CHAPTER XXXII
THE “TRADE” OF THE CONGO STATE
It is a little surprising to find that M. Cattier, the Belgian Imperialist, whose masterly indictment of King Leopold’s administration does him infinite honour, should attempt to defend, not the outcome of the system of the _Domaine Privé_ in the shape of compulsory military service for twelve years, forced labour in Government plantations, &c., all of which he condemns, but the legality of the system itself. He states his case as follows. Article V. of the Berlin Act, which forbade monopoly and privilege in the Congo Basin in matters of trade, was meant to apply internationally, and the Congo State was thereby bound not to grant commercial advantages to the subjects of any one nation which it denied to the subjects of another nation. M. Cattier says:
“The Government of the Congo State could not, therefore, adopt any legislative measure, nor establish any _régime_ conceding international monopolies or privileges.... All facilities granted to its subjects in trade matters should be legally extended to the subjects of other nations.... But this does not prevent the Congo State from establishing the commercial _régime_ which it thinks advisable, and no objection can be raised against its legislative action, when the measures adopted apply, under the same conditions and in the same manner, to the subjects of other nationalities, including the Congo nationality.”
It follows, therefore, according to M. Cattier, that in attributing to himself all vacant lands in the Congo Basin, from which action arose the _Domaine Privé_, and in farming out portions of the _Domaine Privé_ to his financial friends, upon whom he has conferred an absolute monopoly of exploitation in the regions affected, the Sovereign of the Congo State has not violated the Act of Berlin; although M. Cattier admits that by so doing he has committed “a violation of the rights of the natives.”
This curious theory of M. Cattier’s has been dismissed by Dr. Anton (_Professeur agrégé à l’Université d’Iéna_) as a legal quibble, in which opinion I entirely concur. M. Cattier’s views are mutually destructive. Admitting, for the sake of argument merely, that the interpretation he gives to Art. V. of the Berlin Act is, from the strictly legal aspect of the matter, accurate; once M. Cattier attempts to put his case in language that laymen, unversed in legal subtleties, can understand, it breaks down hopelessly. For what does M. Cattier tell us in the passage above? “No objection can be raised against its (the State’s) legislative action when the measures adopted apply under the same conditions and in the same manner to the subjects of all nationalities, including the Congo nationality.” But the measures adopted do not apply equally to all nationalities! Three-fourths of the Congo State is the State’s—that is, the king’s—private property, and is closed to the trade of all nationalities, except the Belgian and “Congo nationality;” not in theory but in fact. Can an Englishman, or a German, or a Chinaman if you like, import European merchandise in the territory, for example, acquired by the _Société Anversoise_, and barter that merchandise against the raw products of the soil, on a basis of a legitimate commercial transaction? Of course they may not. Was not an Austrian arrested—on Lake Moëro, and on, it appears, a British steamer—only a few months ago for trading with the natives in the Katanga region, although he actually had a permit to trade from the Katanga Company, given to him prior to the arrangement arrived at by the Congo State and the Katanga Company to work those territories on joint account? And arrested, too, in such a way that his removal from this world was a matter of moral certainty—handed over to the merciful treatment of King Leopold’s cannibal soldiery, to be transported 2000 miles away; he a white man and unarmed![278] What pitiful sophistries are these which attempt the squaring of the Congo circle! The Congo State, which undertook not to trade directly or indirectly in its dominions, has become not only the largest “exploiter” within it, but in the major portion thereof the exclusive “exploiter.” The king has translated Article V. of the Berlin Act, which reads that “no Power which exercises or shall exercise sovereign rights in the above-mentioned regions, shall be allowed to grant therein a monopoly or favour of any kind in matters of trade,” by conferring upon himself an absolute monopoly, which has made of him the biggest ivory and rubber merchant in the world. In this capacity he can export his produce under special conditions, free of dues, which come out of one of his Majesty’s pockets to go in at the other. All this is diametrically opposed to the provisions of the Berlin Act.
My object is principally to prove that King Leopold’s intervention in the Dark Continent has from first to last been due to selfish motives, and has resulted in the most appalling consequences; whether we confine ourselves to the past and present merely, or whether we look into the future. I must crave forgiveness for having dwelt so largely upon matters of trade. It was, however, necessary, because the king’s native policy is the inevitable sequel of his commercial policy. I must, indeed, revert again to this aspect of the question in order to refute once and for all the untruths so sedulously fostered, that the Congo State is in a nourishing condition and that independent trade is flourishing within it; and in refuting it to show—which is more important—that, were it not for the ivory and rubber which the natives of King Leopold’s preserve are forced to produce at the cost of constant warfare, massacres, and atrocities innumerable, the export returns, and consequently the whole trade of the Congo State, would be practically _nil_, or so small as to be unworthy of attention. This can best be done by giving facts and figures which all the ingenious theorising in the world cannot overcome.
The following table shows the relative proportion of the rubber and ivory exports from the Congo to the total exports:
TABLE I
Total of Total of Year. Rubber. Ivory. both Exports. all Exports.
Francs. Francs. Francs. Francs. 1898 15,850,987 4,319,260 20,170,247 22,163,481 1899 28,100,917 5,834,620 33,935,537 36,067,959 1900 39,874,005 5,253,300 45,627,305 47,377,401 1901 43,965,950 3,964,600 47,930,550 50,488,394
If the rubber and ivory exports are deducted from the total exports, it will be seen that—apart from these two products—the exports only amounted in 1898 to 1,993,234 francs, in 1889 to 2,132,422 francs, in 1900 to 1,750,096 francs, and in 1901 to 2,557,844 francs, about 97 per cent. of which was represented in each year by kernels and palm-oil shipped almost exclusively from the Lower Congo[279] to Rotterdam, by the Dutch House _Die Nieuwe Afrikaansche Handels Vennootschap_.
The next table provides statistics of the rubber and ivory shipped home by the Congo State, as shipper, being the proceeds of the taxes—_impôts de nature_—levied upon the natives of the _Domaine Privé_. As will be observed, the Congo State is at pains to conceal the real proceeds. Ever since 1893, when the actual returns exceeded the estimates by one-half, the State has never published the former. The correct figures may, however, approximately be arrived at by comparing the estimates with the rubber and ivory disposed of by the State, as vendor, on the Antwerp market. The enormous difference during these last few years between the estimates _and the produce actually sold by the State_, possesses a significance which will not be lost upon my readers. Into whose pocket does the surplus go? But need we ask the question?
TABLE II
VALUE OF PRODUCE (IVORY AND RUBBER) DERIVED FROM THE “DOMAINE PRIVÉ” IN THE SHAPE OF TAXES (IMPÔTS DE NATURE).
Produce (ivory and rubber) from the Year. Published returns. Actual returns. _Domaine Privé_, sold on the Antwerp market by the State’s brokers.
Francs. Francs. Francs. 1893 237,057 347,396 Unobtainable. 1894 300,000 } _Ibid._ 1895 1,250,000 } 5,500,000 1896 1,200,000 } Withheld 6,000,000 1897 3,500,000 } from public 8,500,000 1898 6,700,000 } knowledge. 9,000,000 1899 10,000,000 } 19,130,000 1900 10,500,000 } 14,991,300[280]
It will thus be seen that, out of a total rubber and ivory export from the Congo State in 1898 amounting to 20,170,247 francs (see Table I.), the _Domaine Privé_ taxes produced 9,000,000 francs, or close upon one-half; and that out of a total rubber and ivory export in 1899, amounting to 33,935,537 francs, the _Domaine Privé_ taxes produced 19,130,000 francs, or not far short of two-thirds. The illustration is in itself sufficient to destroy the theory of commercial prosperity so assiduously propagated by King Leopold and his friends, in order to deceive public opinion. Such “prosperity” entails the death of many human beings. What could, indeed, be more eloquent of the true condition of affairs! The total exports from the Congo State in 1899 are found (see Table I.) to amount to 36,067,959 francs, of which 33,935,537 francs are represented by rubber and ivory, in which the Congo State’s share as tax-gatherer is no less than 19,130,000 francs. The Congo State asserts that it does not trade. It merely imposes taxes which every “civilised” Power (Heaven save the mark!) has the right to do; yet it incorporates in its so-called trade figures the yield of its taxes! What becomes, then, of this flourishing trade we hear so much about? On the evidence produced, it sinks for 1889 to 16,937,959 francs (36,067,959 minus 19,130,000) instead of 36,067,959 francs, which the world is invited to believe. In reality it does not amount to anything like 16,937,959 francs, for the simple reason that there is no “trade” at all in the Congo State north of Leopoldville; and that, if we extract from the remaining figures the exports from the Lower Congo, where genuine trade, sadly hampered by taxation, alone exists, the balance is represented by the shipments of the _Domaine Privé_ subsidiary monopolies in which the Congo State benefits to the extent of 50 per cent.; and by the shipments of the Thys Trust, which is a monopoly within a monopoly, although conducted, it is but right to add, on different lines. Such is the “trade” of the Congo State, the most gigantic fraud which ever came into being to work misery upon mankind.
It would be unjust not to recognise that all this sordid history has aroused loathing and distress in the hearts of many honourable Belgians—not confined to the Party which opposes Colonial policy for Belgium—mainly, as I believe, on the ground that King Leopold, in the course of his illegalities and intrigues, will end by compromising the neutrality of his country. It would be as equally unjust not to express admiration for the indomitable energy displayed by Colonel Thys in constructing the railway to Leopoldville, as to include in the condemnation of King Leopold’s POLICY in Africa all the Belgians who have been employed at one time or another in the State service. Sir Harry Johnston has recently lent the weight of his name in favour of the Congo State, in respect to the “very small portion” of the State which he has visited. Sir Harry Johnston might have added that the rubber laws are not in full operation in the “very small portion” of the country he visited, and that the Belgian officers with whom he came in contact have not been employed in that degrading business, their duties in that particular region being confined to strengthening the obscure political aims which King Leopold is pursuing in the Nile Valley. For a description of the state of affairs prevailing south of the “very small portion” of the Congo State alluded to, Mr. Grogan’s volume, and Mr. Robert Codrington’s recently published “Travel and Trade Routes in Northern Rhodesia and adjacent Parts of East Central Africa,”[281] together with the revelations attending the treatment meted out to the late Mr. Rabinek by the officials of the State, may be consulted with advantage. It would be an insult to Sir Harry Johnston—who has himself condemned the system of territorial concessions—to suggest that he desires in any way to bolster up the Congo State; but it is certainly a thousand pities that he has committed himself, even partially, to statements which, however accurate in themselves, cannot fail to exercise an unfortunate influence, without making himself acquainted with the general system under which the Congo State is run. When the nature of that system is understood, it becomes an outrage upon common sense and common decency to write one word in extenuation of the system, or of the man who has originated it.
M. Cattier, to whose work I have several times alluded, represents the type of Belgian who, convinced of the necessity of a colonial programme for Belgium, has sufficient perspicacity to realise, and sufficient courage to assert, that the policy of King Leopold in the Congo State carries within it the germs of death. How true this is, the reader must judge for himself; but it is at least significant that among a section of French Colonial writers who think they see in the recent abandonment of M. Beernaert’s Annexation Bill, at the king’s dictation, the final postponement by Belgium and the consequent assertion—at some future date—of France’s right of pre-emption, are beginning to ask themselves whether the king’s ultimate aim is not to continue for some years longer his “ruinous exploitation” of the Congo State; and then, when uprisings have reached such a scale that the king’s cannibal army, however large it may by that time have become, is powerless to cope with them; and when whole tracts of the richest and most easily accessible rubber districts have been irretrievably impaired, to offer the squeezed lemon, for a consideration, to his Gallic neighbours. If the pernicious _régime_ which King Leopold has inaugurated in Africa were confined to the Congo State, it would still be sufficient, one might have thought, to stir the conscience of Europe, if not for the sake of her own dignity outraged in the violation of solemn obligations, if not for the sake of humanity, then for the sake of the future relations of black man and white man in Central Africa. But, as we have seen, the _régime_ is spreading, and with every year that passes it threatens more acutely all legitimate European enterprise in Africa.[282]
This accursed _Domaine Privé_, and all the evils it has brought with it, cannot last for ever. Like all such “negations of God” it will perish. But what will remain behind for Europe, when the Congo State has passed away, to deal with? A vast region, peopled by fierce Bantu races, with an undying hatred of the white implanted in their breasts; a great army of cannibal levies, drilled in the science of forest warfare, perfected in the usage of modern weapons of destruction[283]—savages whose one lesson learned from contact with European “civilisation” has been improvement in the art of killing their neighbours; disciplined in the science of slaughter; eager to seize upon the first opportunity which presents itself of turning their weapons against their temporary masters; rendered more desperate, more dangerous, more debased than before the advent of King Leopold’s rubber collectors, who, by way of regeneration, have grafted upon the native’s failings, born of ignorance, the worst vices of the Africanised civilisation of modern Europe—cupidity, hypocrisy, cruelty, and lust.
