THE TABLET A WEEKLY NEWSPAPER AND REVIEW

ESTABLISHED 1840 REGISTERED AS A NEWSPAPER

VOL. 170 No. 5091

LONDON DECEMBER 4th, 1937

SIXPENCE

IN THIS ISSUE

THE TABLET CHRISTMAS LITERARY SUPPLEMENT

Twenty-four Pages o f Book Reviews, Selected Reading Lists, etc.

CONSISTORIES AND CARDINALS An Account o f the History and Functions o f the Sacred College.

By Philip Hughes THE SOCIAL ORDER

Editorial

THE FULL TEXT OF THE WESTMINSTER

ADVENT PASTORAL Full L ist o f Contents on page 744.

THE WORLD WEEK BY WEEK The French Visit

The visit o f the French Premier and Foreign Secretary passed off very successfully. The official communiqué was inevitably o f a very general and non-committal character, but the statesmen o f both countries, testing each o th e r ’s temper, were satisfied and relieved to find no hardened and limited views. The meeting consisted o f a few hours’ talk over a very wide field, and it went as smoothly as it did because the position is still fluid. But a realization o f the gravity o f what is a t stake kept both the British and French statesmen in a mood o f caution and reasonableness. In contrast to the confident forecasts that Herr H itle r’s attitude was th a t he would postpone the colonies in exchange for an agreed reassertion of special German interests in central Europe, the British and French attitu de is to approach first the German colonial claims, to endeavour, by agreement upon them, to improve the atmosphere, and so the outlook, in central Europe. Britain is the largest, France the second largest, overseas empire in the world. The two Powers between them hold most o f Africa.

half-century to be content with the phrase “ the scramble for Africa,” and only to see the divisions o f the ’eighties and ’nineties in terms o f national jealousies. Those jealousies were indeed strong, and often decisive motives. The settlement o f New Zealand, a hundred years ago, was finally accepted as necessary by the British Government from a fear that the French would get in first. But equally important in Africa was the imperative necessity for Government intervention, once the unofficial trader had established himself. The Governments o f the day, and Britain particularly, were only with difficulty brought to face the additional responsibilities and expense of political control. They sheltered themselves as long as they could behind the device o f chartered companies, hoping to leave the burdens and expense to those who voluntarily undertook them. They were led to embark on the great adventure of African imperialism, in no mood o f conquest, with no sort of resolve to impose their civilization and ideas and religion on a lower race. The Industrialization of Africa

What is now suggested is the full transference o f a certain area in west and central Africa, Togoland, the Cameroons, to German sovereignty, primarily as a recognition of equal status, and the development of some system o f jo in t economic control, in which Germany would share, over a much larger area. One device would be the creation of chartered companies in which the different nations would hold shares of varying p roportions and different parts. This idea was mooted privately as far back as 1931, and German business interests, particularly shipping, sounded different people in London about it. At that time there was little disposition in London to consider the plan. What is Im portant is that the repercussions in Africa of European policy shall be turned to good, and not to bad, account. It is a great misreading o f the history of the last

The French theory o f imperialism has been the more self-confident. The French rule in the Latin tradition and seek a full incorporation o f the Africans in the life o f France. The black troops who were brought to Europe, and whose presence in Germany was so great an error, surprised Europeans by the way they thought o f themselves as “ we Frenchmen.” But both imperialisms have found themselves unprepared for the shattering effects of the modern economic order on primitive peoples. The coming o f the European meant the end o f the old native preoccupation, with the tribe as the source of security and livelihood. The good side o f European rule, the ending of tribal war, oppression and enslavement, left economic activity, working for wages in order to satisfy newly discovered wants, as the only obvious alternative. From many directions the attempts to fit primitive Africans into the directly