Now the significance of that convention does not lie in its ethics8—which are very questionable9; nor in [Pg 166] the territory and population and resources concerned—which are very great; but in the fact that it brings within reasonable measure of fulfilment the imperial dream which William II began dreaming some seven and twenty years ago, and which he recently translated to the world in the declaration “Germany's future lies oversea.” In those four words is found the foreign policy of the Fatherland. The episode which began with the sending of a war-ship to an obscure port of Morocco and ended with Germany's acquirement of a material addition to her African domain10 was not, as the world supposes, an example of the haphazard11 land-grabbing so popular with European nations, but a single phase of a vast and carefully laid scheme whose aim is the creation of a new and greater Germany oversea—a Deutschland über Meer.
To solve the problems with which she has been confronted by her amazing increase in population and production, Germany has deliberately12 embarked13 on a systematic14 campaign of world expansion and exploitation. Finding that she needs a colonial empire in her business, she is setting out to build one just as she would build a fleet of dreadnoughts or a ship canal. The fact that she has nothing or next to nothing to start with, does not worry her at all. What she cannot obtain by purchase or treaty site will obtain by threats, and what she cannot obtain by threats she stands perfectly15 ready to obtain by going to war. Having once made up her mind that the realisation of her political, commercial, and economic ambitions requires her to have a colonial [Pg 167] dominion16, she is not going to permit anything to stand in the way of her getting it. In other words, wherever an excuse can be provided for raising a flagstaff, whether on an ice-floe in the Arctic or an atoll in the South Pacific, there the German flag shall flutter; wherever trade is to be found, there Hamburg cargo17 boats shall drop their anchors, there Stettin engines shall thunder over Essen rails, there Solingen cutlery and Silesian cottons shall be sold by merchants speaking the language of the Fatherland. It is a scheme astounding18 by its very vastness, as methodically planned as a breakfast-food manufacturer's advertising19 campaign and as systematically20 conducted; and already, thanks to Teutonic audacity21, aggressiveness, and perseverance22, backed up by German banks, fleets, and armies, much nearer realisation than most people suppose.
In Morocco, East Africa, and the Congo; in Turkey, Persia, and Malaysia; in Hayti, Brazil, and the Argentine; on the shores of all the continents and the islands of all the seas, German merchants and German money are working twenty-four hours a day building up that oversea empire of which the Kaiser dreams. The activities of these pioneers of commerce and finance are as varied23 as commerce and finance themselves. Their guttural voices are heard in every market place; their footsteps resound24 in every avenue of human endeavour. Their holdings in Brazil are the size of European kingdoms, and so absolute has their power become in at least two states—Santa Catharina and Rio Grande do Sul—that the Brazilian Government has [Pg 168] become seriously alarmed. Their mines in Persia and China and the Rand rival the cave of Aladdin. They are completing a trunk line across western Asia which threatens to endanger England's commercial supremacy25 in India; in Africa they are pushing forward another railway from the shores of the Indian Ocean to the Great Lakes which will rival the Cape26-to-Cairo system in tapping the trade of the Dark Continent. They own the light, power, and transportation monopolies of half the capitals of Latin America. In China the coal mines and railways of the great province of Shantung are in their hands. They work tea plantations28 in Ceylon, tobacco plantations in Cuba and Sumatra, coffee plantations in Guatemala, rubber plantations in the Congo, hemp29 plantations in East Africa, and cotton plantations in the Delta30 of the Nile. Their argosies, flying the house flags of the Hamburg American, the North German Lloyd, the German East Africa, the Deutsche Levante, and a score of other lines, carry German goods to German warehouses31 in the world's remotest corners, while German war-ships are constantly aprowl all up and down the Seven Seas, ready to protect the interests thus created by the menace of their guns.
Back of the German miners and traders and railway builders are the great German banks, which, when all is said and done, are the real exploiters of Germany's interests oversea. So completely are the foreign interests of the nation in their hands that there is no reason to doubt the story that the Emperor, when warned by the great bankers whom he had summoned to a [Pg 169] conference over the ominous32 Moroccan situation that war with France would endanger, if not destroy, Germany's oversea ambitions, turned to his ministers with the remark, “Then, gentlemen, we must find a peaceable solution.” We of the West have not yet awakened33 to a realisation of the magnitude of Germany's foreign interests or to the almost sovereign powers which the banks behind them exercise in certain quarters of the world—particularly in that Latin America which we have complacently34 regarded as securely within our own commercial sphere. In Asia Minor35 the Deutsche Bank not only controls the great Anatolian Railway system but it is building the Bagdad Railway—probably the most important of Germany's foreign undertakings36—these two German-owned systems providing a route by which German goods can be carried over German rails to India more cheaply than England can transport her own goods to her possessions in her own bottoms. In one hand the Disconto Bank Gesellschaft holds the railway and mining concessions38 of the Chinese province of Shantung, while with the other it reaches out across the world to grasp the railway system of Venezuela, it being to enforce certain claims of this bank that the German gun-boat Panther—the same that occupied Agadir—bombarded La Guayra in 1902 and as a consequence brought the relations of the United States and Germany uncomfortably close to the breaking-point. Seven German banks—the German-Asiatic Bank, the German-Brazilian Bank, the German-Orient Bank, the German-Palestine Bank, the Bank of [Pg 170] Chile and Germany, the Bank of Central America, and the German Overseas Bank—devote themselves exclusively to the exploitation of foreign concessions, either owning or dominating enterprises of every conceivable character in the regions denoted by their titles or lending financial assistance to German subjects engaged in such undertakings.
