Democratic Sentinel, Volume 9, Number 51, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 January 1886 — TEUTONIC CUPIDITY. [ARTICLE]

TEUTONIC CUPIDITY.

Germany Seizes Upon the Samoan Islands and Annexes Them to Her Empire. Arbitary Aotion of Bismarck’s Consul— American and British Consuls Protest. [London dispatch.] Intelligence has been received here that Germany has seized the Islands of Samoa in the Pacific Ocean. The King and his chiefs were insulted, and finally fled, A force of marines were landed from the German war ship Albatross. The German Consul then hauled down the Samoan flag and ran up the German colors in its stead. The Samoans threaten to make war on the Germans. The American and British Consuls protested against the action of the Germans. In February, 1885, the announcement was made that Germany had annexed these islands, and that its action was in pursuance of a secret agreement between the Governments of Germauy and England. The officials at the Coionial Office in London said that they believed that the agitation of the Australians was only temporary, and that there was a growing feeling both in Australia and England that Germany would be a good neighbor, and that it was wise to give Germany an interest in the Pacific Islands to offset the aggressions of France. Strangely enough the dispatch announcing the annexation said that Germany’s proceedings were “despite the protests of the English and American Consuls.”

This seizure touches England more nearly than any other power, because the Samoans are distant only 400 miles from the British Fiji Islands, and contain two of the safest and best harbors in the Pacific. The islands are nine in number, havo an area of about 1,400 square miles, and a population of nearly 50,000. The largest island is Upola; area, 335 square miles; population, 17,000. On this island is Apia, the capital of the group, residence of the King and foreign consuls, and principal commercial town in the kingdom. The soil is rich and the surface densely wooded. The products comprise cocoanut-oil, arrowroot, cotton, castor beans, ginger, coffee, tortoise shell, and vegetables. The commerce of the island is mostly controlled by a single Hamburg house, and the protection of that solitary German trading establishment furnishes to the Berlin island-grabber a pretext for the theft of a whole Polynesian kingdom. The inhabitants are superior in bodily and mental endowments to those of other parts of Polynesia. They are Christians and mostly Presbyterians. The country has been under the protection of the United States.