In their own most obvious interests, for the sake of humanity and right, in the name of enlightened statesmanship and political common sense, the Powers cannot allow the disease introduced into West and Central Africa by King Leopold of Belgium to be farther extended. Nor do their responsibilities end there. The source of the disease must be dealt with. The canker must be rooted out and cast upon the dunghill. The Congo State must be called to account for its crimes against civilisation; for its outrages upon humanity; for the unparalleled and irreparable mischief it has committed.
And what a warning lies here for the Western nations! The Congo State is the living embodiment of the evil counsels, so lavishly, so thoughtlessly given in connection with native policy in West Africa. In the Congo State we see what these counsels lead to when put into practice. All this talk about the puerility of preserving land tenure, the futility of maintaining native institutions, the efficacy of punitive expeditions, the necessity of teaching the native “the dignity of labour,” the cry for territorial concessions, the advocacy of monopoly, and all legislative acts framed in accordance with these views, or with some of them, tend to produce in greater or less degree a state of affairs in Western Africa similar to that which prevails on the Congo. In the case of the Powers, the motives may be of the very best, the intentions honest and sincere; but if once the thin end of the wedge be driven home; if once legislation be passed or acts sanctioned which are founded upon a repudiation of the inherent right of the native to his land and the fruits thereof; if once it be officially admitted that it is legitimate to force the native to give under compulsion that which is purchasable on fair terms, we are committed to a policy of reaction of which no man can prophesy the consequences or the end. To those conceptions Tropical Africa opposes her vastness, her climate, and the prolific nature of her peoples. They can be tried; apparent success may attend them for a time; lasting success they will never secure. Tropical Africa _cannot permanently be held down by force_, and in attempting to do so by placing modern engines of destruction in the hands of Africans, Europe will be but digging the grave of her ambitions on African soil.
But Europe can achieve a great work in Tropical Africa for good, and benefit her own peoples in doing so. To divorce the two is impossible. Evil wrought in Tropical Africa will have its aftermath in Europe. The European has need of the Negro, and the Negro of the European. In occupying the country of the Negro, Europe has assumed a great responsibility. It is well, perhaps, European statesmen should occasionally be reminded, that for Europe to forget the moral responsibility in pursuing the material ends is to invite a certain Nemesis. These pages cannot be more fittingly closed than by recalling the words of a wise and good woman, who understood the nature and immensity of the problem:
“Not only do the negroes not die off in the face of white civilisation in Africa, but they have increased in America, whereto they were taken by the slave trade. This fact urges on us the belief that these negroes are a great world race—a race not passing off the stage of affairs, but one that has an immense amount of history before it. The moulding of that history is in the hands of the European, whose superior activity and superior power in arts and crafts give the mastery; but all that this mastery gives is the power to make the future of the negro and the European prosperous, or to make it one of disaster to both alike. Whatever we do in Africa to-day, a thousand years hence there will be Africans to thrive or suffer for it.”[284]
E. D. M.
APPENDIX
SIERRA LEONE
EXPENDITURE, LOANS, EXPORT TRADE, RAILWAY
Expenditure Export Trade 1897-1902. 1897-1902.[285]
1897 £112,000 £361,747 1898 121,000 267,156 1899 145,000 307,929 1900 156,000 317,980 1901 173,457[286] 265,433 1902 177,882[287]
RAILWAY
Railway Expenditure 1899-1902. (Included in total expenditure.)
1899 £10,493 1900 23,320 1901 19,642 1902 23,606[288]
LOANS FOR RAILWAY
Amounts advanced to end 1900 £307,539 Loan authorised 631,000
First section, 32 miles, formally opened May 1st, 1899.
Second section, 23¼ miles, “taken over by the open line,” end 1900.
Third section, 80½ miles, in course of construction.
According to the statement forwarded by the Local Traders’ Association of Freetown to Sir A. King-Harman in 1901, the third section of the railway (to Bo) will entail an annual charge on the Colony of £11,000, plus a further sum of £6000 for “increased cost of administering and operating.”
FOR MILITARY PURPOSES
Annual charge of £6000 for eight years from 1899 on account of the sums advanced by the Imperial Treasury for the Hut-tax war.
THE PROTECTORATE
Expenditure 1898-1902. Revenue 1898-1901. Civil. Military. Total.
1898 £10,455 £20,634 £31,089 £7,754 1899 14,124 25,672 39,796 21,943 1900 17,000 23,499[289] 40,499 33,468 1901 25,767[290] 23,707[291] 49,474 38,347 1902[292] 24,807 24,911 49,718
GOLD COAST
EXPENDITURE, LOANS, EXPORT TRADE, RAILWAY
Expenditure Liabilities incurred Export trade 1897-1900 1897-1902. 1897-1900. (Inclusive.)[293] (Incomplete.) (Inclusive.)[294]
1897 £406,370 1897 £ nil. 1898 377,976 1898 265,000 1897 £857,793 1899 309,656 1899 100,000 1898 992,998 1900 272,303 1900 928,300 1899 1,111,738 1902 1,035,000 1900 885,446
Total £1,366,305 Total £2,328,300 Total £3,847,975
Expenditure, £1,366,305; Liabilities incurred (incomplete), £2,328,300 Export trade, £3,847,975.
The Gold Coast Report for 1901 has not yet been published. According to the statement made this year before the Legislative Council of the Colony by Sir Matthew Nathan, the Imperial Government advanced £400,000 on account of the last Ashanti expedition, but whether this sum includes the £202,300 advanced for the same purpose in 1900 is not clear. Assuming that it does, the liabilities incurred by the Colony from 1897 to 1902 inclusive will amount: (1) Loans by Imperial Government, £1,491,000; (2) Gold Coast Government Loan, £1,035,000; Total, £2,328,300.
The Ashanti Blue Book (1901) estimated the total cost of administrating Ashanti at about £60,000 per annum. According to Sir Matthew Nathan’s statement referred to above, the expenditure in 1902 may be set down at £107,148. Assuming these figures to be correct, the total expenditure in Ashanti from 1897 to 1902 (reckoning an expenditure of £60,000 in 1901) works out at the very large figure of £319,385, entirely exclusive of grants-in-aid (assuming the £202,300 in 1900 to be incorporated in the £400,000 advance), amounting to £695,000. Up to and including 1900, the revenue of Ashanti was £3406. In the Ashanti Blue Book already mentioned, the annual revenue for Ashanti is estimated at £14,600, less 10 per cent. to the Chiefs (_i.e._ less £1460). Assuming this amount to have been collected in 1901 and 1902, the total revenue for Ashanti from 1897 to 1902 inclusive amounted to £29,686, against an expenditure of £319,385, and grants-in-aid to the amount of £695,000.
These figures should be borne in mind when examining the following tables, which do not go farther than 1900, that is to say, as far as the last issued Colonial Office Report.
EXPENDITURE, GRANTS-IN-AID, AND REVENUE OF THE NORTHERN TERRITORIES AND ASHANTI
1897-1900 inclusive
TOTALS
Expenditure. Grants-in-Aid. Revenue.
Northern Territories £213,338 £195,000 £7,736 Ashanti 175,450[295] 202,300 3,406
DETAILED
NORTHERN TERRITORIES
Expenditure. Grants-in-Aid. Revenue.
1897-98 £121,022 1898 £45,000 1897 Nil. 1899 54,875 1899 100,000 1898 ” 1900 37,441[296] 1900 50,000 1899 ” 1900[297] £7,736
ASHANTI
Expenditure. Expenditure. Revenue. Grants-in-Aid. Ordinary. Extraordinary.
1897 £13,723 1897 £151,614[298] 1897 Nil. 1898 4,304 1898 603 1898 ” 1899 2,608 1899 20 1899 ” 1900 2,578 1900 Not given. 1900 £3,406 1900 £202,300
RAILWAY
Position December 31st, 1901: Completed, say, 45 miles;[299] sum expended, £389,869.[300]
Loans from the Imperial Treasury: 1898, £220,000 (Railway Ordinance);[301] 1900, £676,000 (“certain public works, railway construction,” etc.)[302]
Future: Officially expected to reach Obuassi end 1902.
Gold Coast Loan: 1902, £1,035,000, “to defray cost of constructing a railway 169¼ miles from Sekondi to Kumasi.”
LAGOS
EXPENDITURE, LOANS, EXPORT TRADE, RAILWAY
EXPENDITURE, 1891-1902-03 LIABILITIES INCURRED
1891 £66,388 “The amount of the debt of the 1892 86,513 Colony on 31st March 1901 was 1893 101,251 £972,902. This debt has been 1894 124,829 incurred solely for the building 1895 144,483 of the railway from Lagos to 1896 168,444 Ibadan, the tramway from Lagos 1897 182,668 to Iddo, the Abbeokuta branch of 1898 203,802 the railway, and the bridges from 1899 223,289 Lagos Island to the mainland. 1900-1901 187,124 “The Legislature has sanctioned 1901-1902 231,597[303] the borrowing of £1,053,700 for 1902-1903 240,718 these purposes.”[304] It is recognised that the above amount will not be sufficient to defray the entire cost.
EXPORT TRADE
(These figures include the export of specie.)
1891 — 1892 — 1893 £836,295 1894 821,682 1895 985,595 1896 975,263 1897 810,975 1898 882,329 1899 915,934 1900-1901 831,257[305]
Owing to the intelligent way in which the Report for 1900-1901 is prepared, it is possible to separate the specie from the total exports for the years 1896-1900, 1901, as given in that Report. The total exports, less specie, for the above-mentioned period were as follows:
EXPORT, LESS SPECIE
1896 £906,393 1897 740,179 1898 821,112 1899 834,358 1900-1901 705,237
There are special reasons to account for the heavy fall in 1900-1901. Nevertheless, a glance at the expenditure and export columns cannot fail to accentuate the fact that the growth in expenditure is incommensurate with the increase in the purchasing power of the Colony. The financial future of Lagos now depends entirely on the railway. When the entire sum authorised has been expended, which will be this year, I believe, and other expenses are added thereto, it is estimated that the railway will have cost about £9000 to £10,000 per mile. In this connection the Dahomey figures should be consulted.
The notes in the expenditure column include, of course, moneys expended on public works. The growth in expenditure and the relation it bears to the producing capacity of the country would, perhaps, appear even more clearly if the expenditure totals were given, minus the expenditure on public works. It has not been possible to satisfactorily separate them in every case; but, as a simple illustration, 1893 and 1900 may be compared.
Ordinary expenditure. Export trade. 1893 £75,207 £836,295 1900 131,742 831,257
It will thus be seen that whereas, within the period given—eight years—ordinary expenditure has nearly doubled, the producing power of the country is found, at the close of the eighth year, to be stationary. It may be argued, and justly, that the area of the Protectorate has been extended since 1893. But the point is, _the way these dependencies are managed_. Is not the management carried out upon altogether too elaborate and expensive a scale? Does this increase in ordinary expenditure correspond with an increase in the production, that is to say, in the prosperity of the colony and the people of the colony? If it does not, no special knowledge of political economy is required to predict that, if the system be not modified in the future, the steadily increasing expenditure will, before very long, act as a positive deterrent upon the producing power of the country. In fact, there is sufficient evidence to justify the fear that in some instances this stage has already been reached.