A few years ago, when Germany was starting in the race for naval42 supremacy, the Imperial Admiralty issued a review of Germany's oversea interests for the purpose of impressing the Reichstag with the necessity for dreadnoughts and then more dreadnoughts. Here are some of the figures, taken from the list at random43, and the more impressive because they are from official sources and because, since they were published, they have materially increased:
North Africa $25,000,000
Egypt 22,500,000
Liberia 1,250,000
Zanzibar 1,500,000
Mozambique 2,750,000
Madagascar 1,500,000
British South Africa 337,500,000
Turkey and the Balkans 112,500,000
British India and Ceylon 27,500,000
Straits Settlements 8,750,000
China 87,500,000
Mexico 87,500,000
Venezuela and Colombia 312,500,000
Peru and Chile 127,500,000
Argentine 187,500,000
Brazil 400,000,000
And this endless caravan44 of figures represents but a fraction of Germany's transmarine interests, remember, for [Pg 171] it does not include her colonies on both coasts of Africa, in North China, and in the South Seas. Now, if you will again glance over the above list of Germany's foreign interests, you can hardly fail to be struck by the fact that by far the greater part of them are in countries notorious for the weakness and instability of their governments, as, for example, China, Morocco, Turkey, Liberia, Mexico, and Venezuela; or in countries which, though possessing stable governments, would not be strong enough successfully to resist German aggression45 or German demands. In regions where German settlers abound46 and where German banks are in financial control it is seldom difficult for Germany to find an excuse for meddling47. It may be that a German settler is attacked, or a German consul3 insulted, or a German bank has difficulty in collecting its debts. So the slim cables carry a dash-dotted message to the Foreign Office in Berlin; instantly the cry goes up that in Morocco or China or Venezuela or Hayti German “interests” are imperilled; and before the government of the country in question realises that anything out of the ordinary has happened a cruiser with a German flag drooping48 from her taffrail is lying off one of its coast towns. Before the silent menace of that war-ship is removed, Germany generally manages to obtain a concession39 to build a railway, or a ninety-nine-year lease of a coaling-station, or the cession40 of a strip of more or less valuable territory, and so goes merrily and steadily49 on the work of building up a German empire oversea.
But these interests, world-wide though they are, [Pg 172] fail to satisfy the German expansionist party whose prophet is the Kaiser. They demand something more material than figures; they would see the German flag floating over government houses instead of warehouses, over fortifications instead of plantations. They would see more of the map of the world painted in German colours. But Germany was late in getting into the colonising game, so that wherever she has gone she has found other nations already in possession. In North Africa her prospectors50 and concession-hunters found the French too firmly established to be ousted51; the only territory left in South Africa over which she could raise her flag was so arid52 and worthless that neither England nor Portugal had troubled to include it in their dominions53; though she bullied54 China into leasing her the port of Kiauchau, the further territorial55 expansion in the Celestial56 Empire of which she had dreamed was halted by Russian jealousy57 and Japanese ambition; around Latin America—the most enticing58 field of all—stretched the protecting arm of the Monroe Doctrine59.
Now, these “Keep Off the Grass” signs with which she was everywhere confronted did not improve Germany's disposition60. They made her feel abused and peevish61, and whenever she saw a foreign flag flying over some God-forsaken islet in the Pacific or a stretch of snake-infested African jungle, she resented it deeply and said that she was being denied “a place in the sun.” So when France despatched an expedition to Fez in the summer of 1911 to teach the Moorish tribesmen proper respect for French property and French lives, Germany [Pg 173] seized on that action as an excuse for occupying a Moroccan harbour and a strip of the adjacent coast, on the pretext62 that her interests there were being jeopardised, and flatly refused to evacuate63 it unless France gave her something in return. I might mention, in passing, that Germany's interests in Morocco are considerably64 more important than is generally supposed, the powerful Westphalian firm of Mannesmann Brothers having obtained from Sultan Abdul Aziz extensive mining, ranching65, and plantation27 concessions in that portion of his empire which the German newspapers proceeded to prematurely66 dub67 “West Marokko Deutsch.” The rich iron deposits in this region, when taken in conjunction with the alarming decrease of the ore supply in the German mines and the consequent shortage which threatens the German iron and steel industry, undoubtedly68 provided one of the reasons underlying69 the Kaiser's interference with the French programme in Morocco.
France, knowing full well the enormous political and commercial value of Morocco, and determined70 to complete her African empire by its acquirement, after months of haggling71, during which battle-ships and army corps72 were moved about like chessmen, consented to compensate73 Germany by ceding74 her a slice of the colony of French Equatorial Africa, better known, perhaps, as the French Congo. [4] It was a good bargain that France made, too, for she took an empire and gave a jungle in [Pg 174] exchange. But Germany made the better bargain, it seems to me, for by agreeing to a French protectorate over Morocco she obtained one hundred thousand square miles of African soil without its costing her a foot of land or a dollar in exchange. From the view-point of the world at large, Germany emerged from the Moroccan imbroglio75 with a good-sized strip of equatorial territory, presumably rich in undeveloped resources, certainly rich in savages76, snakes, and fevers, and, everything considered, of very doubtful value. But to Germany this stretch of jungle land meant far more than that. It was a territory which she had wanted, watched, and waited for ever since she entered the game of colonial expansion. It is one of the links—in many respects the most essential one—which she requires to connect her scattered78 possessions in the Dark Continent and to bar the advance of her great rival, England, to the northward79 by stretching an unbroken chain of German colonies across Africa from coast to coast. The acquisition of that piece of west-coast jungle marked the greatest stride which Germany has yet taken in her march toward an empire oversea.
[4] Germany has given her new colony the official designation “New Kamerun.”
