole yield. New Zealand is not returned as a wine- and grape-producing country.
With regard to minerals, New Zealand raised, 1890, 635,481 tons of coal, valued at .£349,936, and representing 19.2 of the whole Australasian output. The amount of gold raised was 193,193 oz., valued at £773,438, representing 12.9 per cent, of the whole Aus- tralasian yield. Of silver, New Zealand only raised £6162 worth in 1890, representing 0.2 per cent, of the whole yield. New Zealand produced mineral wealth, 1890, to the value of ,£2, gs. id. per inhabitant.
Revenue. — For the year ending December 1890, .£4, 193,942. Expenditure, £4,081,566. With regard to this revenue, .£1,535,868 was raised from customs, £1,143,989 from railways, .£338,315 from post and telegraphs, £330,956 from public lands. With regard to expenditure, .£725,332 was spent on railways, .£257,684 on post and telegraphs, ^397,885 on public instruction, ,£1,640,289 on charges on the public debt.
The Public Debt, March 31, 1891, was £38,830,350.
From the above figures some general conclusions may be
326 British Colonisation
gathered — especially with regard to the distribution of industries. It will be noticed that New South Wales figures as the great wool-producing colony — her share of the export being no less than 44 per cent. She also exports 96 per cent, of the silver raised in Australasia ; and her coal is also an exceptional source of wealth, the amount raised, 1890, being more than 70 per cent, of the whole. She also raises more than 30 per cent, of the tin. As far as mineral wealth is concerned, New South Wales is amply endowed. Victoria, however, stands pre-eminent as the great gold-producing colony (39.2 per cent.), although Queensland (35.6 per cent.), owing to the richness of the Mount Morgan mines, is running her close. South Australia produces more than 70 per cent, of the copper. The wealth of New Zealand in coal (19.2 per cent.), in gold (12.9 per cent.), is considerable.
When we come to crops and cereals, the variations of industries are remarkable. Wheat, oats, barley, potatoes grow best in New Zealand ; but the importance of Australasia as a producer of wheat is small when compared with the rest of the world. The greatest amount of wheat is grown in South Australia, and together with Victoria and New Zealand it is able to export some of its surplus. Both Queensland and New South Wales are compelled to import largely. New Zealand (62.9 per cent.) and Victoria (31.1 per cent.) are the great oat-growing countries, whilst New South Wales (64.2 per cent.) and Queensland (26.7 percent.) produce the largest amount of maize. Victoria (50.4 per cent.) and New Zealand (27.2 per cent.) are the great barley-growing colonies, and produce, also, 36.3 per cent, and 31.6 per cent, of the whole crop of potatoes. With regard to other industries, New South Wales and Queens- land are the only sugar-producing colonies, whilst South Australia and Victoria are most successful with the wine industry. There is no article, however, so valuable to Australasia as wool.
SECTION I.— FIJI.
Area. — 7400 square miles. There are about 250 islands, of which half are inhabited. The largest are Viti Levu, 4200 square miles, and Vanua Levu, 2400 square miles. Other islands are Taviuni, 217 square miles; Kandavu, 124 square miles; Ovalu, where the old capital of Fiji, Levuka, is situated ; and Gau, Lakeba, Koro, and Mago.
Appendices 327
Divisions. — The island is divided into fourteen provinces, each under the control of a Roko Tui, or chief native officer.
Physical Features. — The whole group lies within the tropics, and in the track of the south-east trades. The islands are all mountainous, more or less. Some peaks rise to the height of 3000 to 4000 feet. Nearly all the islands are surrounded by coral reefs. Many of them are of volcanic origin, and hot springs are found there as in the West Indies. Viti Levu is the only island with rivers of any importance, viz. the Rewa, Navua, Siga, Tokacond : these permit of navigation to the unusual extent, for an island, often or twenty miles. There are many good harbours and anchorages. At times the rainfall is very heavy, and hurricanes occasionally occur. These are not so violent as in Mauritius and the West Indies.1
Population. — 1891, 121,180, of whom 110,871 are native Fijians, 6311 Indian immigrants, 1988 Europeans, with a mixture of Polynesians, half-castes, and Chinese. Nearly half of the inhabi- tants live on Viti Levu.
Chief Towns. — Suva, the capital, on Viti Levu (700) ; Levuka.
Government. — Fiji is a Crown colony, and is administered by (i) a Governor nominated by the Crown; (2) an Executive Council ; (3) a Legislative Council of six official and six non- official nominated members. The natives live under a system of village councils.
Trade.— 1891, imports, ^259,049. Exports, £474*334- Nearly the whole of Fiji imports and exports is with British colonies. 'Their trade (1872-1886) was chiefly carried on with New South Wales, Victoria, and New Zealand. The imports and exports from and to British possessions were respectively 87 per cent, and 79 per cent. The same from and to the United Kingdom were only 9 per cent, and 7 per cent.'2 In 1891, the imports from United Kingdom were .£195.
Products. — Sugar is the most important product. Bananas come next, cocoa-nuts, tea, tobacco, vanilla. Coffee-growing has been tried, but has failed owing to the attacks of the Acarus coffece. Indian corn is grown by the natives.
Revenue. — 1891, ,£71,250. Expenditure, ,£67,820.
Public De&t.—i>, ^246,690.
1 Paper on 'Agriculture in Fiji,' Proceedings of the Royal Colonial Insti- tute, vol. xxi. 2 Sir Rawson W. Rawson.
328 British Colonisation
THE GILBERT ISLANDS.
The Gilbert Archipelago, over which a British protectorate has recently been proclaimed, lies across the equator in longitude 170° and 1 80° E., to the north-west of the Fiji group. It consists of 16 atolls, many of them triangulai in shape. It was discovered by Marshall and Gilbert in 1788. The inhabitants are described as a mixed Malayo-Polynesian race, and supply the labour market of Fiji. They are known as Tokalaus in the Pacific. Apimama is one of the chief islands. The group has been visited by German traders from Apia, who import Hamburg gin in large quantities.
Cocoa-nuts and copra are the chief products.
Since 1877 these islands, together with the southern Solomon Islands, the New Hebrides, the Tongan or Friendly Islands, the Samoan or Navigators' Islands, and other small islands in Melanesia, have fallen under the High Commissioner of the West Pacific. The object of this Commission has been to carry out the Pacific Islanders Protection Acts, 1872 and 1875, anc^ to provide a civil court for settlement of disputes between British subjects. It covered, indeed, all islands not included in Fiji, Queensland, or New South Wales, or claimed by any foreign Power.
The following are some general statistics, 1891, of the seven ' responsible ' colonies of Australasia : —
Religious Denominations. Number.
Church of England, . . . .1,516,190
Roman Catholic, .... 829,180
Presbyterian, ..... 495,830
Wesleyans and Primitive Methodists, . . 440,680
Congregational,. . . . . 78,120
Baptist, . ... . . . 84,340
Lutheran, ..... 75.240
Salvation Army, .... 42,820
Unitarian, ..... 4>23°
Other Protestants, . . 49>77o
Hebrews, ..... 14,820
Pagans, . . . 49,5^0
Unclassed, . 129,280
3,810,080
Appendices 329
State-aided Immigrants to 1890.
Prior to 1890. 1881-90. Total.
New South Wales, . 114,253 34,°79 148,332
Victoria,. . . 140,102 140,102
Queensland, . . 52,399 103,140 155,539
South Australia, . 88,050 7,298 95,348
West Australia, . . 889 4,552 5,441
Tasmania, . 18,965 2,734 21,699
New Zealand, . . 100,920 14,614
515,578 166,417 681,995
Of late years State-aided immigration to the Australasian colonies has practically ceased.
Distribution of Trade in Australasia.
The greater portion of the trade of Australasia — viz. about three- quarters — is with the United Kingdom ; the remainder is carried on with the United States, France, Germany, and Belgium. This foreign trade, especially with Belgium, is growing. The steamers of the Messageries Maritimes (1883), of the Nord Deutscher Lloyd Company of Bremen (1887), testify to its im- portance. The following is a statistical account of the external trade of Australasia in 1881 and 1890-91 : —
1881. 1890-91
With the United Kingdom (exports
and imports), . . . ^50,004,607 £56,363,91 1
British possessions (exports and
imports), . . 7,336,156 5,476,404
Foreign countries .... 7,213,915 13,383,412
^64,554,678 ^75,2.23,727
In 1 88 1 the trade with the United Kingdom constituted 77.4 per cent. ; in 1890 this was reduced to 74.9 per cent. That with British possessions had also decreased from 11.4 to 7.3, whilst that with foreign countries had increased from 11.2 to 17.8 per cent.1
The best prospects of expansion for Australasian trade lie in the East, especially with India, China, Japan, and the East Indian Archipelago. A large business, especially in tea, is done with the 1 The Seven Colonies of Australasia, by T. A. Coghlan, p. 32.
330
British Colonisation
island of Ceylon. The bulk of the South Pacific trade is with Fiji and New Caledonia. A glance at the conditions and prospects of Australasian trade proves at once the paramount importance to the colonists of naval defence and a system of naval co-operation with the Mother-country. A safe passage to Antwerp and Ham- burg is becoming more and more essential to Australasian pro- sperity.
Australasian Railways.
New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland, .
South Australia, .