COMPARATIVE TABLES OF IMPORT DUTIES IN VOGUE IN LAGOS AND DAHOMEY
DAHOMEY. LAGOS. In favour of
Tobacco (manufactured) 2⅙d. per lb. 8d. per lb. Dahomey. ” (unmanufactured) 2⅙d. ” 4d. ” ” Gunpowder 2⅙d. ” 6d. ” ” Trade guns 1s. 7⅕d. each 2s. 6d. each ” Kerosene 0⅜d. per gallon 2d. per gallon ” Salt rock 11s. 4½d. per ton 20s. per ton ” ” sea 4s. 10½d. ” 20s. ” ” Lead ⅑d. per lb. 1d. per lb. ” Coal Free of duty Pays duty 10% ” Fresh fruit and seeds ” Pay ” ” Tools of all kinds (_i.e._ mechanical, agricultural, etc.) ” [306]Pay ” ” Furniture ” [307]Pays ” ”
SILKS, VELVETS, COTTONS AND PRINTS
In Dahomey these articles pay duty on their weight; in Lagos the tax is an _ad valorem_ one. How these different duties work out in practice can only be ascertained by giving specific instances. The following examples are taken from actual shipments:
DAHOMEY. LAGOS. 50 c. per 10 per cent. kilo. _ad valorem._ In favour of £ s. d. £ s. d. Silk shipment of £50 value— 38 kilos weight 0 15 3 5 0 0 Dahomey. Velvet shipment of £90 value —384½ kilos 7 13 9 7 0 0 Lagos. Cottons shipment of £52 value —659 kilos 13 3 7 5 4 0 ” Prints shipment of £100 value —979 kilos 19 12 0 10 0 0 ”
SPIRITS
DAHOMEY. LAGOS. In favour of Brandy, rum, &c., 18/20 under proof, equals 46° Tralles, at 1f. 20c. per hectolitre per degree plus 5c. for bottles 2s. 1d. per gallon 3s. per gallon Dahomey. Gin 0° to 20° Tralles 1s. 9½d. ” ” ” Gin 20° to 50° ” 2s. 8⅖d. ” ” ” Gin 57° proof (Sykes) 3s. 1d. ” ” Lagos. Alcohol: 68 over-proof—96° Tralles 4s. 2¼d. 5s. 0¼d. Dahomey. 60 ” —91° ” 4s. 4s. 9⅗d. ”
THE DAHOMEY RAILWAY
LENGTH—ESTIMATED COST—FINANCE—PRESENT POSITION—GENERAL REMARKS
KOTONU-TCHARU (TCHAOUROU)
Length, 605 kilometres, or 377 miles, in two sections. First section, Kotonu-Acheribe (Atcheribe). Second section, Acheribe-Tcharu.
Length of first section, 186 kilometres, or say 115 miles. Estimated cost of first section, 63,000 francs per kilometre. Estimated total cost of first section, 11,718,000 francs.
In English figures[308]—Total estimated cost of first section, 115 miles long, £468,740, or say £4076 per mile.
It is intended to subsequently carry on this line from Tcharu to Karimama on the Niger.
RESULTS AS FAR AS AT PRESENT KNOWN
Actual work commenced May 1, 1900. In March 1902, 82 kilometres, or say 51 miles, of embankment, earthworks and “ouvrages d’art” complete, were handed over to the Concessionnaire, who is called upon to provide and lay down sleepers and rails, provide rolling-stock, &c. Fifty more kilometres, or say 32 miles, similarly complete, were ready at the date mentioned to be handed over to the Concessionnaire. The Colony, which has itself undertaken the work, has thus prepared in less than two years 132 kilometres, or say 82 miles of line. The chief difficulties met with have been in crossing the swamps between Kotonu and Godomey, the marshy streams of Whydah and the Pahu lagoon, where the earthworks are 26 feet high. To fill up a depression of 16 feet in the centre of the lagoon 40,000 cubic metres of sand and earth were required. A distance of 12 kilometres between Wagbo (Ouagbo) and Taffo required 75,000 cubic metres of embankment. In the crossing of the Lama 2500 workmen were continuously employed for five months in placing 80,000 cubic metres of gravel. All the labour was found in the Colony. The number of natives continuously employed has varied from 3500 to 5000, _entirely recruited through the Chiefs_. There has been no trouble with the workmen, and no police force has been employed on the works. The export trade of the Colony has not suffered during the process, notwithstanding the withdrawal of so large a quantity of labour from the farms; but, indeed, has increased,[309] a tribute to the wisdom of leaving the _recruiting entirely in the hands of the Chiefs_.
FINANCE
The Colony undertakes the cutting embankment, earthworks, &c., everything but the laying of the rails, sleepers, the providing of the same, rolling-stock, stations and so forth.
It has undertaken to advance for five years _out of its own local resources_ a sum of one million francs, say £40,000 annually. For 1901 the Colony undertook to provide £60,000, instead of £40,000.
GENERAL REMARKS
The French accurately claim that their railway will carry them much farther inland for a given distance covered than the Lagos railway with the big curve eastward which it takes from Abbeokuta; whereas they are pushing their line almost due north, and at their present rate of progress, in comparison with the time taken over the British line, their iron horse will have penetrated very much farther into the interior than Ilorin, long before the British line creeps up to that place. Upon this premise they base a number of conclusions, the first and foremost of which is that the French line will thus be able to capture the inland traffic which finds its way into the Lagos hinterland from the Niger, along the Nikki road (the French have a “post” at Nikki, which is a great centre for the caravan traffic), and to drain the western portion of Sokoto, to the detriment naturally of Lagos and Northern Nigeria. Well, in Northern Nigeria we do not seem to care much about trade, the military and political policy being more showy, albeit a nice little bill will have to be met presently, for the showy policy cannot be indulged in in West Africa without having to pay the piper some day. But in the case of Lagos it is a different affair, and the French argument is worth looking into. There can be no doubt that if the Concessionnaire of the Dahomey line lays his rails and provides his rolling-stock at the same ratio of speed as the Colony has performed its share of the work, the contention that the French rail-head will in a couple of years be carried deeper into the interior is correct. That the Concessionnaire will do so is, of course, an assumption. He has been engaged in quarrelling with his contractors for a considerable time, but now it appears he is seriously setting to work; at least, that is the information I get from Lagos. It is equally true that the French line, when it has reached its terminus at the 377th mile, will plunge into a network of trade roads, branching eastwards to Lagos and westwards to Togo, and will have an excellent chance of diverting the flow of the internal commerce from both those Colonies. To that extent Lagos will probably be a loser, because the African is very conservative and will cling to his old trade routes rather than abandon them for new ones, and naturally the French railway will benefit him. But the French, perhaps, forget that the Lagos line, as far as Ibadan, at any rate—as far, that is to say, as it goes at present—does not rely upon inland traffic for its existence. It will be fed locally by the increased production which will accrue along its line of march by the conversion of thousands of carriers of produce, into cultivators and reapers of produce. Between Ibadan and Ilorin, it cannot hope to do much anyhow. Beyond Ilorin again, increased local production will feed it, Nupe being a rich and well-populated country. If the British line remains stationary at Ibadan for many years, however, the danger from its French competitor, supposing the latter to follow a progressive construction, would certainly become more acute. Here, again, the question of finance comes in, and the French Colony is decidedly better off. What greater contrast could, indeed, be imagined?—Lagos in debt to the tune of over a million, burdened for all time with an annual drain of £50,000, while Dahomey is not in debt to the extent of one penny, and cheerfully advances £60,000 in one year to the works of construction out of its surplus funds! As for the _cost_ of construction, if the French estimates hold good, or anywhere near it, the French line will be built at about half the cost of its British competitor.
* * * * *
Since the above remarks were written news has been received that 65 kilometres of the railway were opened to traffic in September, and that rail-head is expected to reach Abomey in January next.
FRENCH GUINEA RAILWAY
LENGTH. ESTIMATED COST. FINANCE. PRESENT POSITION
KONAKRY-KURUSSA _viâ_ TIMBO
Length, 550 kilometres, or 342 miles.
Highest estimated cost of line, 80,000 francs per kilometre.
Highest estimated total cost, 44,000,000 francs.
First section, Konakry-Kandia, 150 kilometres, or say 92 miles.
In English figures: Total estimated cost of line, 342 miles long, £1,700,000; or say, roughly, about £5140 per mile.
RESULTS UP TO DATE, ACCORDING TO THE REPORT OF THE GOVERNOR-GENERAL OF FRENCH WEST AFRICA IN JUNE LAST
The earthworks have reached Kandia at the 149th kilometre (say 92nd mile).
With the exception of two places, between the 27th and 44th kilometre, and between the 90th and 107th kilometre, the earthworks and embankment, &c. are finished and in good condition. One steel bridge thirty-three yards long is already fixed up, and two others are in process of being so. The 34 kilometres which remain are being proceeded with rapidly. Seventeen hundred workmen are continuously engaged thereon. Rails and sleepers are being regularly landed at Konakry. The first locomotive has arrived. By October the rolling-stock complete for the first 150 kilometres, say 92 miles, will have arrived in the Colony.
FINANCE
For the first section the Colony borrowed from the “Caisse des Retraites,” on its own guarantee, eight million francs (£320,000), at 4 10% in August 1899; and four million francs (£160,000) at 4% from the “Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations” in March 1901. The first loan is to be paid back in forty annual payments, and the second in twenty-five annual payments, the two annuities together amounting to 430,000 francs, or say £17,200.
These loans will be further supplemented by drafts upon the Colony’s local funds.
WEST AFRICAN MAHOGANY TRADE
IMPORTS OF WEST AFRICAN MAHOGANY INTO EUROPEAN PORTS IN THE YEARS 1898-1901
1898 40,167 tons 1899 48,902 ” 1900 55,959 ” 1901 44,582 ”
DESTINATION OF IMPORTS IN 1901
Liverpool 29,312 tons London 6,998 ” Glasgow 278 ” Germany 4,735 ” France 3,259 ”
IMPORTS, IN SUPERFICIAL FEET, OF WEST AFRICAN MAHOGANY INTO LIVERPOOL FOR THE PAST 13 YEARS
Sup. ft. 1889 68,000 ” 1890 259,000 ” 1891 1,600,000 ” 1892 3,000,000 ” 1893 4,984,000 ” 1894 4,700,000 ” 1895 3,400,000 ” 1896 5,098,000 ” 1897 8,134,000 ” 1898 10,519,000 ” 1899 13,508,000 ” 1900 14,034,000 ” 1901 11,652,000
IMPORT, CONSUMPTION AND STOCK OF WEST AFRICAN MAHOGANY INTO LIVERPOOL 1898-1901
1898. 1899. 1900. 1901.
IMPORT 10,519,000 ft. 13,508,000 ft. 14,034,000 ft. 11,652,000 ft. CONSUMPTION 10,571,000 ” 13,496,000 ” 13,764,000 ” 11,978,000 ” STOCK 633,000 ” 645,000 ” 915,000 ” 589,000 ”
IMPORTS OF WEST AFRICAN MAHOGANY INTO LIVERPOOL FOR THE FIRST SIX MONTHS OF 1901 AND 1902 RESPECTIVELY
LOGS
January. February. March. 1901. 1902. 1901. 1902. 1901. 1902. Lagos 1558 799 767 184 386 120 Benin 202 599 62 376 69 — Sapeli 65 49 44 44 58 — Other West African Ports 2373 626 505 1130 264 198
April. May. June. 1901. 1902. 1901. 1902. 1901. 1902. Lagos 311 42 210 43 72 114 Benin 121 181 56 66 77 — Sapeli 87 89 36 42 77 — Other West African Ports 604 617 206 502 320 114
THE GOLD COAST MINING INDUSTRY
Having but casually referred to the Gold Coast mining industry, it has been suggested to me that a few remarks might be contributed to the subject in an Appendix. I am somewhat reluctant to write anything on the point, because I know absolutely nothing about mining; and the opinions I have formed, such as they are, are the outcome (1) of conversations with a number of men who are more or less experts, and have formed their views of the prospects of the Gold Coast mining industry from personal investigation on the spot; (2) the perusal of a quantity of reports by Companies which are operating and prospecting ... and by Companies which are doing nothing at all but squander their shareholders’ money; (3) historical research and study of the past performances of the Gold Coast as a gold producer. Beyond that I have no knowledge whatever; nothing but opinions, which perhaps the reader will kindly bear in mind when perusing the following notes.
There is not the slightest doubt that gold exists in considerable quantities in West Africa. The earliest records we have of any trade at all being done on the West Coast of Africa is a trade in gold dust. The external trade of West Africa dates back to the period when the Negroes beheld the Carthaginian galleys bearing down upon their shores. The internal gold trade of West Africa is probably even more remote—but there we enter the domain of conjecture.
There is not the slightest doubt that the Portuguese, Dutch, English, French, and so on, obtained enormous quantities of gold from the Gold Coast.
For many years the gold _trade_ in the Gold Coast has practically been a thing of the past. The gold _trade_, as a trade, is long since dead.
At the beginning of last century the great gold store—which had been accumulating for ages—of the Coast peoples of the Gold Coast became exhausted. At that period the Ashantis, farther inland, still retained large quantities of gold ostentatiously displayed. James, Bowdich, Dupuis, Hutton, and Hutcheson bear witness to that. With the gradual undermining of the Ashanti Kingdom this store also disappeared.
Coming to more recent times, we find that the geological formation known as “banket” was discovered in 1878 in the Takwa district by a French traveller called Bonnat. That seems to have been the basis of the future modern mining industry in the Gold Coast, replacing the extinct trade.
Many years of disappointment and failure followed Bonnat’s discovery, due in a very large measure to the absence of transport facilities and to mortality. However, some of the mines which had come into existence subsequent to the discovery refused to be discouraged, and went on working, more or less half-heartedly, notably in the Wassau and Takwa districts.
