CAPE COLONY AND SOUTH AFRICA. 



97 



session of the country difficult. The mining 

 concession of the Herero chief to Robert Lewis 

 was the principal basis of their plots, and his 

 claims were kept alive for the purpose of secur- 

 ing more favorable terms in future negotiations 

 with the German Government. A mixed Ger- 

 man and English commission in 1885 affirmed 

 his right to certain mines. When he was taking 

 his machinery to the ground, Capt. von Fran- 

 ois and Deputy-Commissioner Nels stopped 

 him at Tsaubis, and informed him that he must 

 apply for a formal permission before beginning 

 operations. This he refused to do, having the 

 year before defied the imperial commissioner 

 and refused to acknowledge the German pro- 

 tectorate. Returning to Walfish Bay, he com- 

 plained to the Cape authorities, and in 1890 

 went to England to lay his protest before the 

 British Government. Lewis claims, by virtue of 

 the grant of Kamaherero, the exclusive right to 

 dig minerals throughout the whole extent of 

 Damaraland. The German acquisitions were 

 found to be almost valueless, aside from their 

 mineral resources, except as a means of access to 

 pastoral regions beyond and to the trade of the 

 interior, and in the Anglo-German settlement of 

 1890 the German Government endeavored to 

 acquire a pastoral country and a trade route to 

 the Zambesi. 



Ngamiland. The main object of the procla- 

 mation of British sovereignty in Bechuanaland 

 and a British sphere of influence up to 22 of 

 south latitude was to separate the Germans from 

 the Transvaal by a barrier of British territory. 

 It was supposed also that they were excluded 

 from any extension into the interior beyond the 

 Kalihari Desert, since Portugal claimed the 

 regions north of latitude 22. By an agreement 

 with Portugal and treaties with native chiefs 

 the German Government, nevertheless, acquired 

 territorial rights over the rich country that has 

 Lake Ngami in its center. With the Portu- 

 guese Government a treaty was signed on Dec. 

 30, 1886, permitting the expansion of the Ger- 

 man possessions to the upper course of the Zam- 

 besi. In the negotiations with Great Britain in 

 1890 the German Government put forward the 

 claims it had acquired over this desirable region. 

 The English at the same time advanced count- 

 er-claims, and in the final settlement, in which 

 various conflicting rights and aims of both gov- 

 ernments in Africa were balanced against each 

 other, a compromise was struck that gave Nga- 

 miland to Great Britain and to Germany a strip 

 running to the upper Zambesi. Besides claim- 

 ing Ngamiland, the Germans disputed the 

 boundary of the British protectorate, which was 

 asserted in the proclamation of 1885 to be 20 

 of east longitude, affirming that the countries 

 over which they exercised a protectorate ex- 

 tended to 24 of east longitude. They also 

 pressed for the abandonment to them of Walfish 

 Bay, the only good harbor along the German 

 coast, to which the Cape Colonists clung tena- 

 ciously, being resolved to make every effort to 

 drive the Germans from the southwest coast and 

 to gain the whole' region south of the Zambesi 

 for the South African confederation that they 

 hope to form under the hegemony of Cape Col- 

 ony and the protection of Great Britain. The 

 German Government, by the abandonment of 

 VOL. xxx. 7 A 



Ngamiland, virtually relinquished the prospect 

 of ever being able to contend with England for 

 the supremacy in South Africa, obtaining as the 

 price the cession of theisland of Heligoland, which 

 is held by the German nation to be of greater 

 value than any colonial expansion in South Af- 

 rica. By the agreement that was signed at Ber- 

 lin on July 1, 1890, the Orange river and the 20th 

 meridian remain the south and east boundaries 

 of the German sphere of influence. At latitude 

 22 the line runs eastward to the 21st meridian, 

 which forms the eastern boundary northward as 

 far as the 18th parallel, which it then follows 

 eastward to the river Chobe, descending that 

 river to its junction with the Zambesi, where it 

 terminates. Germany is to have free access 

 from her protectorate to the Zambesi by a strip 

 of territory nowhere less than 20 miles wide, ex- 

 tending along the Portuguese frontier. This is 

 supposed to be merely a formal concession, be- 

 cause the narrow strip, traversing an almost im- 

 passable country where the head streams of the 

 Chobe take their rise in marshes, is of no value 

 as a trade route. A dispute regarding the south- 

 ern boundary of the British territory of Wal- 

 fish Bay was left to be arbitrated in case the two 

 governments fail to come to an understanding 

 within two years, the disputed territory being in 

 the mean time considered neutral. The* Germans, 

 in drawing the line from the village of Schep- 

 pemansdorp to the Swartkop river, had included 

 in their territory a plateau that the Cape officials 

 claimed on the ground that it was used as graz- 

 ing-ground during a part of the year by natives 

 living under their jurisdiction. 



Ngamiland, since it was discovered by David 

 Livingstone, in 1849, has never engaged the at- 

 tention of Europeans until it became an object 

 of contention between the English and German 

 governments. The term is applied to the terri- 

 tory lying north of the 22d parallel and east of 

 the 21st meridian, and bounded on the east by 

 a line intersecting the 22d parallel and passing 

 through Letterboom, on the Botletli, to the 

 confluence of the Chobe and the Zambesi, and 

 on the north by a line drawn from that point 

 through Andara to the 21st meridian. This 

 country, having an area of about 75,000 square 

 miles, is one of the most fertile districts in 

 southern Africa. In the center is Lake Ngami, 

 through which passes the navigable Okavango, 

 or Tonke river, known as the Botletli, or Zuga, 

 after it issues from the lake. South of the lake 

 is a well- watered, hilly, forest region, said to 

 contain valuable minerals, and known to have a 

 remarkably pleasant and healthful climate. Im- 

 mediately north of the lake is a swampy district 

 full of large game and elephants, where one of 

 the most valuable fibrous plants, the bauze grass, 

 resembling silk in fineness, grows wild in pro- 

 fusion. Beyond are vast prairies, on which the 

 finest cattle in South Africa are reported to 

 roam in herds. Ngamiland is inhabited by the 

 western branch of the Bamangwatos, a peace- 

 able and industrious people, who travel as far 

 as Johannesburg in search of work. One of the 

 most powerful chiefs is Moremi, who has for his 

 adviser a missionary trader named Strombone, 

 a Swede, who was induced after the Germans 

 began to acquire territorial rights from neigh- 

 boring chiefs to obtain from Moremi a concession 