Western Australia, Tasmania, New Zealand,
Miles of Line. |
Gauge. |
Ft. In. |
|
2,263 |
4 8J |
2,763 |
5 3 |
2,195 |
3 6 |
1,829 | |
5 3l 3 6f |
585 |
3 6 |
399 |
3 6 |
1,956 |
3 6 |
11,990
Total Cost. |
Cost per mile. |
^31,768,617 36,341,626 15,101,617 |
,£14,559 13,153 6,487 |
12,544,733 |
6,923 |
832,497 2,900,362 14,278,586 |
4,204 8,269 7,752 |
^113,768,038 |
^10,030 |
The average interest on all Australasian loans is 4.02 per cent., and the returns yielded by the railways is 3.01 per cent, showing a loss in working of i.oi per cent., equivalent to ;£i, 149,150.*
Defence Forces of Australasia, 1890.
New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland, South Australia, . Western Australia, Tasmania, . New Zealand,
Total Forces. Paid. Partially Paid. Unpaid.
9,285 |
538 |
4,146 |
4,601 |
7,314 |
406 |
4,343 |
2,565 |
4,497 |
134 |
2,787 |
i,576 |
2,202 |
64 |
1,361 |
777 |
688 |
2 |
686 |
— |
2,038 |
32 |
521 |
1,485 |
7,824 |
204 |
— |
7,620 |
33,848 1,380 13,844 18,624
In addition to these forces, all the colonies, with the exception of Western Australia, have small corps of volunteer artillery, or a
1 See Coghlan's Seven Colonies of Australasia, p. 174.
Appendices 331
partially paid force of a similar character. The marine forces are
as follows : —
New South Wales, .... 633
Victoria, . . . . . . 615
Queensland, 428
South Australia, 170
Tasmania, 68
New Zealand, 1,192
The combined forces of all the Australasian colonies is there- fore 36,954.
Males of Military Age, 20 to 40 years, 1891.* New South Wales, 209,237 representing 30.26 per cent. Victoria, . . 207,033 „ 29.93 „
Queensland,. . 86,593 „ 12.52 „
South Australia, . 53,964 „ 7.80 „
Western Australia, 12,018 „ 1.74 „
Tasmania, . . 24,858 „ 3.60 „
New Zealand . 97,864 „ 14.15 „
691,567
Naval Defence.
The boundaries of the Australian naval station are from 95° E. longitude, by the parallel of 10° S. latitude, to 139° E. longitude ; thence north to 12° N. latitude, and along this parallel to 160° W. longitude ; and on the south by the Antarctic Circle, including the numerous groups of islands within those limits. The defence of the Australasian coast is in the hands of the British ships of the Australian station and of the Australasian Auxiliary Squadron. Sydney is the headquarters of the fleet. In 1891 there were nine Imperial vessels — Orlando, Curaqoa, Cordelia, Rapid, Royalist, Lizard, Goldfinch, Ringdove, Dart.
Australian Auxiliary Squadron.
This arrived in Port Jackson, September 5, 1891, and consisted of five fast cruisers, the Katoomba, Ringarooma, Mildura, Wallaroo, Tauranga, and two torpedo-boats, the Boomerang and Karakatea. i The Seven Colonies of Australasia, by T. A. Coghlan, p. 342.
332 British Colonisation
The contribution of each colony for the maintenance of this auxiliary fleet, on the basis of population, for the year 1891, was:— New South Wale?, . . .£27,430 Victoria, . . . * . . 27,280 Queensland, . . . 9)38o
South Australia, . . ' 7,47° Western Australia, . . % 1,210 Tasmania, . . . 3,47o
New Zealand, . . . 14,760
£91,000
Victoria has a navy of its own for harbour defence, Queensland has two gunboats, South Australia maintains one twin-screw steel cruiser, Tasmania has one torpedo-boat, and Western Australia owns one schooner. The total expenditure for defence and forti- fications, 1890-91, was as follows :—
New South Wales, ,£280,780 representing 45. lid. per head Victoria, . . 149,381 „ 2s. 8d. „
Queensland, . . 66,013 „ 35. sd. „
South Australia, . 47,797 „ 35. od. „
Western Australia, 4,013 „ is. gd. „
Tasmania, . . 16,836 „ 2s. 4d. „
New Zealand, 75>852 » 2s. sd. „
Chief Dates.
1606. Voyages of the Spaniards, de Quiros and Torres, in the Pacific.
The Dutch Explorers. 1606. The Dutch landed from the Duyfhen on the shores of the
Gulf of Carpentaria. 1616. Dirk Hartog landed at an island in Shark's Bay.
1618. Zaachen sailed along the north coast.
1619. Edel surveyed the west coast.
1622. Cruise of the Dutch ship, the Leeuwin or Lioness, along the south coast.
1627. Peter Nuyts entered the Australian Bight.
1628. General Carpenter sailed round the Gulf of Carpentaria. Captain Pelsart wrecked on Houtman's Abrolhos.
1642. Abel Jansen Tasman discovered Tasmania and New
Zealand. 1695. William Vlaming explored the Swan River.
Appendices 333
The English Explorers.
1699. Dampier explored the west coast in the Roebuck from Shark's Bay to Dampier's Archipelago.
1768. Captain Cook left England in the Endeavour with the
object of observing the transit of Venus.
1769. In September, Cook sighted New Zealand.
1770. New South Wales named and occupied by Cook.
1772. Voyage of Marion and Crozet to Van Diemen's Land.
1773. Voyage of Furneaux.
The British Occupation.
1788. Landing of the first convicts, January 26, at Port Jackson
under Governor Phillip. Arrival of the French ships Astrolabe and Boussole under
la Perouse and 1' Angle. Norfolk Island established as a dependency on February
13- 1795. First voyage of George Bass and Matthew Flinders.
1797. Sheep imported from the Cape by Macarthur.
1798. Circumnavigation of Van Diemen's Land by Bass and
Flinders.
1803. Lieutenant Bowen in the Lady Nelson occupied Tasmania. First Australian newspaper, the Sydney Gazette and New
South Wales Advertiser. Macarthur brought to England the first sample of wool.
1806. Famine at New South Wales. Governorship of Captain W. Bligh.
1807. Norfolk Island settlers brought to Tasmania.
1813. Blaxland, Went worth, and Lawson crossed the Blue
Mountains in New South Wales. 1817. Bank of New South Wales established. 1824. Journey of Hume and Hovell to Port Phillip.
1828. Hume and Sturt explore the Darling River.
The vine first planted on the Hunter River, New South Wales.
1829. Sturt and M'Cleay explore the Murray River.
Captain Fremantle hoisted the British flag at the Swan River, Western Australia.
334 British Colonisation
1831. Sir Thomas Mitchell explored the northern parts of New
South Wales.
The South Australian Association and Gibbon Wakefield's schemes.
1835. Batman landed at Geelong.
1836. Governor Hindmarsh proclaimed British authority at
Adelaide.
1837. Governor Bourke planned the town of Melbourne.
1839. Captain Wakefield hoisted the British flag in New Zealand.
1840. Strzelecki, a Pole, discovered gold near Mount Kosciusko. Wellington, New Zealand, founded by the New Zealand
Company. Journey of Eyre.
1842. Discovery of Kapunda copper-mines, South Australia. 1845-8. First Maori War.
1850. First sod turned of first railway.
1851. Port Phillip (Victoria) separated from New South Wales. Gold discovered by Hargraves.
Extension of representative government to the colonies. First telegraph messages sent in New South Wales. Anti-Transportation League.
1858. TheTorrens Act.
1859. Queensland separated from New South Wales. 1860-70. The Second Maori War.
1864. Sugar grown in New South Wales and Queensland.
1868. Polynesian Labourers' Act, Queensland.
1869. Submarine cable between Tasmania and Australia.
1872. Australia first connected' with the outside world by telegraph
in July. Completion of overland cable across South Australia in
August.
Discovery of tin mines at Mount Bischoff, Tasmania. 1884. Formation of the Imperial Federation League. British protectorate proclaimed over New Guinea.
1886. Inauguration of foreign parcels post, Colonial and Indian Exhibition.
1887. The Colonial Conference.
Appendices 335
VII.— CEYLON.
Area. — 24,702 square miles, in shape resembling a pear, with an extreme length of 266 miles, and breadth of 140 miles. The Maldives, of which Mali is the largest island, 7 miles in circum- ference, are tributary to Ceylon.
Divisions. — The island is divided into seven provinces : (i) the Western, (2) North-Western, (3) Southern, (4) Central, (5) Uva Province, (6) Eastern, (7) North Central, (8) Northern. Altogether, 2| million acres are cultivated out of 13! millions ; and, allowing for tanks, lakes, rivers, swamps, there are about 3 million acres of forest-land capable of being cultivated. The greater portion of Crown reserve-land is in the dry zone. There is a limit, there- fore, to the tea-producing areas.1
Physical Features. — The interior of Ceylon forms an elevated plateau, with an average elevation of 6000 feet, from which rise peaks to a still further height — the most remarkable being Pedara- tallagulla, 8300 feet, and Adams Peak, 7430 feet. The whole mountain region of Ceylon is said to cover an area of 4300 miles. On the north the island is level, and a chain of small islands and sand-banks, called Adam's Bridge, connects it with the mainland. Trincomalee, the headquarters of the naval commander in the East Indies, is one of the great harbours of the world. The island is well wooded, and is intersected by many streams, the longest being the Mahavilia-Ganga, 200 miles in length, and flow- ing into the sea near Trincomalee Bay. The scenery is very beautiful, and the ascent from the town and port of Colombo by railway and road to Newera Ellia, the well-known European sanatorium, is one of the most picturesque in the world.