In January 1900 the scene changed, as though by a magician’s wand. The man who waved it was a Mr. Stanley Clay, an engineer reputed of considerable ability, in the employ of the Consolidated Goldfields of South Africa, which Corporation had been approached by the men who owned the Wassau and Takwa mines. This gentleman reported in effect that the banket formation of the district he had been despatched to examine was so like the banket formation of the Rand as to be hardly distinguishable from the latter. Although some years previous to that report the Ashanti Goldfields Corporation, Limited—the parent, so to speak, of the Ashanti mines—had come into existence, I believe I am correct in stating that the remarkable “boom” in Gold Coast mining undertakings practically dates from the favourable report above alluded to.
Be that as it may, the last two years have witnessed the extraordinary movement with which every one is familiar. According to “Wallach’s West African Manual” for June 1901, 321 companies had at that time been created, with a total nominal share capital of £25,567,170. “The issued share capital will amount to approximately £15,750,000, if all is fully paid up.”[310]
This is truly colossal. But all is not gold that glitters. The boom, prematurely, and to a large extent, dishonestly engineered, collapsed. Deep distrust has taken the place of sanguine anticipations, and public confidence, greatly shaken, is apt to rush to the opposite extreme. The Gold Coast mining industry has many enemies and many unwise friends. The “boom” was, of course, thoroughly unjustified. The public lost their heads completely. Company after company was formed, a large proportion of which hardly knew where their territory lay, let alone whether it contained any gold. But the public did not care twopence so long as it was a Gold Coast venture, and a great many rascals have done excellently well out of the British investor. Finally, this constant flotation of companies got to be in the nature of a scandal; and the Governor of the Gold Coast, in a courageous speech, which has remained famous, before the local Chamber of Commerce, and for which Sir Matthew Nathan deserves the greatest possible credit, denounced the abuses which the movement was giving rise to. Mr. Chamberlain promptly endorsed the Governor’s views, and caused a public statement to be made which fell like a bombshell on the market-riggers. Flotation of new companies after that was an almost impossible task, and the market received a staggering blow from which it has not yet recovered. There is pretty certain to be renewed activity at some not very distant day. Let us hope that the next time it will rest on something more tangible than fairy tales.
That gold exists in the Gold Coast is demonstrated beyond a shadow of doubt. That it can be worked at a profit has yet to be satisfactorily proved, even in the case of the properties which are, or will be, in close proximity to the railway now in course of construction. For the purposes of illustration the Gold Coast may be divided into three portions. First, where gold exists in such quantities—other conditions being favourable—that it is reasonable to believe the mines, if economically and wisely administered, will become dividend-producing. Secondly, where gold exists, but not in sufficient quantities—the conditions of mining in West Africa being what they are—to enable the mines ever to become dividend-paying. Thirdly; where no gold exists at all.
Now when it is borne in mind that options have been acquired by individuals pretty well all over the country, and companies have been formed to work those options, it will be easily understood that shares of a considerable number of existing companies are not worth the paper upon which they are inscribed. In my opinion, if Mr. Wallach’s “321” companies were divided by six, the residue would be an optimistic prophecy as to the number of Gold Coast mining companies existing ten years hence. This number would be amply sufficient to allow of the Gold Coast to become, what I believe it will become, a gold-producing region of very considerable value. Personally, I am as equally convinced that some of the mines will become good dividend-payers, as I am that the majority are rubbish. The two main difficulties which the mining industry in the Gold Coast have to face are climate and transport.
The first is a very real difficulty, and the public would do well to treat with the utmost scepticism reports emanating from directors of Gold Coast companies, especially those whose properties are situate near the coast; who pooh-pooh the danger of the climate. If Major Ross’s indefatigable efforts are backed up by the authorities and the mining companies, we shall see a better state of things before many years are past. But that the climate will always be an adverse element to contend against is positively certain. Those who say the contrary are not dealing honestly with the public.
Many people imagine that transport difficulties will vanish when this crawling single line to Kumasi has been completed. Let those who are inclined to that belief study one of the excellent maps of the Gold Coast mines now available, and see how many of the properties, out of the total of companies floated, approximate sufficiently to the line to feel its usefulness. Before transport difficulties can be said to be overcome, the Gold Coast must be a network of railways. That may come, but the time is not yet by a long, a very long way.
The alleged labour difficulty I have dealt with elsewhere. It is largely fictitious, as the most reputable companies and the most experienced Europeans will bear witness. The boot, the stick; abuse; inadequate pay; dishonest dealing—so long as these incentives to labour exist on the Gold Coast, and they exist to-day, so long will certain people endeavour to make the British public believe that labour is improcurable in West Africa save by measures of coercion, or by Asiatic emigration, or by draining the other West African colonies of their able-bodied men. Decent wages; just treatment; tactful dealing; a high type of representative—the mining companies which supply these have not, and will not have, occasion to complain. The Administration might play a useful part in imitating the French policy of obtaining labour for the Guinea Railway, viz. through the Chiefs, and through them alone, and refuse to allow authorised or unauthorised recruiting agents.
From the point of view of the investing public, those who contemplate putting any money into the Gold Coast mines should carefully weigh the difficulties mentioned against the counterbalancing reasons for optimism in the facts (1) that some undoubted experts, and some men of undoubted integrity and ability who have a reputation to lose, have staked that reputation upon the existence of “paying” gold in the Gold Coast; (2) that a powerful corporation has undertaken a heavy liability in guaranteeing a certain sum for a number of years to the Gold Coast Railway; (3) that a very large sum of money has been sunk in the country for the purpose of mining enterprise; (4) that the past history of the Gold Coast is all in its favour. Finally, the investor should discriminate carefully between the companies and “groups” which are justifying, or honestly seeking to justify, their existence and those that are not.
APPROXIMATE AREA AND POPULATION OF THE BRITISH WEST AFRICAN POSSESSIONS
GAMBIA. Population, 14,260.
SIERRA LEONE. Colony, 4000 square miles; population, 136,000. Protectorate, 30,000 square miles; population, 750,000.
GOLD COAST. Gold Coast Proper, 40,000 square miles; population, 1,500,000. Ashanti proper. Neither area nor population known. Northern territories, 38,000 square miles[311]; population, 317,964 (C.O. Report, July 1902).
LAGOS. Colony, 3460 square miles } Population,[312] Protectorate, 25,450 square miles } 1,500,000.
NIGERIA. 500,000 square miles; population, 25 to 30 millions.[313]
THE RABINEK CASE
(See Chapter xxxii.)
On October 27th, Sir Charles Dilke, having asked the Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs if he could say whether, in the Rabinek case, the prisoner was taken by the Congolese authorities from a British ship in British waters, and, if so, what course his Majesty’s Government proposed to adopt, Lord Cranborne, in a printed answer, said: “It is at present uncertain whether Mr. Rabinek was actually on board a British vessel when arrested, or whether the ship was at the time in British waters. Inquiries are, however, being made, and on receipt of definite information his Majesty’s Government will be in a position to consider what action should be taken in the matter.”
Since the above question by Sir Charles Dilke, the doubt as to the actual place of Mr. Rabinek’s arrest has been removed. The Congo State authorities can no longer evade the point. Here is a copy of the _Procès-verbal d’arrestation_, showing conclusively that Mr. Rabinek was arrested _on board a British vessel_.
PROCÈS-VERBAL D’ARRESTATION.
Le soussigné, Saroléa, Louis, Sous-Lieutenant de la Force Publique, commandant la colonne mobile du Tanganyka, stationnée à Mpueto, officier de police judiciaire, a procédé le 15 Mai 1901, à 3 heures de l’après-midi, à l’arrestation du sieur Rabinek en exécution du mandat d’arrêt délivré le 17 Décembre, 1900, à charge du dit Rabinek par le tribunal territorial d’Albertville. _Le prénommé se trouvait à bord du steamer anglais “Scotia,” ancré dans le port de Mpueto._ Le Sieur Rabinek a été remis à M. Chargois ff du représentant du Comité Spécial du Katanga à Mpueto.
Fait à Mpueto, le 15 Mai 1901.
(L.S.) Lieutenant Commandant la Colonne mobile du Tanganyka.
(Sig.) SAROLÉA.
The British Government has now a copy of the above.
FOOTNOTES
[1] _Journal of the African Society_, October 1901.
[2] Among the principal exceptions may be mentioned gum arabic from Senegal, pepper, spices, &c., from the Guinea Coast.
[3] The totals here given do not, of course, include foreign and Colonial merchandise shipped to British West Africa from British ports.
[4] The total volume of trade—British and foreign and coastwise—in each of the West African Colonies in the five years 1896-1900, including specie, has been as follows:
Gambia £1,797,916 Sierra Leone 4,646,503 Gold Coast 10,393,850 Lagos 8,853,461 Niger Coast Protectorate (and for 1900, “Nigeria”) 8,183,288 ----------- Gross total £42,728,479
The trade of the former territories of the Niger Company, from 1896 to 1899 inclusive, is not reckoned in this total, no public figures being available.
[5] The totals given are, of course, exclusive of foreign and Colonial merchandise shipped to these foreign possessions from British ports.
[6] Due to exceptional imports of coal and telegraph apparatus.
[7] German imports, like British imports, are largely for re-exportation to other European and American ports.
[8] The chief town in Borgu on which the Lugard and Decœur expeditions were directing their efforts.
[9] _Journal of the African Society_, January 1902.
[10] This document is published _in extenso_ in the annual report of the Liverpool Chamber of Commerce for 1901.
[11] The Foreign Office lost us the Cameroons, the French Congo littoral, Futa-Jallon, and heaven knows what besides. In doing so it showed itself the indifferent servant of an indifferent public.
[12] See, more particularly, Appendices and the chapter on the Finances of Nigeria.
[13] “By the end of April 1900,” says the report for Southern Nigeria for 1900, “twenty proclamations were passed.” I should be afraid to say how many have been passed since.
[14] The activity of the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine has been phenomenal, and the useful work performed by it is internationally recognised. To the splendid enterprise of Sir Alfred Jones, its initiator and President, is due the astonishingly strong financial position which the School has attained—entirely the outcome of private benevolence.
[15] In the remarkable speech he made at the Lagos Literary Institute—the most able and statesmanlike oration ever delivered by a British official in West Africa—Sir William MacGregor said in reference to the extension of the Lagos Railway: “It would require probably not much greater expenditure than would a number of military campaigns, it would save many valuable lives to open up the country in that way, and it would leave a permanent valuable asset. In this the locomotive would be preferable to the Maxim.”
[16] That admirable German Institution, the _Kolonial Wirtschaftliches Komitee_ (Agricultural Committee) might also be imitated with advantage by our Government. Attached to the German Colonial Society, the Agricultural Committee devotes its exclusive attention to a study of the economic resources of the German possessions, giving special notice to cocoa, rubber, gutta-percha, cotton, &c. Experts have been despatched by the Committee to the South Seas to study gutta-percha, to the States for cotton, to Central and South America for cocoa, &c. The Committee is really composed of a trained body of agricultural and botanical specialists working in the joint interests of the Government and the merchants.
[17] M. Empain has lately been granted by King Leopold a huge concession in the Aruwimi region of the Congo State in connection with the promotion of a railway to the Great Lakes.
[18] The London Chamber being mainly—although not exclusively—concerned with Gold Coast trade and mining developments.
[19] It was entirely owing to the assistance of the African Association’s agents that the people of the Niger Delta were induced to accept British protection and consular jurisdiction. By the merchants’ good offices, Consuls Johnston and Hewett were enabled to ascend the rivers to places where they would not have dared to enter unaccompanied by representatives of the merchants.
[20] Chairman of the African Section.
[21] Report of the Manchester Chamber of Commerce, 1900.
[22] Messrs. Shelford’s estimate is £7000 per mile. But this cannot be reconciled with the amount expended. It leaves out of account the cost of bridges between Lagos Island and the mainland, which are part and parcel of the railway scheme. In March of this year the Colony had already expended its loan of £1,053,700, which works out at £8430 per mile. But although the railway has reached its present terminus it is not yet properly finished. Speaking in March, Sir W. MacGregor foreshadowed a further expenditure of £60,000, and added, “the probability is, however, that this will not be sufficient.” On the same occasion the Governor, reviewing the state of the Colony, said that one of the two “principal causes of anxiety” was “the difficulty experienced in getting the railway into working order.”
[23] French Guinea borrowed £480,000 at the rate of 4.10 per cent. and 4 per cent. respectively.
[24] 14_s._ 8_d._ per head of the whole population of the territory.
[25] Another incident of the kind is referred to by Sir W. MacGregor in one of his speeches before the Legislative Council. Plans were sent home for a steam-hopper or tramway to remove refuse. The plans were rejected by the “consulting engineers.” The Governor sarcastically remarked: “It is doubtful that any remedy that would cost less than £100,000 will ever be approved by the engineers.”
[26] The same belief was entertained, curiously enough, by the inhabitants of the Niger Basin itself even in Clapperton’s day, as witness Sultan Bello’s map, drawn for Clapperton at the latter’s request, referred to farther on.
[27] Lyon subsequently gained Timbuctoo from Murzuk, being the second European to visit the mysterious city. It has always remained an open question whether Horneman did not actually cross the Desert and reach the Chad. Denham, indeed, believed that he did so, but no trace of the unfortunate German has ever been discovered from the time he left Murzuk, nearly a quarter of a century before Denham arrived there himself.
[28] Caffre—_i.e._ unbeliever.
[29] For instance, the Bahr-el-Ghazal, Bahr-el-Asrek, Bahr-el-Abiad, &c., all rivers.
[30] Some authors consider the Hausas to be a branch of the Mandingo race. According to this theory, the Mandingoes are the parent stock, and the Hausas, Songhays, Bambarras, &c., are all offshoots of the same great family. Although there would appear to be a certain basis of probability—especially as regards the Bambarras—in the plea of a common Mandingo origin, our historical and ethnological knowledge of the different races of West Africa, which is still in the embryonic stage, precludes anything in the nature of a positive assertion.
[31] Subsequent to the final overthrow of the Berbers, under Kuseila, by the Arabs in 688 A.D.
[32] “Historical Account of the Kingdom of Tek-roor.” By Sultan Mohammed Bello of Hoosa. Denham & Clapperton. Vol. ii., Appendix xiii.
[33] “Hausaland.” By the Rev. Charles Robinson. P. 179.
[34] The _Hausa bokoy_, or seven States, as distinct from the _Banza bokoy_ or Bastard States, representing the seven other provinces where the Hausa language had partly spread.
[35] “A Mission to Central Africa.” By James Richardson. 1850-51.
[36] “L’Annamite mère des langues.” Le Colonel Frey. 1892.
[37] Lieutenant-Colonel Monteil’s estimate, 1891.
[38] For hours you may wander about noting industrial scenes like these, showing to what a length their advance in civilisation has increased the wants of the people, and produced a necessary division of labour into weavers, dyers, blacksmiths, brass-workers, saddle-makers, tailors, builders, horse-boys, agricultural labourers, domestic servants, shoe-makers, shopkeepers, traders, and others.—Joseph Thompson, in _Good Words_, 1886.
[39] Leo Africanus tells us that Gober “had a good trade and considerable industry, especially in leather-work” (beginning of sixteenth century).
[40] Since the above was written, Mr. Consul Jago’s report (No. 578) on the “Trade and economic state of the vilayet of Tripoli during the past forty years” has been published by the Foreign Office. It is a most interesting document. The Consul gives a table of the value of Tripoli’s trade with the Central Sudan States (Sokoto, Bornu, Wadai) for the period 1862-1901 as follows: 1862-71, £318,000; 1872-81, £1,846,300; 1882-91, £1,283,000; 1892-1901, £1,141,700; annual average, £114,725.
[41] Consul Jago appears to favour this view. I venture to suggest that the paragraphs (pp. 7 and 8) in which he refers to the point are open to criticism. Take, for instance, the cost of transport. Notwithstanding that, at first sight, the assertion may appear strange, I believe that, if any one cares to take the trouble to work out the cost of transport of a ton of European merchandise from London to Kuka (1) _viâ_ Tripoli and by caravan across the desert, (2) _viâ_ Burutu, the Niger and overland, the former route will be found the cheaper of the two. Things do not always appear to be what they are in Africa. If France can come to a working understanding with the Senussis, the caravan trade will revive.
[42] According to Lieutenant-Colonel Pilcher, who commanded the West African Frontier Force in 1898, the Hausa is more quarrelsome than the Yoruba or Nupe, gets into trouble more often, and is not so quick at picking up drill or musketry (Colonial Office Report, No. 260, West African Frontier Force, June 1899). Other officers eulogise the Hausas, and among military men they are, I think, believed to be superior fighters to either the West Indian or Mendi Negro, while about equalling the Yoruba. The Negro seems to fight more fiercely and recklessly when he has Islam to fall back upon.
[43] “Géographie Universelle,” livre xii. p. 587. 1887.
[44] “The Colonisation of Africa,” p. 282. 1899.
[45] “Narrative of a Mission to Central Africa.”
[46] “The Language of Bornu.”
[47] “Magana Hausa.” By J. F. Schön, D.D., F.R.G.S.
[48] “Hausaland; or, Fifteen Hundred Miles through the Central Sudan.” 1897.
[49] “Specimens of Hausa Literature.” “A Hausa Grammar.” “A Hausa-English Dictionary.” “The Gospel of St. John in Hausa.”
[50] Full details are supplied in Canon Robinson’s book.
[51] Apart from the question whether the Hausas can claim to have “attempted the production of a literature” any more than the Fulani or Kanuri, there remains the fact—which goes to confute Canon Robinson’s somewhat sweeping generalisation—that the language of the Tuareg—the Tamashek—has been reduced to literature in _Tamashek characters_, and that both sexes among the Tuareg are regularly instructed therein.
[52] “Kanuri Proverbs and Kanuri-English Vocabulary.” By the Rev. S. N. Koelle. On page 9 of the introduction to his book, Koelle speaks of the system of orthography followed by him as that of Professor Lepsius, of Berlin, in the pamphlet entitled “Standard Alphabet for Reducing _Unwritten Languages_ and Foreign Graphic Systems to a Uniform Orthography in European Letters.”
[53] Baikie gives nine Hausa dialects, viz.: “Katshena, the purest and best; (2) Kano; (3) Gober; (4) Daure; (5) Zamfara; (6) Zuzu; (7) Biranta Goboz; (8) Kabi; (9) Shira, or Shura.”—“Narrative of an Exploring Voyage up the Rivers Kwora and Binue.” By William Balfour Baikie. 1856.
[54] It is found in French Guinea, north of Sierra Leone, but is not there the staple product, rubber taking its place.
[55] Southern Nigeria, or rather the Niger Delta, is commonly known as “the rivers.”
[56] The figures for 1900 include the whole of Nigeria—that is, the former Niger Company’s territories in the Lower Niger, and the Niger Coast Protectorate, now incorporated into Southern Nigeria.
[57] _Idem._
[58] Germany has a protective tax on kernel or other foreign crushed oil, which enables her to keep the home market to herself, and she has made a profitable use of the cake for feeding cattle, whilst our farmers—largely, I understand, through the operation of the tenant-right conditions of tenure, or perhaps through mere prejudice—refuse to use it to any extent.
[59] In Senegal and the Gambia the ground-nut industry, which is also essentially a native industry, takes its place, the number of palm-trees in those possessions being very scanty—not worth mentioning, in fact.
[60] It is also used for lubricating mixtures for the axles of railway carriages.
[61] Giving out trust is not invariably confined to the European. Native chiefs have been known to give trust to Europeans up to 1000 cases of palm-oil, in days, too, when palm-oil was worth £15 per puncheon. This would represent a credit of £15,000.
[62] In point of fact, palm-oil from the Congo district is the richest in stearine.
[63] The first West African kernels were imported in 1860 by Mr. A. Mackenzie Smith and the late Mr. Charles Lane, of Liverpool. The Old Calabar district led the way in Southern Nigeria. The trade was begun there in a small way in 1864. Benin was the next place in Southern Nigeria to follow suit, and by 1867 the trade was fairly large. By 1880 the trade had spread to the other rivers, New Calabar, Bonny, Brass, and Opobo.
[64] The average crushing of the African Oil Mills is, I believe, about 600 tons weekly.
[65] The exception is the machine erected at the Brass River in 1877 (by the Count de Cardi, I believe) and used to this day by the firm which has the principal trade of this district. It can produce, I believe, forty or fifty bags of clean kernels per day of ten hours. It would require 600 or 700 pairs of hands to give this result in the same time.
[66] I am given to understand that efforts to use hand-crushing machines are being made by a merchant firm in French Guinea.
[67] An interesting account of this most valuable experiment is given by M. Pierre Mille in the _Journal of the African Society_ for October 1901.
[68] Various types of hand-ploughs are now being experimented with in Senegal for the purpose of quickening production.—See _Journal d’Agriculture Tropicale_, September 1901.
[69] Many people, on the other hand, will consider the somewhat elaborate judicial machinery set up in Northern Nigeria as distinctly premature. The administration of English law in West African Protectorates (see p. 16, Northern Nigeria Report), even when modified by native law and custom, is a feature of the Crown Colony system which has little to recommend it. Dr. Ballay’s plan in French Guinea was infinitely preferable. In all matters affecting the relations of natives with natives Ballay insisted that native law should be the basis. He declined to introduce all the technicalities of European law among a people whose own laws are founded upon just principles, and, given security in their application, work effectively and well.
[70] August 1, 1891. It was first called Consular Jurisdiction.
[71] Sir Ralph Moor has since declared that Southern Nigeria is in “a very sound financial position.” The test of sound finance must be different in West Africa from any other part of the world.
[72] Colonial Office Report, No. 315.
[73] In that year Southern Nigeria spent £30,196 on military expenses and £8236 only on the “Aborigines” department. Under “Political and Administrative” expenses, £20,327 was absorbed; under “Marine Department,” £32,531; £24,654 only was spared for public works, but “Prisons” necessitated £7200, against £1171 under “Botanical” and £1147 under “Sanitary”!
[74] In 1890 the value of exports from the Delta was estimated at over £1,300,000.
[75] The Nupe campaign was undertaken after great provocation, and is understood to have been carried out with the approval, tacit or avowed, of the Emir of Sokoto, who had reason to complain of the Emir of Nupe’s conduct.
[76] Similarly Nupe refused to have anything to do with Herr von Puttkamer in 1889 without consulting the Company, although the German (or his interpreter) passed himself off as the “Queen of England’s messenger.”
[77] Northern Nigeria.
[78] “The Foundation of British East Africa.”
[79] Colonial Report, No. 346, page 11, par. 2.
[80] Lord John Russell’s Instructions to Captain Henry Dundas Trotter, Commander William Allen, Commander Bird Allen, and William Cook, Esquire, Commissioners for making and concluding agreements with the Chief Rulers of the Western Coast of Africa for the suppression of the traffic in slaves and the establishment of a lawful commerce, 1840.
[81] The absence of any wish to “act otherwise” on the part of the native is invariably assumed in Europe, and but too often by Europeans in Africa. In this connection the following passage from Clapperton (when travelling in Nigeria) is worth noting: “It was with feelings of the highest satisfaction that I listened to some of the most respectable of the merchants, when they declared that; were any other system of trading adopted, they would gladly embrace it in preference to dealing in slaves.”
[82] Archibald Constable & Co. 1898.
[83] Not to be confounded with the King of Benin who massacred Consul-General Phillips.
[84] Referring to domestic slavery in the Northern Territories of the Gold Coast, the late Lieut.-Colonel Northcott, C.B., whose death was a sad blow to the Empire and to West Africa particularly, in his report on those territories (Report on the Northern Territories of the Gold Coast—published by the Intelligence Division of the War Office in 1899), says: “The every-day life of slaves differs in no respect from that of the free men. Ground is allotted to them, on which they are free to work for their own benefit, the rule generally being that they may take two days out of every five for work on their own account. With the accumulated results of this labour they are at liberty to purchase their freedom. The price demanded is not excessive, and ranges from £2 to £5, according to locality; but so lightly does the yoke of slavery bear that only a comparatively small proportion seek their emancipation by this means. Slaves may marry, and are encouraged to do so, the children becoming the property of the master. The apparent hardship of liability to sale is in reality not oppressive. The march to the new owner’s place of abode is free from any suggestion of cruelty or force; the slave partakes of his master’s food and shares his lodging, and he is certain of kind treatment on arriving at his destination.”
[85] This is pidgeon-English, the Hausa for ivory tusk (_i.e._ piece of ivory) being _hakorin_, or _hauwin giwa_.
[86] Named in honour of Park, who is supposed to be the first European to have noticed it.
[87] And Lagos again since the opening of the railway.
[88] Up to the present, however, shipments of this prepared latex have met with scant success.
[89] In the “Report of the Sierra Leone Company” (London: James Phillips, printer, 1794) the following passage occurs, which most probably refers to the _Pendatesma butyracæ_. “Butter and tallow tree. This is common in low lands about Freetown; it abounds with a juice resembling gambodge in taint and durability, which exudes after the least laceration, and becomes more coagulated, viscous, and of a darker colour. The wood of this tree is firm, and seems adapted to various economical purposes. The fruit is nearly oval, about twice the size of a man’s fist; the rind is thick, pulpy, and of a pleasant acid; in the inside are found from five to nine seeds of the size of the walnut, containing an oleaginous matter, extracted by the natives and used with their rice and other food.” A gentleman of my acquaintance who knows this tree, tells me he has seen it growing in Sierra Leone, so that there seems no reason why experiments similar to those undertaken in French Guinea should not be made in our colony, which adjoins that French possession.
