In America the German immigrants have readily assimilated, though in Brazil they have formed separate centres.
In the German Colonies a set-back to development has been the fact that they have never realised the importance of respecting local manners and customs, but the home machinery has been applied in every particular to conditions wholly dissimilar and unsuitable.
In South West Africa, for instance, Dr Bönn of Munich says they "solved the native problem by smashing tribal life."
Being trained and accustomed to obey, moreover, the German cannot act without orders, and lacks initiative and therefore administrative ability.
Compulsory military service has been instituted, and the German Colonial administration is cordially detested except where perhaps it favours ill-treatment and oppression of natives.
Where the British have evolved a system of government which is a comity of commonwealths within a monarchy, and hold their dependencies by the sense of honour and appreciation, to which the attitude of South Africa bears splendid witness, the German's grip was by the claws of militarism and terrorism.
Under the circumstances it is perhaps not surprising that the Germans should fall into the error that the British dependencies would embrace an opportunity of "throwing off the British yoke"; and the assumed disloyalty of British Colonies, with the further assumption, widely distributed, that various peoples under the British flag were capable of being tampered with easily, may well have been one of the most cogent theories leading the German Emperor and his advisers to their fateful decision.
With the extraordinary aptitude of the Germans for intrigue, perhaps the war Lords were not altogether foolish in their conclusions.
There was a chance of seduction, especially with native races in Africa, but it was a very small chance, and, like many another well-laid scheme, this one failed because its authors did not understand the material which was to be used to work it.
It failed in Africa because the African is more than the beast of burden the German Colonists schooled and deluded themselves into thinking. They did not understand the native; and, in a word, the native hates the German, especially the officials.