Population. — 1881, 2,763,984; 1891, 3,008,239 : consisting of (i) the Singhalese, the most numerous ; (2) the Tamils, a race of South India ; (3) the Moormen or Mohammedans ; (4) the Burghers or Eurasians ; (5) the Europeans, of whom there are about 5000.
Chief Towns. — Colombo, the capital, 130,000, with an area of eleven square miles ; Galle, or Point de Galle, with an excellent harbour; Trincomalee, a fortified post on the east coast; Kandy, in the interior, once the capital of native sovereigns ; Newera Ellia, forty-seven miles south of Kandy ; Batticaloa, in the East Province ;
1 Paper by T. Ferguson, Proceedings Royal Colonial Institute, vol. xxiii.
336 British Colonisation
Kartmegala, in the North-West Province ; Jaffna, in the North Province, are all places of importance.
Government.— Ceylon is a Crown colony, administered by (i) a Governor ; (2) an Executive Council of five members, viz. the Lieutenant-Governor and Colonial Secretary, the officer command- ing the troops, the Attorney-General, the Treasurer, and the Auditor-General ; (3) a nominated Legislative Council of seventeen members, including the Executive Council, four other office- holders, and eight unofficial members.
Trade. — Imports, 1891, including specie, Rs. 66,635, 392. Exports, Rs. 58,799,744. The leading export is now tea. The amount sent home for consumption in the United Kingdom was 70,000,000 Ibs. in 1891-2. There is a growing market in Australasia. Into the colony of Victoria alone no less than 15,310,442 Ibs. were imported during the year ending December 31, I890.1 Of this quantity China sent 9,544,655 Ibs. by Foochow Foo, and 1,396,887 Ibs. by Hong Kong ; the Bengal Presidency sent 2,707,457 Ibs., and Ceylon 877,273 Ibs. The duty at Victorian ports is only id. Victorians are great tea-drinkers.
Products. — In 1891 there were exported 89,692 cwt. of coffee, 5)679,339 Ibs. of cinchona, 68,274,420 Ibs. of tea, 20,532 cwt. of cocoa, 422,109 Ibs. of cardamoms, 2,309,771 Ibs. of cinnamon in bales, 409,251 cwt. of cocoa-nut oil, 400,268 cwt. of plumbago. It maybe remarked that coffee has fallen from 139,283 cwt. in 1888 to its present amount of 89,692 cwt., whilst tea has leapt up from 23,670,268 Ibs. to its present amount. For 1892-3 the tea-crop is calculated to be about 80,000,000 Ibs. Ceylon is also a gem-pro- ducing colony, such as sapphires, rubies, catseyes ; and in 1891 it was calculated that the total finds were worth ,£20,000. In 1891 the pearl-fisheries were very valuable, yielding a net revenue of ,£86,000. In the low country the cocoa-nut palm is very profitable. Of cocoa-nut oil the export has trebled in ten years, and the other products of the palm (coir, copra, nuts, etc.) have advanced at an equal rate. The cocoa-nut trees take twelve to fifteen years before they become profitable. Rice, cacao, and tobacco can also be cultivated. Ceylon is said to be the best school available in the world for tropical agriculturists. The danger of this fertile island is the unusual one of over-production, as has happened in the case of cinchona. In 1890 New South Wales imported 1 Statistical Register of Victoria, 1890.
Appendices 337
8,785,015 Ibs. of tea, China sending 5,528,856 Ibs., India 318,170 Ibs., Ceylon 231,065 Ibs. Through Hong Kong 690,480 Ibs. was sent. In both Australian colonies the superior Ceylon teas have a growing market. It may be noted that the whole amount of Ceylon tea imported into Australasia for nine months ending September 1891 was 2,465,242 Ibs. A large market may also arise in the United States.
Revenue.— 1891, ^1,309,781. Expenditure, ^1,198,391.
Public Debt.—ifyi, ^2,535,247, the rupee at is. 5^d.
Public Works. — There are four railways in Ceylon : —
(1) From Colombo to Kandy, .
(2) From Kandy to Malele,
(3) From Colombo to Kaltura,
(4) From Peredenia to Nanuoya,
Total,
There are more than 1400 miles of metalled roads, and of gravelled and natural roads 859 and 630 miles respectively. There is a canal system of 167 miles. There are 1203 miles of telegraph, connecting with the Indian system. The harbour at Colombo has cost more than ,£690,000.
Communications. — Colombo, chief port and naval station, is 6000 miles from London, 2100 from Aden, 900 from Bombay, 600 from Madras, 1600 from Singapore, 2000 from Mauritius, 3000 from Western Australia. The voyage from London to Colombo, -vid the Suez Canal, generally occupies 20 days.
Chief Dates. 543 B.C. Founding of the Kandian kingdom, which lasted up to
1815, under 170 kings and queens. 306 B.C. Buddhism introduced. 1505 A.D. Landing of the Portuguese. 1656 Portuguese supplanted by Dutch.
1795 Ceylon taken by the British, and made part of the Pre-
sidency of Madras.
1 80 1 Constituted a separate colony.
1802 Formal cession to England by the Peace of Amiens.
1803 The Areca-nut War. First native war.
1815 The Kandian kingdom destroyed. Second native war.
1833 Establishment of present form of government.
1837-1867. Development of the coffee industry. 1867-1892. Development of the tea industry.
338 British Colonisation
THE MALDIVES.
The Maldives are groups of coral islands about 500 miles to the south-west of Ceylon, of which island they are a dependency. There are thirteen main groups, which are divided politically. The cocoa-nut palm grows well. There has always been a great traffic in cowrie-shells. Dried' fish is sent in large quantities to Ceylon. The population is said to be about 30,000, most of them being engaged in fishing. The Arabs, Portuguese, Dutch, and French have all come to the Maldives. They fell under the British power in 1795. The inhabitants are Mohammedans, and are said to have been converted A.D. 1200. The head of the Government is the Sultan.
VIII.— MAURITIUS.
Area. — 708 square miles, with an extreme length of 36 miles and extreme breadth of 28 miles.
Divisions. — The island is divided into nine districts : (i) Port Louis, (2) Pamplemousses, (3) Riviere du Rempart, (4) Flacq, (5) Grand Port, (6) Savanne, (7) Moka, (8) Plaine Wilhelms, (9) Black River.
Physical Features. — Mauritius is of volcanic formation, sur- rounded by coral reefs. The surface is covered with rugged mountains, rising nearly 3000 feet. The highest peak is Piton de la Riviere Noir (2900). The island is subject to hurricanes, of which the most noted were those happening in 1754 and 1773, in the latter of which 32 ships were stranded in the harbour and 360 houses levelled in Port Louis. But the worst hurricane of all was that of 1892, by which 1200 lives were lost, no fewer than 280 being buried without identification ; and 50 churches out of 60 were either ruined or demolished. The velocity of the wind on this occasion is said to have been 121 miles an hour at the Royal Observatory. One-third of Port Louis was destroyed, the loss in property being estimated at 12,000,000 rupees.
Population. — 1891, 370,588, of whom 206,038 were males and 164,550 females.
Chief Towns. — Port Louis, the capital, 61,170.
Appendices 339
Government. — Mauritius with its dependencies is administered by : (i) a Governor; (2) an Executive Council of five, with two unofficial members ; (3) a Legislative Council of twenty-seven, eight being ex officio, nine nominated by the Governor (of these five are unofficial), and ten elected on a moderate franchise. In Mauritius the Crown reserves legislation by order in Council.
Trade. — The trade of the island passes almost entirely through Port Louis. Imports, 1891, ,£2,562,250; exports, 1891, £2,430,840.
Sir R. W. Rawson has calculated that during the years 1872- 1886 Mauritius imported one-fifth from the United Kingdom, one- half from British possessions, and more than a quarter from foreign countries. She also exported nearly three-fourths to British possessions, and 14 per cent, to the United Kingdom and foreign countries. The exports exceeded the imports by 52 per cent. Mauritius trades with India, New South Wales, France. In 1891, imports from United Kingdom, ,£664,782 ; exports to, £277,415.
Products. — Sugar and rum chiefly ; also vanilla and aloe fibre. Mauritius raises scarcely anything for her own consumption, the island being almost entirely given up to sugar-growing. It imports rice from India, breadstuffs from Australia, cured fish and sheep from South Africa, and oxen from Madagascar.
Revenue.— 1891, £759>565- Expenditure, 1891, £817,470; the rupee counting 2s.
Public Debt.— 1891, ^784,449.
Public Works. — There are 73 miles of railway, on two lines — 38 miles on the North line and 35 on the Midland line.
Defence Works. — Fort Adelaide and Fort George, above Port Louis. There is a garrison of 1000 men. The military contribu- tion is about £21,000 per annum.
Communication. — The voyage to Mauritius by the Suez Canal takes about 24 days. By Natal and the Cape the voyage takes a longer time.
