Administrations would vouchsafe. Bismarck, who was at first opposed to German oversea adventures, but who had to face a growing popular opinion favourable to them, eventually caused the German flag to be hoisted [in 1883] in the Bay of Angra-Pequena, some 300 miles south of Walfisch Bay. Here a German merchant had bought land with a ten-mile sea frontage from a Hottentot Chief. A full account of the correspondence between the British and German Governments on the subject is given in Lord Fitzmaurice's Life of Lord Granville.
Most of the coastwise region of German South-West Africa is a desert of sand and scrub, but inland the country rises, is fertile and healthy. The northern and central part is inhabited by branches of the Great Bantu family—Ovambos and Hereros—to which the Matabele, Mashonas, Zulus, Basutos, etc., belong; interspersed with communities of Damaras (whose origin is doubtful), Hottentots, Bastards (half-breeds with a strong admixture of Boer blood) and primitive Bushmen. The southern region is mainly peopled by Hottentots.
For a number of years after the hoisting of the German flag at Angra-Pequena the German Government took very little direct action in the country, contenting itself with a desultory support of various trading companies which had started local businesses. "My aim," said Bismarck in 1885, "is the governing merchant and not the governing bureaucrat in those regions." He persisted in that view until events forced his hand. The representative of one of these companies, assisted by the missionaries, concluded a number of the usual treaties of amity and "protection" with the native tribes, amongst others with Kamaherero, the chief of one of the principal Herero clans. These the German Government subsequently evoked as political instruments, although it is very doubtful whether the original negotiator had any direct official authority. The Dependency's affairs were, in short, very much in the hands of a few merchants, settlers and missionaries, whose numbers, however, grew with the years. Nor did the German Government show any disposition at first to help them when in difficulties. Thus, in 1888, replying to one such appeal, the German Chancellor remarked that:
