Page:Africa by Élisée Reclus, Volume 4.djvu/85

Rh disappeared somewhere on the south coast; and although the annexation has been officially proclaimed, it is still far from being carried out. No military force having been placed at the service of the traders, the conversion of the natives into German subjects remains a pure fiction, nor does it prevent marauding hands from lifting the cattle of the German commissioner at the very door of his residence. Hitherto the Berlin authorities have taken no active steps to assert their claims, beyond forwarding a few rifles to the coast for distribution amongst the warriors of the friendly or allied populations. The rulers who command most

ready submission to their mandates are not the civil functionaries, but the Protestant missionaries of the central and southern districts. Stationed since the year 1842 amongst the Damaras, they at present possess over twenty establishments between the Cunene and Orange rivers.

Thanks to these missionaries, as well as to the traders, sportsmen, and mining prospectors, who have traversed the whole territory in various directions, the new German colonial possession is already well known, at least in its general features. Even the northern tracts, farthest removed from the centre of South African