The dependencies of Mauritius are the Seychelles Islands, Rodrigues, Diego Garcia, and about 70 other small islands, con- taining altogether a population of about 16,000. The principal exports of these islands are cocoa-nuts, cocoa-nut oil, Indian corn, cacao ; also nutmegs, and the celebrated cocos-de-mer, said by some to have been the 'forbidden fruit.' The Seychelles are 940 miles from Mauritius, the largest island being Mahe, 17 miles long and 4 miles broad, with Victoria as the capital. Rodrigues is 300
34o British Colonisation
miles from Mauritius, and is 18 miles long and 7 miles broad. Rodrigues was very useful to the British when Mauritius was taken from the French, and was used as a sanatorium. Diego Garcia is the chief of the Oil Island group. It lies on the direct route from the Red Sea to Australia, and is used as a coaling- station.
Chief Dates.
1507. Cerne' (Mauritius) discovered by a Portuguese, Dom Pedro
Mascarenhas.
1590. Visited by the Dutch, and called Mauritius. 1644. Occupied by the Dutch. 1689. Voyage of Francois Leguat to Rodrigues. 1710. Abandoned by the Dutch.
1715. Taken by the French and called Isle de France. 1734-46. Administration of Mahe de Labourdonnais. 1748. Attack of Boscawen on Mauritius. 1754. A great hurricane.
1810. Mauritius taken by General Abercrombie. 1814. British possession confirmed by Treaty of Paris. 1868. A hurricane.
1884-5. Date of the present constitution. 1892. A terrible hurricane.
IX.— HONG KONG.
Area. — 29 square miles. The length of the island of Hong Kong is 1 1 miles, its breadth from 2 to 5 miles. The peninsula of Kowloon, facing Hong Kong, is 2f square miles. Other small islands, known as Stonecutter's, Green, Apleechow, Middle Island, Round Island, are included in the colony.
Physical Features. — The island of Hong Kong is mountainous, some of the peaks rising to 2000 feet. The chief feature of the colony is its magnificent harbour, with an area of ten square miles. It is separated from the mainland by the Ly-ee-moon strait, not more than half-a-mile in width. From its position with regard to China it has been termed the pivot of Chinese commerce. It lies just within the tropics. It is swept by the south-west monsoon
Appendices 341
from March to September, by the north-east monsoon from October to February.
Population.— 1891, 221,441, of whom 210,995 were Chinese, 8545 Europeans.
Chief Town. — The city of Victoria, on the north side, 221,141, containing nearly the whole population.
Government. — Hong Kong is a Crown colony, and is ad- ministered : (i) by a Governor ; (2) an Executive Council of six ; (3) a Legislative Council of twelve, including the Governor. Of these, five nominated members, one usually a Chinese, form the unofficial element.
Trade. — 1891, imports, from the United Kingdom, ,£2,732,157. Exports, to the United Kingdom, ;£ 1,101,702. About half of the whole trade is with China. The junk tonnage is estimated at 2,000,000 tons, and these vessels are most useful in distributing British merchandise in the non-treaty ports. About a third of the trade is with India in tea, silk, and opium. Hong Kong is a free port.
Products. — Hong Kong produces nothing worth speaking of, the colony being simply a distributing centre. The tea and silk trade is largely controlled by Hong Kong merchants. Opium, sugar, flour, cotton goods, sandal-wood, ivory, betel, etc., are also distributed largely. It may possibly have a future as a manu- facturing centre. Sugar-refining and ice and rope factories exist.
Revenue. — 1891, ^421,938. Expenditure, ^426,893.
Public Debt. — ist January 1891, ^210,000.
Public Works. — The great reservoir of Tytam-took, capable of storing 350,000,000 gallons of water ; the great sea-wall or praya ; five docks, and three slips.
Communication. — Hong Kong is distant 40 miles from Macao (Portuguese), 95 from Canton, 800 from Shanghai, 650 from Manila (Spanish), 900 from Saigon (capital of French Cochin China), 1200 from Labuan and Borneo, 1400 from Singa- pore. Hong Kong, therefore, is admirably placed in regard to the Chinese markets and the European trade-centres. Hong Kong is 6000 miles distant from Vancouver Island and the ter- minus of the Canadian Pacific Railway, and can be reached from England by this route in 36 days.
Defence Forces. — Hong Kong is the headquarters of the China Squadron. There is an Imperial garrison of 1300, towards the
342 British Colonisation
cost of which the colony contributes £20,000 annually. There is an armed police of 700, composed of Europeans, Sikhs, and Chinese.
X.— THE STRAITS SETTLEMENTS.
Area. — (i) The island of Singapore has an area of 206 square miles, being 27 miles long and 14 wide.
(2) The island of Penang has an area of 107 square miles, being 15 miles long and 9 broad.
(3) Malacca, on the mainland, has an area of 659 square miles, being 42 miles in length, and from 8 to 25 in breadth.
(4) The Bindings, on the mainland, has an area of 200 square miles.
The Cocos or Keeling Islands, and Christmas Island, are also included under the colony of the Straits Settlements.
Physical Features. — The Straits Settlements, lying along the east shores of the Straits of Malacca, facing Sumatra, consist therefore partly of islands and partly of small littoral strips, in juxtaposition to the native Malay States. For these they provide a trade outlet. For a long time the most important British post in these waters was Bencoolen in Sumatra. The geographical value of the colony is obvious at a glance.
Population. — 1891, 506,577, of which Singapore had 182,650, Penang 232,977, Malacca 90,950. The population consists chiefly of Chinese and Malays.
Chief Towns. — Singapore, Georgetown, Malacca.
Government. — The Straits Settlements constitute a Crown colony, and are administered by : (i) a Governor ; (2) Executive Council ; (3) Legislative Council of seventeen, ten being official and seven unofficial. The seat of Government is Singapore.
Trade. — 1891, imports, £21, 656,366. Exports, £20,129,982; the dollar reckoned at 35. 2 Jd. With regard to the distribution of this trade, it has been calculated that the Straits Settlements furnished (l885) 3-3 Per cent- of the imports and 2.2 per cent, of the exports of the Empire, but only 1.3 and 0.8 respectively of those of the United Kingdom. More than half their trade (56 per cent.) was with foreign countries, one-fifth (20 per cent.) with the United Kingdom.1
1 In 1891, imports from the United Kingdom, £3,426,835 ; exports to, £3,905,406.
Appendices 343
As a trade centre Singapore occupies an important position. Within a radius of 3000 miles live more than half the population of the world, and within this radius Great Britain has a trade of more than ,£251,000,000, against £86,000,000 in all other British dependencies.1 The ports of the colony are all free. The local trade with the Malay Peninsula is increasing largely.
Products. — In Singapore, gambier plantations, Liberian coffee, pineapples ; in Penang, nutmegs, the betel-palm, and sugar and tapioca plantations ; in the Dindings, tin, ebony, timber, and turtles. It is, however, as an entrepot for the Eastern trade that the colony is most valuable. It is not a port of final destination.
-Revenue.— 1891, ,£609,862. Expenditure, £732,997. The port being free, revenue arises from (i) opium and spirits, (2) stamps, (3) land.
Defence. — Singapore is the headquarters of the Straits division. The aggregate naval expenditure, on the basis of £50 per ton for 4000 tons, is £200,000 per annum, spent by England. With regard to land defences, the expenditure is £136,000 per annum, of which the colony has to pay £100,000. In addition, they have paid £60,000 for barrack accommodation. They maintain a body of Sikh police. The rate is 35. 6d. per head for defence purposes, the home rate being i6s. for every inhabitant of the United Kingdom.2
THE Cocos ISLANDS.
These islands are said to have been discovered by Captain Keeling in 1609. They are a group of coral islands in the Indian Ocean. They have been colonised by a Scotchman named Ross, whose descendants still live there. In 1857 they were taken possession of by Captain Fremantle. They are twenty in number. The population is about 500, consisting partly of Bantamese.
XL— BRITISH NORTH BORNEO.
Area. — 24,000 square miles, with a coast-line of 600 miles. In size Borneo (280,000 square miles) ranks third amonst the islands of the world, coming after Australia and New Guinea.
1 Paper by Sir F. Weld, late Governor of Straits Settlements, Proceedings Royal Colonial Institute, vol. xv. a Times Report, Debate in the House of Lords, July 24, 1891.
344 British Colonisation
Physical Features.— * The shape of the island of Borneo resembles that of a Burgundy pear, the stalk end pointing north- wards towards China, and the base lying southwards upon the equatorial islands of the Eastern Archipelago. Supposing the stalk end of this huge pear to be cut off to the extent of about one- eighth of the whole length of the fruit, the parts so detached would, roughly speaking, represent the portion of territories ceded to the British North Borneo Company. They consequently possess a coast-line in three directions.' x The most important streams are the Kinabatangan, Labuk, and Segama, flowing eastward, and the Papar and Kimanis, flowing westward. At the north-east of the island the peak of Kinabalow is said to be 13,680 feet.
Settlements. — The chief stations or settlements are : (i) Silam, (2) Sandakan, both on the north coast ; (3) Kudat, on the north ; (4) Gaya, Papar, Kimanis, on the west. There are many sub- stations.
Silam was opened chiefly for experimental gardening; Sandakan, with a population of 6319 (1891) of natives and Chinese, is the principal centre of trade. The settlement has a frontage of about 5000 feet. The government is administered by a Governor assisted by a Council and by Residents.