[90] Known as “piassava” in the trade. Large quantities are imported from Liberia. It is used in brush-making.
[91] Benni seeds crushed yield a fine edible oil.
[92] On the right bank of the Binue: in the Mitchi or (Munshi) country.
[93] Stone potash used to be a monopoly of the Igarras, who sold it to the down-river tribes, but the Niger Company has taken the monopoly from the Igarras of late years and disposes of it at Lagos, realising, it is said, considerable profit—from 2 to 300 per cent.
[94] He will sometimes cut the vine down and chop it into pieces of about one foot in length the more readily to extract the sap.
[95] Or even 20 per cent.
[96] There are many other ways of preparing rubber: this is one of them.
[97] “A Short Account of the Invasion of Hausa by the Phulas.” By Bashima, a Hausa-Fulani, in the “Magana Hausa” (J. F. Schön. 1815).
[98] About 1840.
[99] And by no one so well as Joseph Thompson, “Mungo Park and the Niger.”
[100] “Othman established the severest punishment upon whoever committed the slightest violation of the law.”—“Travels of Sheik Mohammed of Tunis” (Bayle St. John. London: 1854).
[101] One of the numerous designations of the Fulani.
[102] “Journal of a Second Expedition into the Interior of Africa,” &c. 1829.
[103] Under the old Hausa _régime_ the inhabitants of the Northern Hausa States paid direct taxes to the Kings. According to the curious and interesting records of Assid-el-Haji-Abd-Salam Shabiny, a Tunisian merchant, the Sultan of Hausa imposed a tax of 2 per cent. on all products of the land. The people also paid a land tax, and certain duties were exacted on all goods sold in the market-place (“Relation d’un voyage à Timbuctoo vers l’année 1787”).
[104] A missionary has recently admitted that “To the Hausa what is in the Koran is of God, and what is not in the Koran is not worth knowing.”
[105] To-day, _Guinée française_.
[106] This is explained by the unwillingness of the Fulani to allow unions between their women-folk and their Negro neighbours.
[107] Recently translated into French by M. O. Houdas (Paris: Ernest Leroux. 1900).
[108] Leo Africanus.
[109] At one time Melle ruled over Songhay and Timbuctoo. In 1329 the Mellians were driven from Timbuctoo by the pagan Mosis (the most powerful pagan kingdom which ever arose in West Africa). The people of Melle reconquered the place, but were finally expelled by the Tuareg in 1433. Melle was subsequently overcome by the Songhay and fell to pieces.
[110] Published by the Hakluyt Society.
[111] We are indebted to M. Dubois for the first complete copy.
[112] The reigning family says the _Tarik_ were white and their subjects Wakoris (Mandingoes). This strengthens the Fulani argument, the complexion of the pure-blood Fulani inclining to white by comparison with their neighbours. In his “Notice Géographique sur la Région du Sahel” (which includes Bakunu, the former Baghena), Commandant Lartigue says of the Fulani still inhabiting that district, “Quelques-uns sont presque blancs; leur cheveux sont à peine crépus, et ils ont les traits fins et réguliers des Européens de bonne race.”
[113] The language of the Fulani.
[114] The Empire which, as we have observed, was raised upon the ruins of Ghanata by the Mandingoes, the subject race at the time of the latter’s foundation.
[115] D’Eichtal’s assertion (“Les Foulahs.” Paris: 1842), that the Fulani “to this day” call the whole of Senegambia “Melli,” I do not find confirmed, but it is worth mentioning, nevertheless.
[116] The first map in which Melle figures is a Spanish one (1375 A.D.). In the map of Mathias de Villadestes, the Venetian (1413 A.D.), the word “Toucuzor” is written by the side of that of the King of Melli, “Mussa.” For “Toucuzor” read “Toukulor” (Tukulor), the cross race of Fulani-Joloff and Fulani-Mandingo.—“Considérations sur la Priorité des Découvertes Maritimes sur la Côte Occidentale d’Afrique.”—Binger.
[117] Barth’s chronological table of the Songhay.
[118] Marmol—born in Granada, 1580—translated by Nicholas Perot d’Ablancourt.
[119] The _Tarik’s_ statement that Salta Tayenda fled into “Futa” affords substantial indication of the presence of Fulani in that country at a previous date, which we know, of course, from other sources.
[120] This tradition obviously refers to Fulani pressure—the root of the word (Pul, or Ful) signifying red, or reddish.
[121] A correspondent of a Paris paper, _La Dépêche Coloniale_, writing from Kunde, on the Sangha River, on December 10, 1901, says: “Our clothes, which are ragged from bush travelling, do not convey a great idea of our influence, especially when compared to the Fulbes (Fulani) in their embroidered cloths and leather riding-boots. They are all on horseback and we are on foot. _There are thousands of them_, and all are armed.”
[122] Their presence in Omdurman—that is to say, in the heart of the Eastern Sudan in the Nile valley—has already been noted by Father Ohrwalder. On page 300 of “Ten Years’ Captivity in the Mahdi’s Camp” (Major Wingate, R.A. London: 1895), we read, “Several of the Fellata, who came from distant parts of Bornu, Wadai, &c., were stopped at Omdurman on their way to Mecca”; and again, on page 305, “The inhabitants of Omdurman are a conglomeration of every race and nationality in the Sudan—Fellata, Takruris, natives of Bornu, &c.”
[123] Dr. Barth’s estimate as to the date of the foundation of Ghanata is certainly not exaggerated, in view of the _Tarik’s_ statement that twenty-two kings had reigned before the Hejira.
[124] Ernest Flammarion, Paris. English edition: W. Heinemann.
[125] Toledo was wrested from the Moors in 1085; Saragossa in 1118; Valencia, 1238; Seville, 1248; the Beni-Nasr held Granada until 1492.
[126] De Barros, Barth, _Tarik_.
[127] Makrizi, de Barros, Barth.
[128] _L’Anthropologie_ (Tome x., No. 6), of which Dr. Verneau is one of the editors.
[129] In plain language, a prominence of the jaws—one of the characteristics of the Negro type.
[130] Dr. Randle MacIver and Anthony Wilkin, in “Libyan Notes.” Macmillan & Co. 1901.
[131] Concubinage with negresses being the natural explanation.
[132] Other authorities, basing their arguments, _inter alia_, upon the assumption that the wild people “covered with hair” encountered by the Carthaginian colonists were none other than the gorillas which Du Chaillu, more than two thousand years afterwards, brought to the knowledge of an incredulous world, and upon the unlikelihood of any of those animals being in Hanno’s day so far north, maintain that the expedition reached the Gaboon estuary, or even the mouth of the Congo. The point is never likely to be cleared up. The two sides are stated with great clearness by the late Miss Kingsley in “West African Studies.” (Macmillan & Co.)
[133] Lest it be supposed that I am appropriating other people’s ideas without acknowledgment, I hasten to add that Major Rennel, in his notes on Park’s travels (“Travels in the Interior of Africa.” London: 1799) hazards the same suggestion, and Barth and Frey follow suit. But I think that, in the light of our further knowledge of the peoples and history of Western Africa, the identification of the “Leucæthiopes” with the Fulani becomes a good deal more than a suggestion.
[134] The cattle possessed by the Fulani—who are the herdsmen of West Africa—are the hump-backed Asiatic kind (_Bos indicus_). That was a great point with Faidherbe in favour of the Eastern theory. The Abyssinians’ cattle, it may be observed, belong to the same breed.
[135] “Then Joseph came and told Pharaoh, and said: ‘My father and my brethren, and their flocks, and their herds, and all that they have, are come out of the land of Canaan, and, behold, they are in the land of Goshen.’”
[136] Cattle-rearer.
[137] “An Account of the Native Africans in the Neighbourhood of Sierra Leone.” By Thomas Winterbottom, D.D., Physician to the Colony of Sierra Leone. 1803.
[138] The Joloffs (Senegal) declare that the Fulani converse habitually with their cattle.
[139] Moore, writing of the Gambia Fulani in the eighteenth century, says, they manage cattle so well that the Mandingoes give them their own to look after.
[140] Native cavalry soldier.
[141] Related in the French African Committee’s journal.
[142] De Guiraudon was, apparently, unaware of this passage, which has an important bearing upon his statements.
[143] Not pear-shaped, as with the negress.
[144] Barth, Baikie, Gray, Monteil, Mollien, De Giraudon, Callié, &c., vie with one another in their enthusiasm over the beauty of the Fulani woman of pure blood, which is all the more pronounced in view of their ethnic surroundings. Barth speaks of young Fulani girls whose forms “recall the finest Grecian sculptury.” “The women are very beautiful, and possess strange powers of fascination in their large deep eyes,” says Monteil. “The women in particular,” remarks Gray, “might vie in point of figure with the finest forms in Europe, and their walk is particularly majestic.” “The Fulani women, many of whose countenances are resplendent with a veritable beauty” (Reclus).
[145] “West Africa.”
[146] _Ibid._
[147] Witness, for example, the admirable work on land tenure on the Ivory Coast just published by Administrator Clozel; also that gentleman’s article in the _Journal of the African Society_ for July.
[148] I have not yet heard of any departure from the rule.
[149] “Modern ideas and legislation,” says Dr. Alfred Zimmerman, “forbid violent proceedings. The natives should be taught to work by cultivating the sentiment in them that it is their interest to do so. _Experience proves that protection of property is the surest means to attain that end._”
[150] Paul Kollmann’s “The Victoria Nyanza” may be consulted in this connection with advantage. The illustrations of domestic ornaments, of flasks, bark-boxes, drums, &c., constructed by the natives of Usukama and Ukerewe show real beauty of design.
[151] Sir Marshall Clarke’s recent report is instructive. Speaking of the natives of Rhodesia, he says: “They work in the mines either from direct pressure brought to bear upon them by the administration, a pressure only short of force, or the necessity of earning enough to pay their taxes.... This,” continues Sir Marshall Clarke, “does not tend to make industry attractive”; and, he adds, “At present there is undoubtedly discontent among the natives.”
[152] “The evidence available seems to indicate that the labour difficulty on the Gold Coast may probably be overcome without the importation of labourers from other countries, and that success or failure in the matter is largely dependent on the person in charge of the undertaking. It is very desirable that the persons in charge should be gentlemen and men of education, as it is found that such are more likely to be able to deal satisfactorily with the natives, who generally require to be handled with much tact and judgment.”—Par. 9, “Labour Ordinance”: issued by Colonial Office.
[153] “According to native ideas there is no land without owners. What is now a forest or unused land will, as years go on, come under cultivation by the subjects of the Stool, or members of the village community, or other members of the family” (“Fanti Customary Law,” J. M. Sarbah). What holds good in the Gold Coast is equally applicable to the rivers and to Lagos, indeed throughout West Africa, wherever Negro culture is met with.
[154] In order, of course, to do away with the idea that there is any wish or desire on the part of the Government to alienate the land from the rightful owners thereof.
[155] The amended Lagos Bill exempts from its operation native customary rights and defers to the authority of the Native Councils of the hinterland. Its working depends largely, therefore, upon the interpretation placed by the Colony’s Governor for the time being on the nature of the relationship between those Councils and the Administration. Sir W. MacGregor has passed a Bill (the Native Councils Bill) which, he thinks, will strengthen the position of the Councils. But it is safe to say that, in all matters affecting land legislation in West Africa, the procedure for safeguarding native rights, and in their main lines those rights themselves, should be laid down as clearly as possible in the Act itself.
[156] For an intelligent native view on the subject the reader is referred to the speeches of Dr. O. Johnson, Member of the Legislative Council of Lagos, in moving the rejection of the Amended Forest Ordinance (May 1902). Dr. Johnson’s status in the Colony may be estimated from the fact that the extraordinarily able historical address on the native history of Lagos, delivered by him at the Lagos Institute last year, was published as a Government paper in the Colony.
[157] Who, for some time past, has individually done much to stimulate cotton-growing for export in West Africa.
[158] In the manifesto issued by the Association in October there figures a list of Vice-presidents, headed by Sir Alfred Jones, K.C.M.G., and including no less than twenty-two members of Parliament, among whom one notices such well-known names as Winston S. Churchill, R. Yerburgh, Alfred Emmott, Sir William Mather, Lord Stanley, the Hon. Arthur Stanley, the Hon. W. R. W. Peel, C. A. Cripps, K.C. J. H. Whitley, Sir J. Leigh, &c.
[159] Moloney.
[160] Secretary of the Manchester Chamber of Commerce.
