GERMAN COLONIZATION IN SOUTHWEST AFRICA 83 
interior, harbors built, roads opened, and excellent experi- 
mental stations erected; and everything possible was done 
to conserve the natural resources of the German West 
African possessions and to place them upon a sound and 
prosperous basis. Colonization was encouraged, but only 
settlers who possessed from $2500 to $12,000 were permitted 
to purchase land, as it is not in any sense a poor man’s coun- 
try. Although possessing nearly thrice the area of the 
mother country, it remained a question whether the three 
protectorates would ever pay. Togo, about the size of 
Maine, and the Cameroons, after 1911 somewhat larger than 
Texas, although containing large reaches of unhealthy or 
unproductive territory, possessed a fair share of fertile soil 
and some excellent promise of future worth. But they 
would have required the expenditure of much time, labor, 
care, and money before returning any net reward to the 
Empire. The hundred thousand square miles added to the 
Cameroons by the Franco-German treaty of 1911! made 
the situation even more difficult, because little had been 
done to develop the territory, and the natives resisted the 
German occupation. 
German Southwest Africa, one fifth larger than Texas and 
possessing some mines and other valuable assets, was 
nevertheless a veritable “white elephant” to the German 
Government. Its population was estimated at 100,000; 
and the greater portion of the country, particularly the 
southern section, is either a sandy desert or a sterile plain. 
The ultimate cost of placing such a colony on a self-sustain- 
ing or remunerative basis will be enormous. In spite of all 
that was done during the first twenty-six years of its history 
as a German colony, and of the rapid development of 
diamond mining after 1908, the Imperial Government had 
! An account of the Franco-German negotiations of 1911 will be found 
in Chapter XII.