Trade.— Imports, 1891, 1,936,547 dollars. Exports, 1,238,277 dollars. The trade is almost entirely in the hands of the Chinese, who traffic directly with the natives.
Products.— Edible birds'-nests, sago, rattans, gutta-percha, a resin called 'damar/trepang^pearl-shells, sharksj-fins,and camphor. Liberian coffee, cocoa, and sugar-cane grow well. Tobacco is one of the most promising products, especially on the banks of the Suan Lambar River, near Sandakan. The leaf, like that of Sumatra tobacco, is good for wrapping.
The birds'-nests industry is a peculiar one. The nest is that of a swift that builds in countless numbers in certain caves. The nest is made of a soft fungoid growth that encrusts the limestone in damp places : it is about an inch thick, brown outside, white inside, and is woven in a filament backwards and forwards by the bird, as a caterpillar weaves a cocoon. The natives detach the nests by climbing up bamboo ladders and thrusting at them with a light pronged spear. The guano is valued at £$ to ^10 a ton,
1 Paper by Sir Walter Medhurst, Proceedings of the Royal Colonial Institute, vol. xvi.
Appendices 345
and the value of the nests is estimated at 25,000 dollars annually. Borneo is the only place where the ' orang-outang' is found. Gold has been found on the Kinabatangan River, and indications of coal have been discovered in many places. On the coast the pearl- oyster exists of the same variety as that found off Thursday Island. There is a great variety of useful timber in Borneo, the billian or ironwood being plentiful. Borneo timber supplies the Melbourne market. As British North Borneo lies on a highway between China and Australia, it occupies a rare position as an exporting country, a labour market, and a trade centre. The powers of the Company are derived solely from the Sultans of Brunei and Sulu. All the British Government did was to incor- porate by royal charter.
Revenue.— 1891, 375,507 dollars. Expenditure, 468,644 dollars. The revenue is derived from opium, sales of land, royalties on exports.
In connection with British North Borneo, the territory ruled over by Rajah Brooke of Sarawak may be noticed. In 1842 Sir James Brooke gained a land concession from the Sultan of Borneo of part of Borneo extending over an area of 30,000 square miles, and holding a population of 240,000. The imports and exports of this little principality exceed three millions of dollars.
LABUAN.
Closely connected with British North Borneo is the island of Labuan, the smallest of the British colonies, situated six miles off the north-west coast, and about thirty miles from Brunei, the capital of Borneo proper. Its area is 30 square miles. It was ceded to England in 1847 by the Sultan of Borneo, at which time it was uninhabited. Sir James Brooke was appointed the first Governor. The island has a fine harbour, and was supposed to have extensive coal-mines, but the output has proved to be in- significant. Labuan, it was thought, might prove to be a great coaling centre in the Eastern seas. It is a market for much of the produce of the coasts of Borneo and the Sulu Archipelago. There are three sago manufactories on the island. The inhabitants are chiefly Malays from Borneo and Chinese. Cattle and goats are reared, and about 2000 acres are under cultivation. The Governor of British North Borneo is Governor of Labuan. In
346 British Colonisation
1871 the military garrison was withdrawn. There is a local police force. The nearest telegraph station is Singapore. The popula- tion is about 6000. The island is 9000 miles from London, vid the Suez Canal. Imports, 1891, ^54,537 5 exports, £39,766.
XII.— GIBRALTAR, MALTA, CYPRUS, ADEN, PERIM, SOCOTRA.
These possessions of Great Britain are strategic posts occupied for the sake of securing the route to the East, rather than colonies in the strict sense of the term. There is little scope for overflow of population here. Gibraltar, Malta, Cyprus are the Mediterranean strongholds on this side of the Suez Canal ; Aden .and Perim guard the entrance to the Red Sea from the Indian Ocean. The traffic through the Suez Canal is enormous, and more than three- fourths of it is carried in British vessels. India and Further India, Australia, and the South Seas .send their argosies by this route. If it were blocked in time of war, trade would be diverted and go by the Cape of Good Hope, or perhaps by way of Vancouver and the Canadian Pacific Railway. In either case the derangement of commerce that would be felt would be enormous.
Gibraltar is a rocky promontory three miles in length and three-quarters of a mile in extreme breadth. Its highest point is 1439 feet. It was taken from the Spaniards on 24th July 1704, by Sir George Rooke, and has been held by England ever since. It was besieged in 1779, 1781, and 1783, and has earned the title of being an impregnable fortress. The Bay of Gibraltar is four or five miles across, and affords a good anchorage. It is useful to the mercantile marine trading with the Mediterranean, Spain, and Morocco. Opposite Gibraltar, at a distance of 54 miles, is the Spanish town of Algeciras.
Malta or Melita (the Island of Honey) is 17 miles long, 9 miles broad, having an area of 95 square miles. With Malta is included the smaller island of Gozo, with an area of 20 square miles, and Comino, with an area of 7 square miles. Malta possesses one of the finest harbours in the world. In 1798 Malta capitulated to Napoleon, who was on his famous expedition to Egypt, and coveted it as a French stepping-stone to the Red Sea and the East ; but the
Appendices 347
Maltese rose against their conquerors and blockaded them in the towns. The island was taken by England, and confirmed to her formally by the Treaty of Paris in 1814. The old capital of the island was Citta Vecchia (Medina). In former days Malta was taken (1530) by the Hospitaller Brothers, a military order, who held it for 268 years. Valetta is the chief town of Malta now. A large proportion of the Maltese population is centred round Valetta. Their prosperity depends chiefly on the passing trade.
Cyprus has an area of 3584 square miles. The port of Larnaca is 258 miles from Port Said, and 1117 miles from Valetta. In 1571 Cyprus was captured by the Turks, and has remained part of the Ottoman Empire ever since. In 1878 Cyprus came into British possession. The Turks retain certain administrative and judicial powers, together with religious privileges. The island is divided, for legal purposes, into six districts : (i) Nicosia, (2) Larnaca, (3) Limassol, (4) Kyrenia, (5) Famagusta, (6) Papho. In 1891 the population was 209,291 of whom 23 per cent, were Mohammedans. The island is governed by a High Commissioner and a Legislative Council of eighteen, of whom six are official and twelve elected. There are three electoral divisions, each returning one Mohammedan and three Christians. It may be noted that Cyprus was conquered by Richard Cceur-de-Lion in 1 191, whilst on his way to Palestine. Here he married Berengaria. King Richard sold the island to the Knights Templars.
The principal towns are Nicosia, Larnaka, Limassol. In 1891-92 the revenue was ,£217,162, the expenditure £112,742.
One of the conditions of British occupation of Cyprus is that if Russia restores to Turkey Kars and the other conquests made by her in Armenia during the last Russo-Turkish War, the island of Cyprus will be evacuated by England and the Convention of 4th June 1878 be at an end. Meantime, ample provision is made for freedom of worship for Mussulmans, for administration of religious endowments, and for the general exercise of Mussulman rights and privileges. A certain sum is paid annually to the Porte by England.
Aden, Perim, and Socotra are British posts occupied for the purpose of guarding the entrance of the Red Sea and the Straits of Bab-el-Mandeb.
Aden consists of two peninsulas and a strip of Arabian territory, covering an area of 70 square miles. The fort is about no miles
348 British Colonisation
to the east of the Straits of Bab-el-Mandeb. Here is an important coaling-station and also an entrepot for Arabian trade. Aden came into British possession in 1839. The place is subjected to the Government of Bombay.
Petim, a small rocky island lying in the Straits, is a dependency of Aden. Its length is 3 miles and breadth if. It is garrisoned by a few troops. It was first occupied in 1857.
Socotra is an island situated about 1 50 miles east-north-east of Cape Guardafui. The Government of Aden pays a small subsidy to the Sultan of Keshin for it. It was taken under British protection in 1886. The Somali coast protectorate extends from 48° 15' to 49° E. longitude. It is a small outlet of East African trade. To the south and towards the interior is the sphere of the British Imperial East Africa Company.
In former days Socotra was one of the sees of the Syrian bishops.
The Kooria Mooria Islands lie east-north-east of Aden, and were ceded to England in 1854 by the Sultan of Muscat, for the purpose of landing the Red Sea telegraph cable.
INDEX
Abercromby, Sir R., 33, 244.
Acadia, 241.
Acapulco, 138, 139.
Accra, 88, 97.
Acheen, 253, 257.
Adamawa, 96.
Africa, West, 59, 86, 87.
Akaroa, 207.
Albany, 180.
Albuquerque, 228, 257.
Alexandra Land, 185.
Alima, 105.
Alleghanies, The, 73.
Alligator River, 194.
Allouez, 68.
Allumette Island, 65.
Amboyna, 135, 151,' 250.
Anegada, 29.
Angas, G. F. , 204.
Angola, 112.
Anguilla, 20, 21, 28.
Anian, Straits of, 47.
Annam, 254.
Annamaboe, 88, 97.
Anson, 138, 142.
Antigua, 20, 21, 24, 25.
Antilles, The, 20, 21.
Apollonia, 97.
Ariel, 35, 36.
Arkansas, 68.
Arnheim, 151, 186.
Arrowroot, 33.
Arthur, Governor, 161, 162, 163.