[161] The cotton-producing capacities of Northern Nigeria have already been commented upon.
[162] The _Deutsche Togo-gesellschaft_.
[163] And as with cotton, so with rice—the Songhays were great rice-growers, and _Gao_, or Gago, their ancient capital, is said to mean rice in the Songhay language.
[164] Sir Alfred Jones has voluntarily offered to carry cotton from West Africa freight free for two years, and I understand that Mr. Woermann, of the line of that name, has agreed to ship a considerable quantity of Togo cotton free of charge.
[165] And where the enterprise has been carried out on the household labour plan, which has been compared to the peasant proprietary system.
[166] Chemical manure has been supplied free by manufacturers of the article. An exhibit of cloths manufactured with Togo cotton has been held at Dusseldorf, &c.
[167] Sir H. Johnston’s and Mr. Grogan’s discoveries have recently emphasised this fact.
[168] Now Southern Nigeria.
[169] And, say the merchants engaged in the trade, to high freights.
[170] The American demand is, I understand, increasing.
[171] C. O. Report, No. 348.
[172] For a technical explanation read the following: “The extremely high prices obtained here for figured logs have naturally excited shippers, especially native traders, and all are desirous to learn what constitutes figure.... This is a subject difficult to elucidate, but we may say that ‘roe’ may be described as the curved direction the grain of the wood takes by one ring overlapping the other; to be of any value, beyond ordinary plain wood, it must be of a very pronounced and bold character. This gives the required variation of light and shade.”
[173] The conversion of several hundred natives to Islam at Jebu-Ode, one of the large Yoruba centres in close proximity to Lagos, and where the Church has laboured for years, is a recent incident which points in the direction stated.
[174] _Tarik._
[175] Kanem at the time ruled over what was known later as Bornu.
[176] Makrizi attributes the introduction of Islam into Kanem to Hadi el Othman, who was probably of Fulani origin, although Makrizi does not say so.
[177] Timbuctoo was not founded until about seventy years after the conversion of Za Kasai.
[178] The theory which gives an Eastern origin to Mohammedan proselytism in Kanem seems unworthy of consideration.
[179] The manatee is the _ayu_ of the Fulani, and its signification—viz. that of a mythical creature living in the water and dragging any one in who sees it—seems to argue the existence of an ancient superstition. In various parts of the Niger and Binue this strange animal is still regarded with a certain awe, which, however, does not prevent it from being slaughtered, both for its flesh and skin. The Soninke legend of the water serpent, which each year claimed the handsomest girl of the village as a victim, would seem to bear a distinct relation to this, the former _ayu_ worship of the Songhays.
[180] Binger suggests that the word Mande, or Mandingo, is derived from the same root as manatus, and signifies the people of a country where the manatus is worshipped.
[181] “Mungo Park.” Joseph Thomson. The “World’s Greatest Explorers” series.
[182] Palgrave’s “Arabia,” vol. i. p. 372.
[183] “Niger and Yoruba Notes,” January 1900.
[184] A native of the Western Sudan.
[185] Blyden.
[186] It has been pointed out to me that the Muslim teachers in this mosque do not teach reading, but only the Slate-pattern. That simply shows that Islam in West Africa is capable of being much improved, and should be moulded, if possible, on Western lines of thought; but it does not affect the main argument in the least.
[187] Captain Morrison’s report, issued by the Government of the French Sudan.
[188] For instance, read the following passages in “Pilkington of Uganda” (C. F. Harford Battersby). “This is the lost truth, the loss of which gave Satan the opportunity of introducing both Mohammedanism and Popery.... They (the Waganda) have learnt to contend with the three forms of darkness which they will meet in Africa: Heathenism, Mohammedanism, and Popery.” And again: “Does it not seem as if the French Mission is just God’s appointed instrument to complete the confusion of Rome in Uganda?”
[189] Le Chatelier.
[190] The nineteenth century.
[191] The nineteenth century.
[192] It is a remarkable fact, frequently borne witness to, that an unarmed Muslim Negro can travel without molestation through vast stretches of country in Africa, a privilege denied to his Christianised compatriot.
[193] “Esclavage, Islamisme, et Christianisme.”
[194] Affecting in many parts the laws and customs of the people in respect to native land tenure.
[195] “Le Sénégal: la France dans l’Afrique Occidentale.”
[196] Negro medical men—I mean qualified medical men—of whom there are a few in West Africa, emphatically corroborate this: and they bring a great many arguments, founded upon actual experience, in support of the contention.
[197] An ecclesiastic well known in the African field, and for whose really wonderful labours I entertain the highest respect and admiration, informed me only the other day that, within his personal cognisance, over 150 couples had been married in Liberia by a certain minister, in a certain district, within a period of five years; and that the total number of births up to date was five, and the survivals two. My reverend friend found in that striking fact (for the truth of which he vouched, and he is a truthful man) a justification of his view that a large proportion of Liberians, that is to say, the descendants of the blacks from the States, led indolent and unhealthy lives. To my mind, it conveys an eloquent demonstration, that _on West African soil_ monogamy for the Negro spells race extinction. Naturally my friend would not admit the conclusion, although in his heart of hearts I believe he is rather troubled on the subject. But he recognised—and admitted—in course of conversation that polygamy was a question which the Church, in her work among tropical peoples, had now to resolutely face and earnestly discuss. There is, I fear, no doubt that the monogamist—or professing monogamist—Liberians are, like the Waganda, dying out.
[198] Politically, the same attitude is adopted by the British authorities; and in the case of the Sierra Leone Hut-tax war, and the Forest Ordinances in Lagos, it has been sought to divorce the educated—and mainly, professing Christian—element of the coast from community of thought, sympathy, and common racial feelings with the non-educated, and mainly pagan or Mohammedan, element of the interior.
[199] “As soon as half a dozen missionaries leave Liverpool,” writes the same authority, Archbishop Dobson, “no end of a stir is made about the devoted party, and so forth. I do not mean to be sarcastic about the missionaries, but it does make one a trifle ashamed at times to meet a stalwart trader hereabouts on an occasion, who has been coming here off and on for twenty years, and his chief business is palm-oil, and his best view a mangrove swamp.”
[200] It is even admitted to be harmful by Sir Alfred Jones, whose steamers carry a large proportion of this liquor to West Africa, and by a large proportion of the merchants who deal in it. The merchants are sometimes violently attacked on account of this trade. Personally, I detest the West African liquor traffic. I look upon it in the same light as the opium traffic in the Far East—a blot upon the escutcheon of Christian Europe. But those who denounce the merchants might just as well, and more logically, denounce the Governments. _Per se_ the liquor traffic is not a lucrative trade to the merchant, but to the local administrations on the coast it is the backbone of revenue. I was never able to share the late Miss Kingsley’s views on this subject, while fully agreeing with her as to the inanity of making the merchants the scapegoats of an evil the responsibility for which is, in a sense, universal. Despite anything that may be said to the contrary, I shall believe that a powerful factor in determining Miss Kingsley’s views was the knowledge that, but for the existence of the liquor traffic as a supplier of revenue, direct taxation would be substituted throughout British West Africa owing to the extravagance of the Crown Colony system; and I know that Miss Kingsley strongly objected to the introduction of European spirits into the interior regions by means of the railways. The liquor question would require a special chapter to adequately discuss.
[201] He will, no doubt, be edified to learn that the Cape Government has found it necessary to pass a law imposing a severe term of imprisonment upon white _women_ convicted of sexual intercourse with the natives—a circumstance not precisely calculated to increase his respect for our Christian civilisation.
[202] Captain—now Commandant—Binger has for some little time past been in charge of the African Department of the French Colonial Office. His travels, books, and pamphlets are familiar to every student of Western Africa.
[203] It would seem now that they have temporarily prevailed with the Government.
[204] In the Sokoto Empire (Hausa States) more particularly.
[205] They did it so well that, after the failure of their attack upon the French camp, they denuded the country of supplies and reduced the expedition to terrible straits for a time.
[206] The fall predicted, and officially foreseen, in 1901 has come about, owing to the rubber crisis. The measures taken during the last fifteen months to stimulate fresh industries in the country, and the advance of the railway, will, no doubt, make themselves felt in the next two or three years.
[207] For the Lagos exports and expenditure, see Appendix.
[208] C.O. Report. 1900.
[209] “Rapport d’ensemble.” Dahomey, 1900.
[210] For 1902, on a total estimated expenditure of £121,560, Dahomey provides £32,000 for the railway and £11,911 for public works ordinary or, say, a total of £43,911 for railway and public works.
[211] The following statistics of the export trade of Dahomey, compiled from figures recently obtained, are interesting:
QUANTITIES IN KILOS. (1015 kilos to the ton.)
Palm-kernels. Palm-oil. 1898 18,091,312 6,059,539 1899 21,850,982 9,650,081 1900 21,986,043 8,920,359 1901 24,211,614 11,290,658 First quarter 1902 6,972,297 3,488,766 _Ibid._ 1901 4,768,050 1,993,520
[212] See Appendix.
[213] It is worthy of note that the French Government authorises the Administration of the several West African colonies to make their own agreements for railway construction.
[214] So far as the heavier duties charged on spirits in Lagos are concerned, the fact is distinctly to the credit of Lagos.
[215] There is a very curious circumstance connected with the ground-nut trade. All the ground-nuts go to the Continent—both from Senegal and Gambia—the oil extracted, therefrom, or the bulk of it, is used in making margarine, which is subsequently consumed, to a very large extent, by the English people! Why have we not our own crushing-mills? Is it because we are short of milk? It cannot but strike one as peculiar and unfortunate that we should send our West African ground-nuts to France, and afterwards buy from the French the oil the nuts yield for our own consumption! Ground-nuts will grow anywhere in West Africa, and the labour involved in cultivating them is very small.
[216] Belgian syndicates have been trying, and are still trying, to get hold of the French Ivory Coast goldfields. Hitherto they have been defeated by the vigilance of the French merchants; but there is no knowing what may happen in view of the extraordinary influence which King Leopold appears to wield over the French official world.
[217] “Sur des traces probables de civilisation Egyptienne et d’hommes de race blanche à la Côte d’Ivoire.” Masson & Cie., Paris. A pamphlet which ought to be read by all students of West Africa.
[218] Specie is usually included in the trade figures—a very misleading practice.
[219] Sir David Chalmers’ report, p. 169.
[220] Like the Susus, for example, who are very numerous in French Guinea, but of whom a few only have settled in the British Protectorate adjoining.
[221] Let it not be imagined that the contrast here made between French political action in Dahomey and British political action in Ashanti implies approval of direct taxation _per se_. It is ever a dangerous experiment in West Africa, especially with pagans, even if conquest has supervened. If the system under which the taxes are collected is not carefully watched, grave abuses are almost certain to follow. Quite recently rumours of oppression in the taxation of the natives in Upper Dahomey have appeared in the French Press. What truth there may be in them I do not know. But it is true, I believe, that the excellent staff whom Governor Ballot gathered round him has left the Colony since Ballot left it, and has been replaced by less experienced and less competent material.
[222] Last Ashanti Blue Book, 1902.
[223] See Note in Appendix.
[224] See the evidence of Lieutenant-Colonel Gore, Colonial Secretary for Sierra Leone. Sir David Chalmers’ report.
[225] Between July 1894 and February 1898 no fewer than sixty-two convictions—admittedly representing a small proportion of offences actually committed—were recorded against them for flogging, plundering, and generally maltreating the natives.
[226] One of the pet arguments of the authorities consists in invoking the benefits which have accrued to the people of the Protectorate since the passing of the Protectorate Ordinance in the matter of putting down the slave trade. For these benefits the natives, says officialdom, ought to be delighted to pay a tax. Possibly they would have paid it in time, more or less willingly, had they been approached in a different spirit. But, so far as the slave trade is concerned, the argument is singularly weakened by the circumstance that Sir F. Cardew publicly declared in 1895 that the slave traffic had “practically disappeared within the Protectorate.”
[227] The French West African Company, _Cie française de l’Afrique Occidentale_, is the largest French firm of African merchants in West Africa. Founded in 1887 with a capital of 7,000,000 francs; total turn-over in 1899, 22,000,000 francs; factories in Senegal, French and Portuguese Guinea, Gambia, Sierra Leone, Lagos, and Ivory Coast.
[228] In 1900, 39,874,005 francs; in 1901, 43,965,950 francs.