Heretofore Germany has been in much the same predicament as a boy who tries to put a picture puzzle together when some of the pieces are missing. In Germany's case the missing pieces were held by England, France, Belgium, and Portugal, and they refused to give them up. If you will open the family atlas80 to the map of Africa, you will see that Germany's four colonies on that continent are so widely separated that their consolidation81 [Pg 175] is apparently82 out of the question. Northernmost of all, and set squarely in the middle of that pestilential coast-line variously named and noted41 for its slaves, its ivory, and its gold, and aptly called “the rottenest coast in the world,” is the colony of Togo. Approximately the size of Cuba and rich in native products, it is so remote from the other German possessions that its only value is in providing Germany with a quid pro4 quo which she can use in negotiating for some territory more desirable. In the right angle formed by the Gulf83 of Guinea is the colony of Kamerun, a rich, fertile, and exceedingly unhealthful possession about the size of Spain. Though its hinterland reaches inland to Lake Tchad, it has hitherto been destitute84 of good harbours or navigable rivers, being barred from the Niger by British Nigeria and from the Congo, until the recent territorial readjustment, by French Equatorial Africa. Follow the same coast-line twelve hundred miles to the southward and you will come to German Southwest Africa, a barren, inhospitable, sparsely85 populated land, stretching from a harbourless coast as far inland as the Desert of Kalahari. On the other side of the continent, just south of the Equator, lies German East Africa, almost twice the size of the mother country and the largest and richest of the Kaiser's transmarine possessions. The combined area of these four colonies is equal to that of all the States east of the Mississippi put together; certainly a substantial foundation on which to begin the erection of an empire, especially when it is remembered that French Africa, which now [Pg 176] comprises forty-five per cent of the continent, is for the most part the work of but a single generation.
When Monsieur Cambon and Herr von Kiderlein-Waechter put their pens to the piece of parchment of which I have already spoken, the boundary of the Kamerun was automatically extended southward almost to the Equator and eastward86 some hundreds of miles to the Logone River, the apex87 of the angle formed by the meeting of these new frontiers touching88 the Congo River and thereby89 bringing the Kamerun into contact with the Belgian Congo. In other words, Germany's great colonies on either coast are no longer separated by French and Belgian territory, but by Belgian alone—and Belgium, remember, is both weak and neutral. Now, it is by no means beyond the bounds of possibility that Belgium might consent to sell Germany either the whole or a portion of the Congo, for the financial difficulties of that colony have been very great, and it has never been able to pay its way, its wants having been supplied at first by large gifts of money from King Leopold, and more recently by loans raised and guaranteed by Belgium. This unsatisfactory financial condition not having helped to popularise the Congo with the thrifty91 Belgians, there is considerable reason to believe that the Brussels Government would lend an attentive92 ear to any proposals which Germany might make toward its purchase. England might be expected, of course, to oppose the sale of the Congo to Germany tooth and nail, it being the fear of just such an eventuality which caused her to seize on the rubber atrocities94 as an excuse for her [Pg 177] vigorous and persistent95 advocacy of the internationalisation of the Congo. Though France holds the reversionary rights to the Congo, there are no grounds for believing that she would place any serious obstacles in the way of its acquisition by Germany, for she has given it to be understood that she intends devoting her energies henceforward to the exploitation of her enormous possessions in North Africa. Assuming, then—and these assumptions, believe me, are not nearly so chimerical96 as they may sound—that the Belgian Government should sell Germany all or a part of the Congo, Germany's possessions would then stretch across the continent from coast to coast, comprising all that is most worth having in Equatorial Africa.
While we are about it, let us carry our assumptions one step farther and take it for granted that Portugal could be induced to dispose of her great west-coast colony of Angola, to which Germany already possesses the reversionary rights. It is not only possible, but probable, that a good round offer of money, or perhaps another Agadir performance, based on some easily found pretext and backed up by German war-ships in the Tagus, would induce the Lisbon Government to hand over Angola, along with its fevers and its slavery, to the Germans. Portugal is bitterly poor, its government is weak and vacillating, and a long list of failures has left the people with little stomach for colonisation. The Portuguese97 Republic has few friends among the monarchical98 nations of Europe and could count on scant99 aid from them in resisting Teutonic coercion100. It [Pg 178] is asserted in diplomatic circles, indeed, that the ink on the Morocco-Equatoria Convention was scarcely dry before the German minister in Lisbon had opened secret pourparlers with the Portuguese Foreign Office with a view to the purchase of both Angola and the east-coast colony of Mozambique. [5] The acquisition of Angola would supply Germany with the final link needed to unite her colonies in East, West, and Southwest Africa, thus giving her an African empire second in size only to that of France. Far-fetched and far-distant as all this may sound, I have but roughly sketched101 for you that imperial dream for whose fulfilment the Kaiser and his people are indefatigably102 working and confidently waiting.
[5] Though commonly applied103 to the colony of Portuguese East Africa, the name Mozambique belongs, strictly104 speaking, only to the northernmost province of that possession.