Ascension Island, 136.
Ashantees, The, 97, 100, 101.
Assiento, The, 6.
Athabasca, 71.
Athelney, 46,
Atolls, 238.
Australia, 92, 112, 132, 146, 156.
Avalon, 50.
B
Baccalaos, 47.
Bacchante, The, 13.
Bacon, Lord, 38, 39, 49, 50.
Bagirmi, 95.
Bagot, Sir Charles, 209.
Bahamas, The, 33.
Ballarat, 170, 172, 183, 191.
Baltimore, Lord, 50, 215.
Bammakou, 104.
Banda Island, 139.
Banks, Sir G., 89, 92, 93, 192.
Banks Peninsula, 207.
Bantam, 251.
Barbados, 8, 20.
Barbuda, 15, 20, 25.
Barnstaple, 46.
Barrier Reef, 145.
Barrow, 9, 92.
Barth, Dr., 94.
Basque colonists, 57.
Bass, 151, 167, 192, 204.
Basutoland, in.
Batavia, 159.
Bathurst, 76, 93, 156, 192.
Batman, John, 162, 168, 181.
Battel, Andrew, 88.
Baudin, 150, 160, 176, 192, 204.
Baymen, The, 18.
Bay of Islands, 207.
Beaufort, 94.
Bechuanaland, in.
Benbow, Admiral, 5.
Bencoolen, 25.
Benin, Bight of, 86, 93.
Benin River, 101.
Benue River, 95, 96.
Benzoni, 94.
Berbice, 16, 123.
Berkeley, Bishop, 39.
Bermudas, 3, 35, 39, 219.
Bertolucci, 91.
349
350
Index
Blackman, Captain, 258.
Bligh, Captain, 219.
Blomidon, 241.
Boers, 126, 127, 130.
Bombay, 231.
Borneo, 139, 251, 253, 258.
Bornou, 93, 94, 96,
Botany Bay, 147, 150.
Bo-Tree, 236.
Bounties, 54, 58, 59.
Bounty mutineers, 143, 219.
Bourbon, 240, 241, 244.
Bourgainville, 140, 222.
Bouri, 104.
Bouvet, 201.
Bowdich, 92, 94.
Bowen, 160, 187.
Braddon, Sir E., 166.
Brady, 162.
Brassey, Lord, 3, 13.
Brazzaville, 105.
Brebeuf, 67.
Breton colonists, 57, 62.
Bridgetown, 9.
Bridgewater, 46.
Brisbane, 187, 188.
Bristol, 45, 58, 86, 134.
Bristol Channel, 46.
Brouage, 64.
Browne, 94,
Bryce, Professor, 77.
Byam, 25.
Byron, Captain, 141, 146.
Bytown, 77.
Cabot, 45, 46. Caicos, 7, 33. Caillie, 93. Cairo, 90, 91, 92. Calcutta, 242, 250, 251. Camden, Lord, 92. Camoens, 132. Campbell, 94, 170. Campeche', 18, 134. Canada, u, 62, 209, 210. Canning, 221. Canterbury, 213, 214. Cape Breton, n.
Coast Castle, 88, 97.
Good Hope, 88, 113, 120, 141,
228.
Horn, 139, 142.
Leuwen, 151, 174.
Cape Murat, 152.
Non, 87, 112.
St. John, 55.
Cargill, Captain, 212, Caribs, The, 18, 22, 30, 32. Carlisle Grant, 27. Carpenter, General, 134. Carpentaria, Gulf of, 15, 184, 194,
195-
Carteret, Captain, 142, 143. Cartier, 51, 62, 66. Castries, 32. Cavendish, 114. Cay os, 3
Censitaires, 74, 77. Cetywayo, 108, 109. Champlain, 37, 64, 66, 77. Charles I., 50, 66.
II., 10, 25, 114.
Charlevoix, 70.
Christchurch, 207, 213.
Christophe, 26.
Christopher, 236.
Clapperton, 93, 94.
Clarence, Duke of, 28.
Clarke, 71.
Clipperton, 137.
Clunes, 170.
Cochin China, 254.
Codrington College, 10, n, 25, 26.
Coffee, 42, 232.
Coffee, King, 101.
Colbert, 70, 74, 106, 118.
Coleridge, Bishop, n, 25.
Samuel Taylor, 137.
Collins, Captain, 147, 160, 188.
Colombian States, 7.
Colombo, 229, 232.
Columbia, British, 81.
Columbus, i, 12, 15, 29, 32, 34, 46.
Commendah, 88, 97.
Company, B. N. Borneo, 258.
Dutch East Indian, 177.
Hudson Bay, 182.
African River, 88.
River Niger, 96.
Congo, The, 90, 103, 104, 112, 132.
Conference, 105.
Consetts, 10.
Convicts, 146, 147, 148, 153, 173,
180, 181, 188, 224. Cook, Captain, 133, .144, 149, 200,
220.
Coolies, 7, 14, 18, 41, 172, 177, 183,
190, 225, 249, 258. Coomassie, 92, 101.
Index
351
Cooper's Creek, 194, 195. Cordiner, 229. Cornwall (Jamaica), 4. Coro, 1 6. Coroni River, 17. Cortereal, 49. Coureurs des bois, Courteen, Sir W., 9. Cowper, 219. Coxcomb Peak, 18. Croker, G. W., 156. Cromwell, 4, 8, 10, 25, 215. Crozet, 145, 202, 203. Cuba, 3, 20, 98. Cumberland, Earl of, 250.
D
Dakar, 104.
Dampier, 15, 134, 136, 143, 192, 251.
Dapper, 115.
Darien, Isthmus of, 6.
Darwin, 185, 188, 189, 193.
Davis, 114, 134.
Dawes, 155.
D' Almeida, 113.
D'Aranda, 79.
De Bouille, 26.
Brazza, 105.
Caen, 153.
'Estrees, 70.
Gonneville, 202.
Grasse, 5, 22, 26, 32, 119.
'Iberville, 73.
Delagoa Bay, 229. De la Salle, 69. Delight, The, 48. Demarara, 2, 16, 123. De Mist, 123.
Mole, 205.
Monts, 66.
Denham, Major, 93, 94.
Denison, Sir W., 165,
De Noyon, 70.
Dentrecasteaux, 151, 163, 192, 204.
De Quiros, 156.
Derwent, 160.
De Soto, 69.
Torti, 69.
— Verteuil, 13.
Vignau, 64.
Devon colonists, 56, 58, 64, 114, 242. Dindings, The, 255, 2157. Dix Cove, 88, 97. Diogo de Conto, 228.
Dominica, 20, 30, 42.
Dragons Mouth, 12.
Drake, Sir F., 113, 114.
Draper, General, 138.
Drummond, 76.
Du Casse, 5.
Duddon River, 198.
Duff, 219.
Dunkirk, 56.
Du Parquet, 30.
Dupleix, 238.
Durham, Lord, 40, 80, 81, 210, 214.
D'Urville, 202.
Dusky Bay, 200.
Dutch colonists, 15, 18, in, 112,
118, 124, 127, 134, 155, 185, 228,
240, 257. Dutton, 184.
Eden, 241,
Edward IV., 87.
Egmont Island, 143.
Egypt, 176.
El Dorado, 12, 16, 132.
Elima, 51, 106.
Elliot, 182, 189.
Ellis, Major, 103,
Elphinstone, Admiral, 120, 121.
Elizabeth, Queen, 48, 87.
Emancipation of Slaves, i.
Encounter Bay, 185.
Enderby, 147.
Esmond, 158.
Essequibo, 16, 123.
Estienne, Bishop, 240.
Eugene iv. , Pope, 87.
Evans, 156.
Eves Washington, 17, 28.
Exeter, 8.
Eyre, Governor, i.
Faidherbe, 104, 106. Falkland Islands, 139. False Bay, 121. Fantin, 51, 106. Fawkner, 168. Federalists, 28. Fell, 6.
Ferryland, 50. Fezzan, 91.
352
Index
Fiji Island, 207, 218, 225.
Fisheries, 52, 54, 83, 224.
Fish River, no.
Fitzroy River, 191.
Flinders, 152, 156, 163.
Fonseca, 15.
Formosa River, 7, 248.
Fowey, 48.
Fox River, 68.
Franceville, 105.
Franklin, Benjamin, 200.
Sir J. , 164.
Fredericton, 75.
Free Trade, 81.
Fremantle, 175, 177.
French colonists, 2, 15, 22, 50, 51, 79, 99, 105, 118, 119, 139, 152, 153, 174, 206, 207, 241, 245, 254.
Frontenac, 73.
Gaboon, 99.
Gallieni, 104.
Gambia, The, 87, 89, 91, 98, 104.
Gambier Island, 222.
Gando, 102.
Gaspar, 49.
Gates, 36.
Genadendal, 127.
Geographers Bay, 174.
George m., 74, 75, 141, 143, 155.
IV., 221.
Gilbert, Sir Humphrey, 34, 48, 49, 58.
Gilbert River, 194.
Gladstone, Mr., 164.
Glastonbury, 46.
Glenelg, Lord, 204.
Glenelg River, 195.
Gloucester Island, 143.
Godley, Mr., 212, 213.
Golconda, 139.
Gold, 153, 157, 158, 171, 191, 198.
Gold Coast, 99, TOO.
