NAURU, THE RICHEST ISLAND IN THE 



SOUTH SEAS 



By Rosamond Dobson Rhone 



THE mandates for the Pacific 

 islands which formerly belonged 

 to Germany were assigned to the 

 powers who seized them in the first year 

 of the war : to Japan, the German islands 

 north of the Equator; to New Zealand, 

 German Samoa; to Australia, German 

 New Guinea, the German Solomons ; to 

 Great Britain, the island of Nauru. There 

 have been doubts expressed as to whether 

 these mandates are not proving to their 

 holders more of a burden than an asset, 

 but Nauru is probably the richest spot on 

 the globe for its size. 



This is a story of the island whose 

 name has risen to notice in the new 

 geographies, as a by-product of the up- 

 heaval caused by the World War, just 

 as, owing to some geological upheaval 

 ages ago, the island itself arose from 

 the sea. 



GERMANY CAME LATE INTO THE PACIFIC 



This story of Nauru under white con- 

 trol is the story of German possessions 

 in the South Seas. Germany came late 

 into the Pacific ; all the good things had 

 been taken. The explorers — Dutch, 

 British, French, and Spanish — had pretty 

 well divided up the islands, for in their 

 day "findings were keepings." 



The German colonial policy was un- 

 dertaken in 1883 by financing certain 

 chartered companies which had been 

 trading with the islands for about 25 

 years. By this means Germany acquired 

 a protectorate over a part of northern 

 New Guinea. A . protectorate is the 

 camel's nose in the tent. When he gets 

 his head in and his hump, it becomes a 

 colony. 



New Guinea is shaped like a dragon, 

 with a Dutch head and shoulders, Brit- 

 ish underparts and tail, and German 

 back and rump. Perhaps, from the Ger- 

 man colonial point of view, their portion 

 was the saddle, in which they would 

 override the entire Pacific. 



In 1886 an agreement between Great 

 Britain and Germany, defining the "Limit 



of spheres of influence in the Western 

 Pacific," was signed at Berlin. This was 

 the camel's head and hump. By this all 

 lands unappropriated by other powers 

 were divided between the two contract- 

 ing parties. It was something like the 

 division of the earth between Abram and 

 Lot — one took the East and the other the 

 West. In this case Great Britain took 

 the East and Germany the West. 



The language of the deed is not like 

 the language of deeds of land ; there are 

 no corners and boundaries of adjacent 

 properties; no "lands, tenements, and 

 hereditaments" ; but the terminology of 

 navigation is drawn upon to furnish the 

 descriptions. 



The division line starts on land, but at 

 once puts out to sea. It begins at a point 

 on the northeast coast of New Guinea on 

 the boundary line between British and 

 German territory, thence east along a 

 parallel of latitude to a point in the Pa- 

 cific Ocean marked on a British admi- 

 ralty chart, thence from point to point 

 on admiralty charts to a point fifteen de- 

 grees north latitude and 173 30' east 

 longitude. 



GERMANY PURCHASED ISLANDS FROM 

 SPAIN 



This line of cleavage gave to Germany 

 the Marshall group, a large number of 

 islands north of New Guinea, rechris- 

 tened the Bismarck Archipelago, some of 

 the Solomon Islands, and a small coral 

 island almost under the Equator, which 

 is Nauru. 



Three years later Germany added to 

 her Pacific holdings by buying from 

 Spain the Caroline group west of the 

 Marshalls, and the Ladrones, with the 

 exception of Guam, which had been pre- 

 viously acquired by the Lmited States as 

 a by-product of the Spanish-American 

 War. 



About the same time, she acquired by 

 agreement with Great Britain and Amer- 

 ica (ceding to the former part of the 

 Solomon group) two islands in the Sa- 



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