Very few people are aware that, as long ago as 1898, England and Germany concluded a secret agreement which definitely provides for the eventual93 disposition of Portugal's African possessions. Of its true history and scope, however, little has ever leaked out. It grew out of Joseph Chamberlain's restless and ambitious schemes for the consolidation of British dominion in Africa. Appreciating, early in the Boer War, that England's success in that struggle would largely depend upon Germany remaining strictly neutral, that master statesman proposed to the Berlin Government a plan the effect of which was to divide the reversion of Angola and Mozambique between Great Britain and [Pg 179] Germany, inferentially leaving the former a free hand south of the Zambezi. This was the famous Secret Treaty, the final text of which was afterward105 signed by Lord Salisbury, and it was largely in virtue106 of this agreement that England was free from German interference during the Boer War. It is an interesting comment on the ethics of international politics that this remarkable107 agreement was concluded without any consultation108 of Portugal, the country the most vitally concerned. Delagoa Bay is no longer as imperative109 a necessity to England as it was in 1898, at which time it was the quickest way to reach the Transvaal, and, on the other hand, the West Coast is daily becoming more important for strategical and commercial reasons, for the “Afro” railway, of which I have made mention in the chapter on Morocco, will become in the near future the great highway between Europe and South America, while the railway now being built between Benguela (Lobito Bay) and the Katanga region will provide the easiest and quickest means of communicating with Rhodesia and the Transvaal. The terms of the Anglo-German Secret Treaty are of interest, however, as indicating how that portion of the African continent lying south of the Congo will be eventually parcelled out, and as showing the framework on which is being slowly but surely constructed Germany's African empire.
The erection of such a German state across the middle of Africa would have far-reaching results in more directions than one. In the first place, it would end [Pg 180] forever England's long-cherished ambition of eventually linking up her Sudanese and South African possessions and thus completing an “All Red” route from Cairo to the Cape. In the second place, Germany is now in a position to build her own transcontinental railway—from east to west instead of from north to south—on German or neutral soil all the way, thus removing the completion of the Cape-to-Cairo system, even under international auspices110, to a very distant day, and making Dar-es-Salam and Duala, instead of Cape Town and Alexandria, the starting-points for those highways of steel which are destined111 to open up inner Africa.
It is surprising how little even the well-informed know of these far places which Germany has taken for her own. Fertile spots as any upon earth, covered with hard-wood forests and watered by many rivers, when seen from the shade of an awning112 over a ship's deck they are as alluring113 as the stage of a theatre set for a sylvan114 opera. Go a thousand yards back from that smiling coast, however, and the illusion disappears, for you find a country whose hostile natives, savage77 beasts, and deadly fevers combine to make it deserving of its title—“the white man's graveyard115.” The statesmen of the Wilhelmstrasse must have taken a long look into the future when they raised the German flag over such lands as these. The returns they have yielded thus far would have discouraged a man less sanguine116 than William Hohenzollern. Though subsidised German steam-ships ply37 along their coasts, though their forests resound to the clank and clang of German railway-builders' [Pg 181] tools, though the plantations of government-assisted settlers dot the back country, though she has spent on them thousands of lives and millions of marks, Germany's only returns thus far have been a few annual tons of ivory, copra, and rubber, some excellent but unprofitable harbours, and many lonely stations where her sons contract fevers and pessimism117. But I would stake my life that this out-of-the-way, back-of-beyond, sun-blistered, fever-stricken German Africa will be a great colony some day.
From the care with which they are laid out, from the perfection of their sanitary118 arrangements, from the substantiality of their public buildings and official residences and their suitability to the climatic conditions, the travellers who confine their investigations119 to the coast are readily deceived into thinking that Tanga and Bagamoyo and Dar-es-Salam and Swakopmund and Duala are the gateways120 to rich and prosperous colonies. From the very outset, however, the imperial government based its claim for popular support in its colonial ventures upon the erroneous assumption that German colonies would attract Germans, and that in this way the language of the Fatherland would be spread abroad and eventually supplant121 that of Shakespeare. The Germans, however, have stubbornly refused to go to their own colonies, preferring those where English is the speech and where there are fewer officials and more freedom. To-day, therefore, you find the model German towns, so perfectly built that you feel as though you were walking through a municipal exhibition, almost [Pg 182] wholly peopled by brass-bound, hide-bound officials, while the German traders are carrying on thriving businesses under the English flag at Mombasa and Zanzibar and Sierra Leone.
Now, Germany has no one but herself to blame for this condition of affairs, having brought it about by the short-sightedness of her colonial policy and the harshness and incapacity of her officials. Intending to found industrial colonies, she created military settlements instead, administering and exploiting them, not as if they were German lands, but as if they were an enemy's country. Nothing emphasises more sharply the purely122 military character of Germany's African colonies than the fact that there are seven soldiers or officials to every German civilian123. Dwelling124 in idleness, in one of the most trying climates in the world, the officials seem to take a malicious125 satisfaction in interfering126 with the civil population, thus driving the traders—who form the backbone127 of every colony—to take up their residence in English ports and so paralysing German trade. The soldiers, for want of something better to do, are forever seeking advancement128 by making unnecessary expeditions into the hinterland for the purpose of “punishing” the natives, thus causing them to migrate by wholesale129 into British, Belgian, and even Portuguese territory, so that the German colonies are left without labour and the plantations are consequently being ruined.
The needless severity of Germany's colonial rule is graphically130 illustrated131 by the fact that during 1911 there were 14,849 criminal convictions in German East [Pg 183] Africa alone, or one conviction to every 637 natives; while in the adjoining protectorate of Uganda, among the same type of natives but under a British administration, the ratio of convictions was only one in 2,047. There is not a town in German East Africa where you cannot see boys of from eight to fourteen years, shackled132 together by chains running from iron collar to iron collar and guarded by soldiers with loaded rifles, doing the work of men under a deadly sun. Natives with bleeding backs are constantly making their way into British and Belgian territory with tales of maltreatment by German planters, while stories of German tyranny, brutality133, and corruption—of some instances of which I was myself a witness—form staple134 topics of conversation on every club veranda135 and steamer's deck along these coasts. In German Southwest Africa the dearth136 of labour, owing to the practical extermination137 of the Herero nation in Germany's last “little war” in that colony, has become a serious and pressing problem. In a single campaign—which cost Germany five hundred million marks and the lives of two thousand soldiers, and which could have been avoided altogether by a little tact90 and kindness—half the total population of the colony was killed in battle or driven into the desert to perish. That is why the builders of the Swakopmund-Otavi Railway in German Southwest Africa—the longest two-foot-gauge line in the world—have to send to Europe for their labour. Until Germany makes a radical138 change in her methods of colonial administration, and until she learns that traders and labourers are [Pg 184] more essential to a colony's prosperity than pompous139 and domineering officials, her colonial accounts will continue to stand heaviest on the debit140 side of the ledger141.
