Chapter 48 Return to Australia

October 24, 1900 was the first day after Queen Victoria's death.

As early as yesterday afternoon after the Queen stopped breathing, someone was responsible for collecting Queen Victoria's body and transporting it back to the British mainland for burial.

Although the place Queen Victoria most wanted to stay during her lifetime was the Isle of Wight, as the monarch of the British Empire and the queen respected and admired by all British people, Queen Victoria's body will eventually be buried in the Royal Cemetery in the UK.

The transportation of the remains is very difficult. It takes at least half a month to sail from the Isle of Wight to the British mainland. If you add in the time spent on supplies along the way, the time may become even longer.

In order to transport Queen Victoria to the British mainland as early as possible, Crown Prince Edward ordered the accompanying battleship HMS Renown to take charge of the transportation operation.

HMS Renown is one of the fastest warships in the Royal Navy. The voyage from the British Empire to New Zealand can be compressed to just over 20 days.

While the UK was busy transporting the remains of Queen Victoria, royal families and senior officials from other countries had no reason to continue to stay on the Isle of Wight.

Everyone said goodbye to each other, then got on the warship and returned to their country.

The only one among these people who had some friendship with Arthur was William II. Before William II left, he specifically called Arthur elsewhere, and the two chatted for a while.

William II was very surprised by Queen Victoria's care and love for Arthur. Originally, when Queen Victoria was dying last night, William II wanted to stay with his grandmother and brush up the favorability of the British.

But I didn't expect that it was precisely because of Arthur that he, a man who was regarded as the emperor, did not get close to Queen Victoria last night.

However, Wilhelm II did not mind this and only reiterated the cooperation treaty between Germany and Australia.

After all, anyone with a discerning eye can see that after Queen Victoria handed over British New Guinea and New Zealand to Arthur, Australia would become the most powerful country in the southern hemisphere, with no rivals in the South Pacific and the Eastern Indian Ocean.

The only British Empire that could compete with Australia, at the request of Queen Victoria, not only did Edward, who was about to become king, agree to a non-aggression treaty, but also promised to protect Australia as an independent country for ten years.

In ten years, if Australia has the dual support of the British Empire and Germany, it will definitely be able to completely absorb the power of British New Guinea and New Zealand. Coupled with Australia's mainland, even the British Empire will be able to create this alone. The behemoth is helpless.

However, William II was still happy to see this happen. After all, Germany basically had no interests in this area, except for a piece of German New Guinea.

But in fact, neither British New Guinea nor German New Guinea had a large population. Even New Guinea as a whole had a population of just over 1.4 million.

In William II's mind, it would definitely be acceptable if German New Guinea could be exchanged for the integrated and powerful Australia's support for Germany in World War I.

If Australia before integration could only harass French colonies in the rear, then Australia after integration would have the ability to threaten French colonies in future wars, and even annexation of some remote areas would not be a problem.

Take France's French New Caledonia, for example, which is very close to Australia. If a conflict breaks out between Australia and France, can France hold on to this area?

You must know that the logistical costs brought by distance are tens of times higher. The logistical costs required by France to defend this area may far exceed the value of this area.

Therefore, William II's intention to win over Arthur was even more obvious, and he even specifically promised to arrange support for Australian industry after his return and speed up the pace of cooperation between Germany and Australia.

The reason why William II was so eager was because before Queen Victoria's death, she specifically ordered the British Empire to provide at least 5 million pounds of support to Australia every year for ten years and not to cut off the source of immigrants.

This would bring Australia, which had already broken away from the United Kingdom, closer to the United Kingdom, and would not be in the interests of William II.

In order to win over Arthur, William II decided to launch a German immigration plan to Australia. As long as most of Australia's population are Germans, wouldn't Australia's policies be subtly biased towards Germany?

Arthur didn't know William II's inner thoughts, but even if Arthur knew, he would only smile slightly.

If you want to change Australia's demographic structure, then at least Germany must immigrate at least 4 million people to Australia.

Such a huge number, let alone ten years, I am afraid that Germany will not be able to immigrate to Australia in twenty years.

In the past two decades, Australia has been able to attract millions or even tens of millions of immigrants from all over Europe and even the world. It is even more impossible to change the entire immigration structure.

There is only one way to turn most Australians into Germans, and that is to only introduce immigrants from Germany in a short period of time.

But Arthur is not stupid. Although the German population has a relatively high literacy rate and generally has a relatively high level of education.

But after all, an immigration country like Australia must ensure the advantages and proportion of the main ethnic group.

Although Arthur is willing to accept immigrants from other countries, that will only happen if the proportion of Australians headed by British people remains above 50% of the total population of Australia.

A country of immigrants needs diversity, but according to the right to speak, it only needs one. In order to prevent future immigration from causing many problems, we can only increase the proportion of the main ethnic group.

After bidding farewell to William II, Arthur also set sail for Australia on a warship.

However, what was different from when he arrived was that there was no Crown Prince Edward around Arthur, but there were two thousand Royal Guards and hundreds of entourages.

Needless to say, the Royal Guards are the elite troops of the British Army. Including Arthur's original possessions, the size of the Guards will reach 4,000, and Arthur's status will be more stable.

It was not without intention that Queen Victoria gave these entourages to Arthur. After all, Arthur was an outsider in Australia. Although he had successfully gained power and won the support of most Australians, he still had to guard against some things.

In addition, Arthur has lost all his power in Britain. If Arthur wants to recruit more loyal followers, it will be theoretically very difficult.

After all, no one can guarantee the loyalty of the newly recruited followers.

But these followers of Queen Victoria are different. Most of them have served the British royal family since childhood and are extremely loyal to Queen Victoria.

After Queen Victoria gave these entourages to Arthur, their allegiance became Arthur.

These people were much more loyal than the entourage Arthur had worked so hard to recruit in Australia, and they were more experienced in serving people and serving as subordinates.

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