At various times during his reign the Emperor has tried hard to win the favour of the peoples who have been forcibly included in the German Empire. He went to Alsace, and made a gracious speech in Strassburg; but later on, at Metz, he harshly told the people of Lorraine, "German you are, and German you will remain. May God and our German sword help us to effect this." These words were meant to crush any hopes that the people might entertain of one day being reunited with France. He also went amongst the Poles,[145] who have never been satisfied with German rule, and severely rebuked the nobles and the citizens. When he was leaving one of the Polish towns he said to the Mayor, "I hope that my words will be well borne in mind, for you know that I can be very disagreeable too."
Not content with being supreme in government, William now set up to be a judge of art and poetry in the Empire. He wrote a set of verses of pagan fierceness, and sent for an artist, and gave him the idea of the picture which you see on page [142]. It represents the civilized nations of Europe standing in the midst of mountains, valleys, and cities, with the castle of Hohenzollern in the foreground. Confronting the nations is a sea of flames and clouds of smoke, which are twisted into the form of terrible faces, representing the Chinese and Japanese. Buddha[146] sits enthroned in the midst of this framework as the demon of destruction. The Archangel Michael with a flaming sword appears in front of the civilized nations, urging them to prepare for a terrific conflict. Underneath the original picture the Emperor wrote, "Nations of Europe, defend your holiest possessions." You will observe that in this picture, which is supposed to warn us of what is called the Yellow Peril,[147] Germany is the chief figure, and that clinging to her is her ally, Austria.
Early in the year 1895 the Kaiser began to turn his thoughts to the Navy. Already he had the finest and best-organized army in the world; now he desired to win the sovereignty of the seas as well. "Germany's future," he said, "is upon the waters." The navy which he proposed to build was out of all proportion to the number of merchant ships which Germany possessed, and from the first many people in this country rightly guessed that it was meant to be the means of overcoming Great Britain. The Kaiser also caused a canal to be dug through Schleswig-Holstein, so as to unite the North Sea with the Baltic Sea, in order that his warships might rapidly pass from one to the other. The work of enlarging and deepening this canal was only finished in June 1914, within six weeks of the outbreak of war.
All this time envy and hatred of Britain was growing in Germany. Thanks to hard work, great perseverance, and much thought, Germany had become a great manufacturing nation, the rival of Great Britain. She felt that she was marked out to be the head of a world-empire, yet there were many drawbacks in her way. If you look at a map of Europe you will see that Germany has a very poor sea coast, and but few good harbours. The bulk of the Baltic Sea, which fronts the greater part of her coast, is frozen up for months every year. Every day Germany feels the necessity of possessing ports on the open ocean; yet she can only secure them by conquest. She is surrounded by old-established nations: by France on the west, Russia on the east, Austria-Hungary on the south. Two small states, one of them neutralized by a treaty to which she was a party, lie between her and the North Sea, and both of them possess ports which rank amongst the world's finest havens. The bulk of her sea-borne trade must pass through Belgium, the more southerly of these states, and she has never concealed her eager desire to possess it. Holland has long been regarded by her as a "brave bit of the Fatherland."
Germany, therefore, cannot expand in Europe without conquest, and she has found many difficulties in the way of expanding overseas. When she was ready to make herself a world-power, all the best parts of the earth had been taken up by other nations. She found that she had been born too late. She managed to found several colonies in Africa; but, with the exception of Togoland and the Kamerun, they were unfruitful and thankless regions of sand and stones. In Asia she set up the colony of Kiao-chau, in North China, and thereby aroused the anger of the Japanese. When she tried to get territory elsewhere she found herself in conflict with one or other of the Great Powers. Then, too, she saw hundreds of thousands of her people departing for America or for the colonies of other Powers, and there becoming lost to her. All this has been very galling to the Germans, and the Prussian military class has never ceased to point out that Germany can only expand by means of warfare.
Kiel Canal.
Though the Kaiser has frequently declared himself the friend of peace, he has always made the most warlike speeches to his own subjects. When he addresses his Army and Navy he does so in a defiant and boastful manner, and is fond of talking about the "mailed fist" and "shining armour" of Germany. For many years past this kind of talk has been very irritating to the other nations of Europe. On the eve of the Boer War he sent a telegram to Mr. Kruger, the President of the South African Republic, which plainly showed that he was no friend to Great Britain. When the war went against us in its early stages he and his advisers thought that we should be beaten, and that the British Empire would fall to pieces. It was openly said by Germans that if they had then possessed a strong navy they would have been able to capture some of the British colonies. The Kaiser seized the opportunity to press his Parliament to give him a big grant for building warships. He plainly told his people that his navy was to be so strong that "the next greatest naval power"—that is, Great Britain—would not be able to attack it without grave risk. So a big navy, costing more than 300 millions of money, was built.