Successful colonial administration in Africa, as in all tropical countries, is largely a matter of temperament142, and the stolid143 sons of the Fatherland seem, strangely enough, to be more quickly affected by the demoralising climate and to be irritated more easily than either the English or the French. The Englishman's sense of justice and the Frenchman's sense of humour are their chief assets as successful colonisers and rulers of alien peoples, but the German colonial official, who is generally serious by nature and almost always domineering as the result of his training, possesses neither of these invaluable144 attributes and is heavily handicapped in consequence. It is no easy task with which he is confronted, remember. The loneliness and the privations of the white man's life, and the debility that comes from the heat and the rains and the fevers, when combined with the strain of governing and educating an inconceivably lazy, stubborn, stupid, and intractable people, make the job of an African official one of the most trying in the world. The loneliness and the climate seem to grip a German as they never do an Englishman, and he becomes irritable145 and ugly and unreasonably146 annoyed by trifles, so that when a native fails to get out of his way quickly enough, or to salute147 him with the punctiliousness148 which he considers his due, he flies into a rage and orders the man to be flogged. The native goes back to his village with a bleeding back [Pg 185] and hatred149 in his heart, and, as likely as not, a bloody150, costly151, and troublesome native uprising ensues. The African native is, after all, nothing but an overgrown and very aggravating152 child, and his upbringing is a job for school-teachers instead of drill sergeants154, and the sooner the imperial government appreciates that fact the better.
I went to German East Africa, which is the Kaiser's star colony, expecting to be deeply impressed; I came away deeply disappointed. It is only about fifty miles from Zanzibar across to Dar-es-Salam, the capital of the colony, but the local steamer, which is the size of a Hudson River tugboat and rolls horribly on the slightest provocation155, manages to use up the better part of a day in making the trip. Seen from the steamer's deck, Dar-es-Salam presents one of the most enchanting156 pictures that I know, and every one who goes ashore157 there does so with high expectations. Imagine, if you can, a city of two hundred thousand people, with the imposing158, red-roofed schools and churches and hospitals and barracks and municipal buildings of, say, Düsseldorf, and the white-walled, broad-verandaed, bungalow159 dwellings160 of southern California; with concrete wharves161 and cement sidewalks and beautifully macadamised roads and many public parks: imagine all this, I say, dropped down in the midst of a palm grove162 on one of the hottest and unhealthiest coasts in the world—that is Dar-es-Salam. The hotel is, barring the one at Kandy in Ceylon and another at Ancon in the Canal Zone, the best and most beautiful tropical hostelry I have ever [Pg 186] seen, but, as it is owned and run by the government, for the benefit of its officials, its manager, a blond, florid-faced, pompadoured Prussian, was as independent as a hotel clerk in a city where a presidential convention is going on. Just as in the other German colonies, I found East Africa to be suffering from a severe attack of militarism. I saw more sentries163 and patrols and guards during my four days' stay in Dar-es-Salam than I did in Constantinople during the Turkish Revolution. I was lulled164 to sleep by regimental bugles165 and I was awakened by them again at daybreak, and I never set foot out of doors without meeting a column of native soldiery, their black faces peering out stolidly166 from beneath the sun-aprons, their spindle shanks encased in spiral puttees, their feet rising and falling in the senseless “parade step” in time to the monotonous167 “rechts! links! rechts! links!” of the German sergeant153. But what struck me most forcibly about Dar-es-Salam was that it appeared to have no business. Apparently the soldiers had frightened it away. The harbours of Mombasa and Zanzibar and Beira and Louren?o Marques are alive with steamers taking on or discharging cargo (and quite two out of three of them fly the German flag), and their streets are lined with offices and warehouses and “factories” (over the doors of many of which are signs bearing German names), and their wharves are piled high with bales of merchandise going to or coming from the four corners of the earth; but in the harbour of Dar-es-Salam, as in all the other German harbours I visited, the only vessels168 are white German gun-boats [Pg 187] or rusty169 German tramps; its streets are lined with government offices instead of business offices; on its wharves are a few puncheons of palm-oil, or other products of the bush, and nothing more.
Warundi warriors170. German East Africa.
Native infantry171. German East Africa. A few years ago these men were just such savages as those shown above.
THE HAND OF THE WAR LORD IN GERMAN AFRICA.