Gordon, Colonel, 154.
Goree, 104.
Goulburn, 76.
Granger, Dr., 26.
Gray, 94, 195.
Greenfield, General, 31.
Grenada, 29, 30.
Grenadines, 29, 30.
Grey, Earl, 158, 165, 170, 179, 181.
Grey, Sir G., 190, 214.
Grosvenor, The, 116.
Guadaloupe, 20, 22.
Guatemala, 7, 18. Guiana, 12, 15. Guinea, 87, 112. Guizot, 207. Guy, Sir J., 49. Gyaman, 100. Gympie, 191.
H
Hacking, 155.
Hamilton, Alexander, 28.
Hampden, 215.
Hancock, Dr., 17.
Hargraves, 157.
Hartpg, 134.
Hastings, Marquis of, 251.
Hawaii, 220.
Hawkesworth, Dr., 221.
Hayti, 2, 30.
Hennepin, 69.
Henrietta Maria, 66.
Henry vii. , 47.
Herodotus, 93.
Highlanders, 76, 77, 106.
Hinds, Dr., 212.
Hispaniola, 129.
Hobart, 160, 167.
Hobson, Captain, 206.
Hobson Bay, 168.
Hochelaga, 67.
Hodgson, Sir A., 173, 189, 190.
Holmes, 78.
Holland, 2, 134, 251.
Honduras, British, 18.
Hongi, 204.
Hong Kong, 232, 246.
Honolulu, 220.
Hood, Sir S., 5, 22.
Hooghly River, 250.
Hopkins, Commodore, 34.
Hornemann, 91, 94.
Hottentots, 108, 113, 126, 131.
Houghton, 94.
Houtmans, Abrolhos, 174.
Hovell, 168, 193.
Huaheine, 202.
Hudson's Bay, 47, 64, 73, 75, 76, 140,
Hue, 247.
Hughes, Sir E., 231.
Hugues, Victor, 28, 31.
Humboldt, 16, 17.
Hume, 168, 193.
Hunter, Captain, 147, 152.
Hunter Island, 151.
Huron Mission, 67.
Index
353
Icacos Point, 12.
Iceland, 46, 49, 162.
Im Thurn, 17.
India, 119, 235, 245.
Irish, The, 5, 23, 37, 146, 208.
Home Rule, 82, 83.
Isandlwana, no. Isla da Gracias, 12. Isle of France, 151.
J
Japan, 81, 248.
Java, 114, 138, 177, 231, 256.
Jenkins, Sir Leoline, 6.
Jenne", 93.
Jesuits, 67, 223.
Johnson, Dr., 26, 27.
Johnson, Commodore, 119.
Johnston, H. H., 88, 101, 102, 103.
chore, 252.
oliba River, 90, 93, 95.
oliet, 68.
cost, Van Dyke, 29.
orgensen, 162. Juan Fernandez, 14, 134. Junius, 139.
K
Kadavu, 225.
Kaffirs, 108, no.
Kaieteur Falls, 17.
Kakondy, 93.
Kalm, 118.
Kanaka, 191.
Kankan, 93.
Kano, 96.
Kapunda, 184.
Kennedy, 195.
Kent, Duke of, 31.
Keppel Bay, 191.
Kew, 121.
Keymis, Captain, 12.
Khayes, 104.
Kimberley, Lord, 252.
King, 195.
King George's Sound, 179.
Kingsley, Canon, 3, 13, 21.
Kingston, 5, 27.
Kirke, Sir D. , 50, 66.
Koopmanner, 124.
Korakadika, 203. Koro, 225. Kowloon, 246. Kreli, 108. Kroomen, 103. Kuka, 96.
Lalor, 173.
Lancaster, John, 114.
Lander, Richard, 93.
Lanne", W. , 163.
La Perouse, 145, 149, 218.
Larin, 238.
Larut, 252.
Latrobe, 126.
Ledyard, John, 91.
Leeward Islands, 20.
Leguat, 241, 244.
Leichhardt, 194, 195.
Leigh, Lord, 9.
Lememe, Fran9ois, 244.
Lesseps, 105.
Le Vaillant, 125.
Lewis, 71.
Lexton, 170.
Light, Colonel, 183.
Limes, 23, 44.
Linnaeus, 117.
Liverpool Plains, 193.
Livingstone, David, 63, 129.
Lockhart, Mr., 92.
Loddon River, 193.
Lok, Captain, 87.
Louis xni., 65.
XIV., 118, 119.
Louisiana, 69, 70, 73. Loyalists, U. E., 74, 75. Low, Sir Hugh, 255. Lynch, Sir Thomas, 6. Lyttelton, Lord, 213.
M
Macao, 240.
Macarthy, Sir Charles, 101. Macartney, Lord, 231. Macarthur, Mr., 154. Maccassar, 143. Mackenzie River, 71, 194. Macomo, 108. Macquarie River, 156, 193. Madagascar, 118, 129, 240.
354
Index
Madras, 138, 231, 242.
Madulsima, 234.
Magelhaen, 113, 133, 138, 143, 146.
Mahrattas, 244.
Malabar, 231.
Malacca, 237, 251, 257.
Malaya, 129.
Malays, 130.
Maldives, 237.
Male, 237.
Malouines, 139, 140, 243, 244.
Malta, 176.
Manchester, Duke of, 4.
Manilla, 137, 138, 139.
Manitoba, 76.
Manoa, 16, 115.
Maoris, 202.
Maraccas, 13.
Mariegalante, 22.
Marion, Captain, 202.
Marlborough, 9.
Marquesas Island, 207, 221.
Marquette, 68, 69.
Martinique Island, 2, n, 20, 30.
Marvell, Andrew, 39, 219.
Mascarenhas, 240.
Mashonaland, in.
Maurice, Prince, 240.
Mauritius, 153, 225, 240.
Maximilian, 5.
Maxwell, W. , 253.
Melbourne City, 165, 169, 173, 195.
Melville Island, 185.
Merino sheep, 154.
Metcalfe, Lord, 209.
Mexico, 5, 18, 68, 70, 79, 139.
Mill, J. S., 210.
Milton, 132, 133.
Minto, Lord, 251.
Miquelon Island, 52.
Mississippi River, 69, 105, 118.
Missouri, 68, 71.
Mitchell, Major, 193, 195.
Mohammedans, 237.
Molesworth, Sir W,, 209, 210.
Mollien, 94.
Moluccas, 133, 135, 139.
Monomotapa, 115.
Montgomery, Earl of, 15.
Montgomery, Martin, 7, 19, 31.
Montreal, 64, 67, 72.
Montserrat, 20, 21, 23, 42.
Moore, Sir J., 31.
Moreton, B., 188, 195.
Morne Fortune, 31, 32.
Morris, Mr., 21, 41, 42, 101.
Morrison, 93. Mosquito shore, 19. Mount Ararat, 172.
Alexander, 170, 191.
Muizenberg, 121. Muscat, 244.
N
Nachtigal, D., 96. Nantes, Edict of, 241. Namaqualand, 115. Napoleon, 78, 115, 151, 176. Natal, in, 113. Navigation Laws, 10. Negn Sembilan, 252. Negroes, 98, 103. Nelson, 9, 28, 212, 214. Nevis, 20, 21, 27, 28, 42. New Britain, 136, 147.
Caledonia, 145, 201, 220, 223,
225.
England, 72, 73, 132, 140.
France, 51, 64, 65, 72, 132.
Guinea, 136.
Hebrides, 145, 201, 220, 225.
Holland, 135, 144, 151, 174.
Ireland, 143, 147.
Norfolk, 161.
Plymouth, n, 45, 144.
Providence, 34.
South Wales, 145, 146, 148, 225.
Spain, 79.
Walcheren, 15.
Zealand, 145, 197, 200.
Newcastle, 189. Newfoundland, n, 45, 144. Newport, 36. Niagara, 69. Niger River, 89, 90.
Protectorate, 91, 99.
Nile River, 90, 95.
Nisbet Widow, 28.
Norman, Captain, 254..
Normandy, 51.
Norton, Lord, 80, 97, 98, 158, 182,
210, 214. Noumea, 224. Nova Scotia, n, 75, 83. Nuyts, 222.
O
Ogoue" River, 105. Ohio, 68.
Index
355
Oil Rivers, 86, 102. Olive blossom, 8. Ontario, Lake, 65. Orinoco, 2, 10, 17, 115. Osbeck, 118. Osnaburgh Island, 143. Otago, 212, 214. Otaheite, 143. Othello, 80. Ottawa, 77, 82.
River, 64.
Oudney, Mr., 93, 94. Overweg, Dr., 94. Owhyhee, 145. Oxley, 188, 192.
Pahang, 252. Palmerston, Lord, 19. Panama, 7, 43, 106. Pandora Pass, 193. Pangkor, 255, 257. Papineau, 80. Paramaribo, 25. Parham, 25. Paria, 16, 30.
Park, Mungo, 91, 92, 192. Parkes, Sir Harry, 246.
Sir Henry, 190.
Parrett River, 46, 47, 50.
Parrtown, 75.
Patagonia, 137.
Patterson, 1155, 161.
Paulett, Lord G., 222.
Payta, 138.
Pearce, 93.
Peddie, 94.
Peel, Sir R., 222.
Peel, Mr., 179.
