INTRODUCTION
Preussische Jahrbücher turns back to read the article which he contributed in June to the Europäische Staats- und Wirtschafts-Zeitung , and from which extracts are given above on pages xxxiv—xxxvi, is likely to find the comparison sufficiently remarkable.
io—D r. Wilhelm Solf,
The German Government is, of course, not bound by the statements of any of the writers we have passed in review ; the writers are all unofficial, although some of them are men of high standing and influence, as writers on public affairs, in Germany. It is, therefore, important to see how far the Mittel-Afrika scheme is endorsed by the German Government. The authoritative exponent of the views of the Government is Dr. Wilhelm Solf, Secretary of State for the Colonies. Dr. Solf is himself a scholar, whose studies earlier in life lay in the field of Sanskrit and Indian languages. After holding an official post for some time in Calcutta, he was appointed Governor of German Samoa in 1900, and has first-hand experience of colonial administration.
Dr. Solf has made various speeches during the war which may be taken as revealing the mind of the Government So far as his manner goes, he is strikingly temperate and reasonable, and only passes into polemical asperity, where he is concerned to rebut English allegations. “The underlying tone of my address can be only deep indignation and fierce anger at the latest pronouncements of British statesmen,” he said, when speaking at Leipzig in June, 1917.
When we examine the substance of Dr. Soifs utterances, they cannot be construed in any sense except one which endorses the Mittel-Afrika plan. He seems to avoid using the term Mittel-Afrika ; he does not specify circumstantially, as the unofficial writers do, the regions which, must be taken