However much the administration of the German colonies may be open to criticism, and however slow they may have been in commercial development, I have nothing but praise and admiration172 for the accomplishments173 of their railway-builders. From Dar-es-Salam I travelled inland by railway motor-car nearly to Kilamatinde, a distance of three hundred and seventy miles, through one of the most savage regions in Africa, over one of the best graded and ballasted roadbeds I have ever seen. The line is now being pushed forward from Kilamatinde toward Ujiji, on Lake Tanganyika, which it will reach, so the chief engineer assured me, by the summer of 1914. From Ujiji, which, by the way, is the place where Stanley discovered Livingstone, a steamer service will be inaugurated to Albertville, on the Belgian shore of the lake, whence a line is under construction to the navigable waters of the Lualaba, which is one of the chief tributaries174 of the Congo; while another line of steamers will ply between Ujiji and Kituta, in northeastern Rhodesia, which point the British Cape-to-Cairo system is approaching. By the close of 1914, in all probability therefore, the traveller who lands at Dar-es-Salam will be able to travel by train, with the passage across Lake Tanganyika as the only interruption, to the Cape of Good Hope, or by train and river steamer to the mouth of the Congo, and in [Pg 188] perfect comfort and safety all the way. As Walfish Bay, the only harbour in Southwest Africa worthy175 of the name, belongs to England, the Germans, finding themselves unable to buy it and appreciating that a harbourless colony is all but worthless, promptly176 set to work and built themselves artificial harbours at Swakopmund and at Lüderitz Bay, though at appalling177 cost. That Germany is exceedingly anxious to acquire Walfish Bay, and that she stands ready to make almost any reasonable concession to obtain it, there is little doubt. The mere178 fact that Walfish Bay is owned by England is a source of constant aggravation179 to the Germans, for it lies squarely in the middle of their Southwest African coast-line, its roomy roadstead and deep anchorage being in sharp contrast to the German port of Lüderitz Bay, which is being rapidly sanded up, and that of Swakopmund, a harbour on which the Berlin Government has already thrown away several millions of marks. Lüderitz Bay is already connected with the inland town of Keetmanshoop by three hundred and fifty miles of narrow-gauge line, and plans are now under consideration for pushing this southeastward so as to link up with the South African system near Kimberley, while from Swakopmund another iron highway, four hundred miles long, gives access to the Otavi copper-mining country and will doubtless be extended, in the not far-distant future, to the Rhodesian border, tapping the main line of the Cape-to-Cairo system in the neighbourhood of the Victoria Falls.
Mr. and Mrs. Powell travelling by railway motor-car in German Africa.
A way-station on the line of the German East African Railway.
RAILROADING THROUGH A JUNGLE.
I have laid considerable stress upon the subject of [Pg 189] railways, because it seems to me that in them lies the chief hope of the German colonies, for wherever the railway goes there goes civilisation180. Throughout the vast and potentially rich regions thus being opened up by the locomotive the imperial government is pouring out money unstintingly in the construction of roads, bridges, and reservoirs, the sinking of artesian wells, the establishment of telegraph lines and postal181 routes, the erection of schools and hospitals, in furnishing trees to the planters and machinery182 and live-stock to the farmers, and in assisting immigration. So, if keeping everlastingly183 at it brings success, I cannot but feel that the day will come when these officers and officials, these soldiers and settlers, these traders and tribesmen, will find their places and play their parts in the Kaiser's imperial scheme of a new and greater Germany over the sea.
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1 suave | |
adj.温和的;柔和的;文雅的 | |
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2 affected | |
adj.不自然的,假装的 | |
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3 consul | |
n.领事;执政官 | |
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4 pro | |
n.赞成,赞成的意见,赞成者 | |
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5 gratitude | |
adj.感激,感谢 | |
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6 moorish | |
adj.沼地的,荒野的,生[住]在沼地的 | |
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7 linen | |
n.亚麻布,亚麻线,亚麻制品;adj.亚麻布制的,亚麻的 | |
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8 ethics | |
n.伦理学;伦理观,道德标准 | |
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9 questionable | |
adj.可疑的,有问题的 | |
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10 domain | |
n.(活动等)领域,范围;领地,势力范围 | |
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11 haphazard | |
adj.无计划的,随意的,杂乱无章的 | |
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12 deliberately | |
adv.审慎地;蓄意地;故意地 | |
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13 embarked | |
乘船( embark的过去式和过去分词 ); 装载; 从事 | |
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14 systematic | |
adj.有系统的,有计划的,有方法的 | |
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15 perfectly | |
adv.完美地,无可非议地,彻底地 | |
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16 dominion | |
n.统治,管辖,支配权;领土,版图 | |
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17 cargo | |
n.(一只船或一架飞机运载的)货物 | |
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18 astounding | |
adj.使人震惊的vt.使震惊,使大吃一惊astound的现在分词) | |
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19 advertising | |
n.广告业;广告活动 a.广告的;广告业务的 | |
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20 systematically | |
adv.有系统地 | |
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21 audacity | |
n.大胆,卤莽,无礼 | |
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22 perseverance | |
n.坚持不懈,不屈不挠 | |
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23 varied | |
adj.多样的,多变化的 | |
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24 resound | |
v.回响 | |
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25 supremacy | |
n.至上;至高权力 | |
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26 cape | |
n.海角,岬;披肩,短披风 | |
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27 plantation | |
n.种植园,大农场 | |
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28 plantations | |
n.种植园,大农场( plantation的名词复数 ) | |
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29 hemp | |
n.大麻;纤维 | |
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30 delta | |
n.(流的)角洲 | |
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31 warehouses | |
仓库,货栈( warehouse的名词复数 ) | |
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32 ominous | |
adj.不祥的,不吉的,预兆的,预示的 | |
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33 awakened | |
v.(使)醒( awaken的过去式和过去分词 );(使)觉醒;弄醒;(使)意识到 | |