Pelican, The, 113.
Pelsart, 134.
Penang, 255, 257.
Penn, i, 5, 215.
Pepys, 141, 250.
Perak, 252.
Perceval, Mr., 216.
Peron, 152, 177.
Perth, 76, 175.
Peru, 47, 50.
Philip, Captain, 147, 149, 203.
Philippines, 258.
Pigeard, 224.
Pigeon Island, 32.
Pitch, Lake, 3, 13.
Pitons, The, 32. Pisani, 122. Pitcairn, 7, 219. Pitt, Mr., 151. Placentia, 52. Pleiad, The, 95. Pliny, 89, 93. Plymouth, 113, 134. Pomare, 221. Pondicherry, 176, 242. Pondoland, in. Pontac, 127. Pontiac, 72. Port Dalrymple, 161.
Darwin, 185, 186, 191.
Dauphin, 240.
Jackson, 149, 159, 185.
Louis, 245.
Morant, 5.
Nicholson, 206, 207.
of Spain, 13.
Porto Nova, 99.
Port Phillip, 158, 168, 169, 172.
Porto Rico, 20.
Port Royal, 5, 6.
Portuguese, 49, 57, 87, 113, 228, 229,
238, 240, 250, 257. Prince Edward Island, 75, 76.
Imperial, no.
of Orange, 121.
Rupert, 75, 76.
Pritchard, Consul, 222.
Privateers, 242, 244.
Protestants, 6, 73, 119, 241.
Ptolemy, 237.
Punta de la Galera,* 12.
Punta Gorda, 19.
Pyrard de Laval, 236, 237.
Quaelpaert, 246.
Quebec, 59, 73, 144.
Queen Charlotte Sound, 143, 201.
Queensland, 187.
R
Raffles, Stamford, 231, 251, 255. Ralegh, Sir Walter, 12, 15, 37, 48,
64, 115, 215. Recidivists, 224. Redonda, 20, 21. | Reformation, The, 87.
356
Index
Reunion, 244. Richardson, Dr., 94, 95. Richelieu, 65, 106. Rio del Rey, 101. Risdon, 160. Robinson Crusoe, 14, 134.
Sir Hercules, 224, 233.
Rockies, The, 62, 71.
Rodney, Lord, 5, 9, 22, 31, 32, 119.
Rodrigues, 241, 244.
Rogers Woodes, 34, 137.
Roman Catholics, 57, 65, 114, 119,
222, 229, 258. Roraima, 17. Rosemary, 7, 193. Royalists. 10, 34, 38, 50. Ruatan Island, 33. Rusden, Mr., 143. Rut, 49.
Saba, 20.
Sahara, The, 94, 95, 102.
Saigon, 247.
St. Bartholomew, 20.
Charles River, 71.
Christopher, 39.
Esprit, 68.
Eustatius, 20.
Francis, 151, 193, 195, 224.
Helena, 113, 114, 139.
lago de la Vega, 5, 6.
Johns, 48, 60.
Joseph, 12.
Kitts, 20, 26, 30, 42.
Lawrence, 51, 59, 66, 73, 144.
Louis, 104.
Lucia, 3, 29, 31, 32.
Malo, 51, 64, 134, 139, 140.
Paul's College, 39.
Pierre, 52, 53, 56.
Thomas, 20, 29.
Vincent, 29, 30.
Salaga, 100.
Samadu, 100.
Sandili, 108.
Sandwich Island, 145, 221, 222.
San Salvador, 34.
Santiago, 119.
Saskatchewan River, 71.
Sault St. Marie, 68, 72.
Saunders, Sir C. , 144.
Schmidt, George, 127.
Scotch colonists, 6, 14, 203, 249.
Scott, Sir Walter, 17, 76.
Seconda, 88.
Seigneley, 70.
Seigniors, The, 74.
Selangor, 250.
Selkirk, Alexander, 34, 136.
Settlement, 76, 213.
Selwyn, Bishop, 211.
Senegal, 87, 93, 102, 104, 106.
Sennaar, 91.
Shakspeare, 35.
Shand, Mr. Loudoun, 233.
Shanghai, 247.
Shark's Bay, 136.
Shari River, 102.
Shelvocke, 137.
Shore Rights, 53.
Siam, 255.
Sierra Leone, 86, 98, 104, 205.
Sikhs, 249, 255.
Singapore, 177, 184, 247, 255.
Singhalese, The, 229.
Sioux, The, 68.
Sisal hemp, 44.
Slaves, i, 2, 9, ii, 27, 30, 129, 130,
146. Slave Coast, 104.
compensation, 131.
Sluysken, 122.
Sofala, 229.
Sokoto, 93, 96, 102
Solomon Island, 225.
Sombrero, 29.
Somes, Mr., 206.
Somers, 36, 37.
Souris River, 71.
Spain, 2, 133, 139, 141, 215.
Spanish colonists, i, 2, 18.
Sparrmann, 117, 125, 201.
Spice Island, 250.
Squatters, 156.
Stanley, Lord, 164.
States General, 121.
Stirling, Captain, 174, 207.
Stony Desert, 184, 194.
Straiths, 144.
Straits Settlements, 250.
Streelecki, 194.
Stuart, 184, 196.
Sturt, 184, 193, 196.
Sudan, The, 96, 103, 198.
Suffren, 119, 120.
Sugar cane, 9, 25, 26, 30, 225, 226.
Sumatra, 249.
Summerhill Creek, 157.
Sungei Ujong, 252.
Index
357
Surat, 135, 250.
Surcouf, 243, 244.
Surinam, 15, 25.
Suva, 226.
Swan River, 174, 177, 195.
Sydney, 147, 154, 157, 169, 193, 224.
Table Bay, 118, 119, 120, 178.
Mountain, 115, 130.
Tadousac, 64, 66. Tahiti, 219, 221, 222. Talbot, 170. Taranaki, 214. Tasman, 134, 200. Tasmania, 160, 197. Taviuni, 225. Tea, 9, 234, 235, 247. Teach. Edward, 34. Temple, Sir R. , 258. Ternate, 135. Thierry, 204. Thiers, 223. Thouars, 207, 222. Tidore, 135. Tientsin, 248. Tierra da Brea, 12.
del Fuego, 145.
Timbo, 93.
Timbuctoo, 88, 89, 93, 104, 115.
Timor, 143.
Tobacco, 12, 13.
Tobago, 14.
Tomund, Earl of, 38.
Tonga Island, 225.
Tonquin, 254.
Toreen, 118.
Torrens, 182, 186.
Torres Straits, 187.
Tortola, 22, 29, 42.
Tortuga, 134.
Tory, The, 206, 207.
Townsville, 190.
Trafalgar, 9.
Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle, 15.
Amiens, 125.
— Nankin, 246.
— Paris, 31, 53, 79, 106, 140, 153, 241.
- Reciprocity, 84. Ryswick, 26, 52.
— St. Germain-en-Laye, 66.
Utrecht, 26, 39, 52, 56.
Versailles, 26, 30.
Treaty of Waitangi, 206. Trelawny, 4. Trincomalee, 120, 231. Trinidad, 12. Tripoli, 94, 95. Trollope, Anthony, 17. Truganini, 163. Tuckey, Captain, 92, 94. Tudor, Mr. , 92. Tulbagh, 122, 124. Turks Islands, 7, 33.
U
Unguratua, 94.
United States, 43, 78, 79, 80, 81, 83,
145- Uva, 234.
Vancouver, 246.
Van Diemen's Land, 151.
Gulf, 184, 194.
— Riebeck, 115. Vanua Island, 22. Venables, i, 5. Venezula, 2, 7, 14, 16. Venus, Transit of, 144. Verandrye, 70, 71. Vern, 173. Verrazano, 62, 66. Vesputius, Americus, 47. Victoria City, 247.
Colony, 158, 176, 225.
Queen, 81, 169, 170.
River, 195.
Vigiti Magna, 115. Virgin Gorda, 29, 42.
Island, 20, 29.
Virginia, 27. Viti Levu, 225. Vlaming, 174. Voltaire, 62.
W
Wafer, Lionel, 137.
Wakefield, E. G., 81, 181, 182, 183,
206, 208, 212.
Waller, 38, 219.
Wallin, Dr., 91.
Wallis, Captain, 143, 220, 221.
Walpole, Spencer, 197.
Warren, Sir Thomas, 23, 26.
358
Index
Washington, 40. Waterloo, 76. Watermeyer, 21. Watling Island, 34, Weld, Sir F. , 252, 256. Wellington, Duke of, 209.
City of, 211, 212, 214.
Wentworth, 155.
West, Rev. J., 165.
Whale fisheries, 146, 147, 203.
Whately, Archbishop, 209.
Whiteway, Sir W. , 53.
Whittier, 67.
Willoughby, 25.
Wills, Mr., 184, 195, 196.
Windward Islands, 29.
Winnipeg, 71.
Wisconsin, 68,
Wolfe, 73, 74, 144.
Wool, 153, 155, 176. Wordsworth, 198.
Yandi, 100.
Yarra, 170, 181.
Yokohama, 246.
York Peninsula, 187, 195.
Young, G. F., 206.
Sir H., 166.
SirW.,
Yucatan, 18.
Zaire River, 90.
Zambesi River, 102, 105, in.
Zululand, 109, in, 225.
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