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34 complacently | |
adv. 满足地, 自满地, 沾沾自喜地 | |
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35 minor | |
adj.较小(少)的,较次要的;n.辅修学科;vi.辅修 | |
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36 undertakings | |
企业( undertaking的名词复数 ); 保证; 殡仪业; 任务 | |
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37 ply | |
v.(搬运工等)等候顾客,弯曲 | |
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38 concessions | |
n.(尤指由政府或雇主给予的)特许权( concession的名词复数 );承认;减价;(在某地的)特许经营权 | |
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39 concession | |
n.让步,妥协;特许(权) | |
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40 cession | |
n.割让,转让 | |
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41 noted | |
adj.著名的,知名的 | |
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42 naval | |
adj.海军的,军舰的,船的 | |
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43 random | |
adj.随机的;任意的;n.偶然的(或随便的)行动 | |
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44 caravan | |
n.大蓬车;活动房屋 | |
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45 aggression | |
n.进攻,侵略,侵犯,侵害 | |
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46 abound | |
vi.大量存在;(in,with)充满,富于 | |
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47 meddling | |
v.干涉,干预(他人事务)( meddle的现在分词 ) | |
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48 drooping | |
adj. 下垂的,无力的 动词droop的现在分词 | |
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49 steadily | |
adv.稳定地;不变地;持续地 | |
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50 prospectors | |
n.勘探者,探矿者( prospector的名词复数 ) | |
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51 ousted | |
驱逐( oust的过去式和过去分词 ); 革职; 罢黜; 剥夺 | |
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52 arid | |
adj.干旱的;(土地)贫瘠的 | |
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53 dominions | |
统治权( dominion的名词复数 ); 领土; 疆土; 版图 | |
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54 bullied | |
adj.被欺负了v.恐吓,威逼( bully的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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55 territorial | |
adj.领土的,领地的 | |
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56 celestial | |
adj.天体的;天上的 | |
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57 jealousy | |
n.妒忌,嫉妒,猜忌 | |
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58 enticing | |
adj.迷人的;诱人的 | |
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59 doctrine | |
n.教义;主义;学说 | |
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60 disposition | |
n.性情,性格;意向,倾向;排列,部署 | |
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61 peevish | |
adj.易怒的,坏脾气的 | |
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62 pretext | |
n.借口,托词 | |
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63 evacuate | |
v.遣送;搬空;抽出;排泄;大(小)便 | |
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64 considerably | |
adv.极大地;相当大地;在很大程度上 | |
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65 ranching | |
adj.放牧的 | |
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66 prematurely | |
adv.过早地,贸然地 | |
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67 dub | |
vt.(以某种称号)授予,给...起绰号,复制 | |
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68 undoubtedly | |
adv.确实地,无疑地 | |
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69 underlying | |
adj.在下面的,含蓄的,潜在的 | |
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70 determined | |
adj.坚定的;有决心的 | |
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71 haggling | |
v.讨价还价( haggle的现在分词 ) | |
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72 corps | |
n.(通信等兵种的)部队;(同类作的)一组 | |
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73 compensate | |
vt.补偿,赔偿;酬报 vi.弥补;补偿;抵消 | |
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74 ceding | |
v.让给,割让,放弃( cede的现在分词 ) | |
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75 imbroglio | |
n.纷乱,纠葛,纷扰,一团糟 | |
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76 savages | |
未开化的人,野蛮人( savage的名词复数 ) | |
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77 savage | |
adj.野蛮的;凶恶的,残暴的;n.未开化的人 | |
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78 scattered | |
adj.分散的,稀疏的;散步的;疏疏落落的 | |
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79 northward | |
adv.向北;n.北方的地区 | |
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80 atlas | |
n.地图册,图表集 | |
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81 consolidation | |
n.合并,巩固 | |
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82 apparently | |
adv.显然地;表面上,似乎 | |
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83 gulf | |
n.海湾;深渊,鸿沟;分歧,隔阂 | |
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84 destitute | |
adj.缺乏的;穷困的 | |
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85 sparsely | |
adv.稀疏地;稀少地;不足地;贫乏地 | |
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86 eastward | |
adv.向东;adj.向东的;n.东方,东部 | |
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87 apex | |
n.顶点,最高点 | |
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88 touching | |
adj.动人的,使人感伤的 | |
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89 thereby | |
adv.因此,从而 | |
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90 tact | |
n.机敏,圆滑,得体 | |
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91 thrifty | |
adj.节俭的;兴旺的;健壮的 | |
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92 attentive | |
adj.注意的,专心的;关心(别人)的,殷勤的 | |
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93 eventual | |
adj.最后的,结局的,最终的 | |
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94 atrocities | |
n.邪恶,暴行( atrocity的名词复数 );滔天大罪 | |
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95 persistent | |
adj.坚持不懈的,执意的;持续的 | |
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96 chimerical | |
adj.荒诞不经的,梦幻的 | |
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97 Portuguese | |
n.葡萄牙人;葡萄牙语 | |
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98 monarchical | |
adj. 国王的,帝王的,君主的,拥护君主制的 =monarchic | |
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99 scant | |
adj.不充分的,不足的;v.减缩,限制,忽略 | |
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100 coercion | |
n.强制,高压统治 | |
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101 sketched | |
v.草拟(sketch的过去式与过去分词形式) | |
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102 indefatigably | |
adv.不厌倦地,不屈不挠地 | |
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103 applied | |
adj.应用的;v.应用,适用 | |
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104 strictly | |
adv.严厉地,严格地;严密地 | |
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105 afterward | |
adv.后来;以后 | |
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106 virtue | |
n.德行,美德;贞操;优点;功效,效力 | |
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107 remarkable | |
adj.显著的,异常的,非凡的,值得注意的 | |
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108 consultation | |
n.咨询;商量;商议;会议 | |
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109 imperative | |
n.命令,需要;规则;祈使语气;adj.强制的;紧急的 | |
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110 auspices | |
n.资助,赞助 | |
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111 destined | |
adj.命中注定的;(for)以…为目的地的 | |
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112 awning | |
n.遮阳篷;雨篷 | |
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113 alluring | |
adj.吸引人的,迷人的 | |
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114 sylvan | |
adj.森林的 | |
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115 graveyard | |
n.坟场 | |
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116 sanguine | |
adj.充满希望的,乐观的,血红色的 | |
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117 pessimism | |
n.悲观者,悲观主义者,厌世者 | |
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118 sanitary | |
adj.卫生方面的,卫生的,清洁的,卫生的 | |
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119 investigations | |
(正式的)调查( investigation的名词复数 ); 侦查; 科学研究; 学术研究 | |
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120 gateways | |
n.网关( gateway的名词复数 );门径;方法;大门口 | |
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121 supplant | |
vt.排挤;取代 | |
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122 purely | |
adv.纯粹地,完全地 | |
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123 civilian | |
adj.平民的,民用的,民众的 | |
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124 dwelling | |
n.住宅,住所,寓所 | |
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125 malicious | |
adj.有恶意的,心怀恶意的 | |
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126 interfering | |
adj. 妨碍的 动词interfere的现在分词 | |
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127 backbone | |
n.脊骨,脊柱,骨干;刚毅,骨气 | |
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128 advancement | |
n.前进,促进,提升 | |
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129 wholesale | |
n.批发;adv.以批发方式;vt.批发,成批出售 | |
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130 graphically | |
adv.通过图表;生动地,轮廓分明地 | |
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131 illustrated | |
adj. 有插图的,列举的 动词illustrate的过去式和过去分词 | |
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132 shackled | |
给(某人)带上手铐或脚镣( shackle的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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133 brutality | |
n.野蛮的行为,残忍,野蛮 | |
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134 staple | |
n.主要产物,常用品,主要要素,原料,订书钉,钩环;adj.主要的,重要的;vt.分类 | |
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135 veranda | |
n.走廊;阳台 | |
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136 dearth | |
n.缺乏,粮食不足,饥谨 | |
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137 extermination | |
n.消灭,根绝 | |
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138 radical | |
n.激进份子,原子团,根号;adj.根本的,激进的,彻底的 | |
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139 pompous | |
adj.傲慢的,自大的;夸大的;豪华的 | |
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140 debit | |
n.借方,借项,记人借方的款项 | |
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141 ledger | |
n.总帐,分类帐;帐簿 | |
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142 temperament | |
n.气质,性格,性情 | |
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143 stolid | |
adj.无动于衷的,感情麻木的 | |
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144 invaluable | |
adj.无价的,非常宝贵的,极为贵重的 | |
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145 irritable | |
adj.急躁的;过敏的;易怒的 | |
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146 unreasonably | |
adv. 不合理地 | |
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147 salute | |
vi.行礼,致意,问候,放礼炮;vt.向…致意,迎接,赞扬;n.招呼,敬礼,礼炮 | |
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148 punctiliousness | |
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149 hatred | |
n.憎恶,憎恨,仇恨 | |
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150 bloody | |
adj.非常的的;流血的;残忍的;adv.很;vt.血染 | |
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151 costly | |
adj.昂贵的,价值高的,豪华的 | |
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152 aggravating | |
adj.恼人的,讨厌的 | |
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153 sergeant | |
n.警官,中士 | |
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154 sergeants | |
警官( sergeant的名词复数 ); (美国警察)警佐; (英国警察)巡佐; 陆军(或空军)中士 | |
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155 provocation | |
n.激怒,刺激,挑拨,挑衅的事物,激怒的原因 | |
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156 enchanting | |
a.讨人喜欢的 | |
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157 ashore | |
adv.在(向)岸上,上岸 | |
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158 imposing | |
adj.使人难忘的,壮丽的,堂皇的,雄伟的 | |
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159 bungalow | |
n.平房,周围有阳台的木造小平房 | |
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160 dwellings | |
n.住处,处所( dwelling的名词复数 ) | |
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161 wharves | |
n.码头,停泊处( wharf的名词复数 ) | |
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162 grove | |
n.林子,小树林,园林 | |
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163 sentries | |
哨兵,步兵( sentry的名词复数 ) | |
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164 lulled | |
vt.使镇静,使安静(lull的过去式与过去分词形式) | |
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165 bugles | |
妙脆角,一种类似薯片但做成尖角或喇叭状的零食; 号角( bugle的名词复数 ); 喇叭; 匍匐筋骨草; (装饰女服用的)柱状玻璃(或塑料)小珠 | |
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166 stolidly | |
adv.迟钝地,神经麻木地 | |
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167 monotonous | |
adj.单调的,一成不变的,使人厌倦的 | |
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168 vessels | |
n.血管( vessel的名词复数 );船;容器;(具有特殊品质或接受特殊品质的)人 | |
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169 rusty | |
adj.生锈的;锈色的;荒废了的 | |
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170 warriors | |
武士,勇士,战士( warrior的名词复数 ) | |
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171 infantry | |
n.[总称]步兵(部队) | |
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172 admiration | |
n.钦佩,赞美,羡慕 | |
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173 accomplishments | |
n.造诣;完成( accomplishment的名词复数 );技能;成绩;成就 | |
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174 tributaries | |
n. 支流 | |
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175 worthy | |
adj.(of)值得的,配得上的;有价值的 | |
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176 promptly | |
adv.及时地,敏捷地 | |
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177 appalling | |
adj.骇人听闻的,令人震惊的,可怕的 | |
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178 mere | |
adj.纯粹的;仅仅,只不过 | |
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179 aggravation | |
n.烦恼,恼火 | |
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180 civilisation | |
n.文明,文化,开化,教化 | |
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181 postal | |
adj.邮政的,邮局的 | |
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182 machinery | |
n.(总称)机械,机器;机构 | |
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183 everlastingly | |
永久地,持久地 | |
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