[229] The same game was tried with the Germans in Cameroons. To quote from an article in the _National Zeitung_, which, as I have reason to know, may be accepted as authorised: “If in the Congo State itself the Berlin Act could be disregarded in this way, and the natives obliged to bring in the produce against their will, why could it not also be done in other places? And as the Congo State was itself making the best use of its monopoly, and only gave concessions to others at high prices, the monopolists tried, and not without result, to obtain the same state of affairs both in France and in Germany. In Germany, the German Colonial Society at once protested against this state of affairs. In spite of this, however, several of the Belgian capitalists were able to obtain the help of influential German persons, who obtained from the Government the concession of South Cameroon. This company had obtained the assistance of Colonel Thys for its operations on the Brussels Stock Exchange, and immediately after the flotation of the company the shares were driven up to two or three times their value. Further concessions in the free-trade zone were not conceded, and, with the exception of the North-West Cameroon concession, in consequence of the energetic opposition in colonial circles, no further concessions were, or will be, made in the German territories. The German Government has entirely abandoned this policy of concessions.”
[230] It is, of course, no easy matter to get at the precise constitution of these companies, but the following example of one of the “groups” is typical of the majority of them. _Comptoir Colonial français._ Parent company: head offices, Paris; has founded at least six Concessionnaire Companies, of a total capital of 9,650,000 francs; Board of Administration numbers six directors, of whom three are Belgians; two-thirds of the shares held in Belgium; two of the Belgian directors are directors of the four _Domaine Privé_ Companies in the Congo State, whose profits are shared by the State (read the King); the third also belongs to the Congo clique; among the Belgian shareholders are other directors of these same _Domaine Privé_ Companies, all men enjoying the confidence of, and closely connected with, the Sovereign of the Congo State. One of the six Concessionnaire Companies of this “group” has specially distinguished itself in the persecution to which British merchants have been subjected—discussed in the next chapter.
[231] Some light has been thrown upon its African chapters by Mr. R. E. Dennett, an Englishman in French Congo, and a recognised authority on the Fjort peoples, in “West Africa.”
[232] I should say now, ex-Deputy.
[233] “Une idée domine l’ensemble du système, tous les produits du territoire, concédé quels qu’ils soient, sont la propriété de la Société Concessionnaire. Seuls les agents de cette Société ont le droit de les recueillir ou de les acheter des indigènes qui les ont récoltés; ces derniers ne pouvant disposer librement que des produits des reserves qui leur ont été spécialement attribuées et sur lesquelles je reviendrai, et devant en thèse générale, lorsqu’ils s’emparent d’un produit quelconque du sol en dehors de ces reserves, les remettre aux concessionnaires dont l’intérêt bien entendu, est de remunérer ensuite leur travail.”
[234] “Les indigènes ont droit aux superficies qui leur sont nécessaires pour les cultures vivrières correspondantes aux besoins de leur alimentation. On peut leur attribuer une certaine étendue de forêt nécessaire à leurs besoins de chauffage et de construction, mais ils n’ont pas droit a réclamer des forêts domaniales _dans le but de faire commerce de leurs produits naturels_ et de constituer ainsi une concurrence ruineuse pour le concessionnaire” (Art. 18).
[235] The French Government has recently voted De Brazza an annual pension of 10,000 francs.
[236] “Concessions Congolaises.” By Albert Cousin, Membre du Conseil Supérieur des Colonies. Paris: Augustin Chalamel.
[237] An English trader, Mr. Walker, was the first to do so. He is admitted by French writers to have discovered the Ogowe.
[238] Messrs. John Holt & Co. and Messrs. Hatton & Cookson, both of Liverpool, and both connected with the West African Trade for upwards of half a century. Mr. John Holt is probably the most enterprising pioneer of Britain’s trade in West Africa, possessing trading stations in most of the British and Foreign West African Colonies. He is the vice-chairman of the African Trade Section of the Liverpool Chamber of Commerce, and very few men living have so wide a grasp of West African questions or so profound a knowledge of West African problems.
[239] Whose existence was unknown in England until towards the end of last year.
[240] Seizure of British goods on public roads; breaking open of British factories; flogging of British native agents, &c.
[241] Notably that most excellent monthly, _Le Bulletin du Comité de l’Afrique française_, through the instrumentality of the two distinguished thinkers and writers who dictate its policy, Count Robert de Caix and M. Auguste Terrier.
[242] Forty tons of ebony, bought in the usual way by a British firm on the Congo and shipped to Havre in a French ship, were seized at that port (1902) on a mandate of a Concessionnaire Company. This produce has, however, now been restored.
[243] The Foreign Office was warned as far back as the beginning of 1898 by the Manchester Chamber of Commerce of the danger of the possible inauguration of a system of territorial monopolies. Lord Salisbury said it would receive “our most earnest attention,” and admitted inferentially that in fiscal questions England had, as a free-trade country, “inferior” means of influencing other countries; “with the occasional exception,” added his lordship, “of territorial concessions, we have no means whatever of persuasion.” Nevertheless, in the purely fiscal question which formed the principal object of the Deputation of Chambers of Commerce to Lord Salisbury on this occasion, that of the differential tariff in the French possessions, Lord Salisbury was able to get his own way, simply by persuasion, by “influencing France’s ideas.” Yet in this matter of the French Congo Concessions, in which the purely fiscal question does not enter at all, and where we have an international treaty to work on, Lord Lansdowne has been unable to prevent the expulsion of British merchants from an internationally free-trade zone!
[244] The _Morning Post_, the _Manchester Guardian_, the _Liverpool Daily Post_, and _West Africa_.
[245] The German merchants, despairing of obtaining even the most elementary justice, have evacuated the territory. Our merchants have chosen the nobler part of making a stand for their rights, guaranteed under international law.
[246] To which must now be added the somewhat similar Rabinek affair—an Austrian subject arrested and “removed” by the Congo State in the Katanga district under circumstances analogous, in some measure, to the case of Mr. Stokes.
[247] The other day the then French Parliamentary representative of Senegal, in a speech to his constituents at St. Louis, warned them that the greatest danger threatening their hinterland, the French Sudan, was King Leopold of Belgium and his monopolist gang.
[248] At the great “Colonial Congress” held in Berlin on October 11, Consul Vohsen moved a resolution, unanimously carried, calling upon the Powers to institute proceedings for the revision of the Berlin Act. Consul Vohsen said: “From the very first the Congo State, and recently France in the French Colony of French Congo, have acted against the principles laid down in the Congo Act.” ... Referring to the Congo State, he continued: “All so-called countries ‘not occupied by natives’ situated in the Free Trade zone were, as far back as July 1885, declared the property of the State, and in the year 1892 heavy taxes were imposed upon the rubber trade, which was entirely prohibited in parts of the Free Trade zone. The consequence was that the freedom of trade and commerce guaranteed by the Congo Act was practically abolished. The first condition of freedom of trade for the nations is freedom to the natives, in such a way as to leave them free to dispose of the natural products of the soil and of the chase; which state of affairs existed before the passing of the Act in all French, English, and German colonies in West Africa, and exists to-day, with the exception of the territories of the Congo State and the French Congo, the very colonies where, strange to say, free trade is insisted upon by Articles I. and V. of the Act.”
[249] Among the supporters of the Mansion House meeting of May 15 (held under the auspices of the Aborigines Protection Society) were Mr. John Morley, Sir J. Kennaway, Earl Spencer, the Marquis of Ripon, Lord Avebury, Mr. Lecky, M.P., Sir Edward Clarke, K.C., Sir W. Brampton Gurdon, M.P., K.C.M.G., Sir Charles Dilke, M.P., Sir Mark J. Stewart, M.P., Mr. James Bryce, M.P., Mr. W. S. Robson, M.P., and other politicians of both parties. Five Chambers of Commerce, the African Society, and the German Colonial Society were represented, and Dr. Alfred Zimmermann, _attaché_ to the German Embassy in London, also attended.
[250] Commandant Binger’s views are well known. M. Cousturier (Governor of French Guinea), in his report on French Guinea for 1901, does not conceal his adverse opinion of Belgian methods of collecting rubber in the Congo State.
The author could produce documentary evidence showing that similar opinions are held by other well-known French officials in West Africa.
[251] Belgium, Great Britain, France, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Italy and Russia sent delegates to the conference.
[252] This was done with the exception of England.
[253] Diego Cam.
[254] The original title had by this time been changed to that of “International Congo Association.”
[255] The point is brought out very clearly by Mr. Dennet, our only authority on the Fjort Kingdom of Congo, and the author of several books concerning the Fjort, in a series of interesting letters published last year in “West Africa.” Mr. Dennet, who has lived twenty-two years consecutively in the Lower Congo, positively declares that the treaties made by the Association, and referred to by General Sandford, had no validity whatever in native law.
[256] In his report on the Congo State for 1898, Consul Pickersgill concludes a long enumeration of the taxes levied upon independent trade by the following humorous passage:
“I may sum up this portion of my remarks by quoting the jocose observations of the English and American missionaries, who declared to me that there is nothing free in the Independent State, except fevers; while a Belgian Father with whom I had some conversation on the subject, remarked: ‘The Government taxes even the civilisation we bring.’”
[257] Who held the monopoly of the ivory trade in the Upper Congo, which the Congo State, by exterminating them with the aid of its cannibal soldiery (see Hinde’s “Fall of the Congo Arabs”), became possessed of.
[258] See Mr. Herbert Ward’s “Five Years with the Congo Cannibals,” p. 297.
[259] The whole paragraph might have been written a few weeks, instead of eleven years, ago. The state of affairs pictured by Colonel Williams has worsened instead of bettered. The evil is more widespread and the means of perpetuating it more extensive and more powerful. Read in this connection the latest revelations by Mr. Canisius and Captain Burrows.
[260] The importance of the 10 per cent. import duty was purposely exaggerated. The amount derived therefrom was trifling. The merchants objected to it on principle. As Sir Albert Rollit justly remarked, “The reason for our opposition is only that they (the import duties) would infringe the great principle of freedom of commerce, which was the very basis of the programme of the Berlin Conference.” It is quite clear, however, that the majority of the merchants also opposed the import duties from a vague distrust of the king’s ultimate intentions, a distrust which events proved to be only too well founded.
[261] The map published by the African Society in the May (1902) issue of its Journal may be consulted with advantage in this respect.
[262] Among whom might be mentioned Augouard, Hinde, Glave, Morrison, Hawkins, Sheppard, Andrew, Sjöblom, Alfred Parminter, De Mandat-Grancy, Rankin, Murphy, Lloyd, Grogan, and many others, without counting Belgian authorities—more numerous than all foreigners put together.
[263] At the present moment heavy fighting is going on in the Welle district, due, as I have reason to know, to the usual rubber taxes. The facts as to this particular rising may, happily, have been made public before the publication of the present volume.
[264] The regular army—_Force Publique_—of the Congo State is admitted officially (Bulletin, July 1900) to be 15,000, but we know that in addition to this regular force—15,000 cannibals armed with Albinis, sections of whom are continually revolting—the State habitually arms, whenever it deems necessary, thousands of irregulars, cannibals for choice (see the letter written in October 1899 to the king by the acting head of the American Presbyterian Mission in the Kassai district). There is also a large reserve corps, but the extent of it is not known.
[265] It may be usefully noted here that the _impôts de nature_ are applied by the Congo State in the so-called Free Trade Zone as well as in the _Domaine Privé_, and until the Kassai district was incorporated in the _Domaine Privé_ many and bitter were the complaints by companies operating in the former zone of the unfair competition to which they were subjected by the levying of this tribute. Instances have been given by some of these irate traders where the State’s officials have threatened the natives with condign punishment if they did not hand over all their rubber to the said officials. An arrangement has recently been concluded between the State and the Kassai companies—the Kassai district was the only portion of the Upper Congo where independent trade had been allowed—whereby the Kassai companies have amalgamated into a syndicate _in which the State holds one half the interest_. To all intents and purposes, therefore, the Kassai has now been incorporated in the _Domaine Privé_, WHICH HENCEFORTH EMBRACES THE WHOLE OF THE CONGO STATE NORTH OF STANLEY POOL.
[266] Both these facts have been repeatedly asserted. They were proved beyond manner of doubt last year by the disclosures attendant upon the Mongolla scandals, in which agents of the _Société Anversoise_ were involved.
[267] Seven, if we include the Kassai Trust recently formed.
[268] Baron A. Goffinet is “Conseiller de Légation, Secrétaire des Commandements de leurs MM. le Roi et la Reine, Major de l’Etat, Major de la Garde Civique, Aide-de-camp, Ministre Résident.” Baron C. Goffinet is “Conseiller de Légation, Intendant de la Liste Civile du Roi, Ministre Résident, Major de la Garde Civique.”
[269] I have quite recently received from another correspondent in the Congo the photograph here reproduced.
[270] “Abir (Société à responsabilité limitée) Statuts.” Anvers: Imprimerie Ratinckx Frères, Grand Place, 40-42.
[271] “Comptoir Commercial Congolais (Société à responsabilité limitée) Statuts.” Anvers: Imprimerie Ratinckx.
[272] “Compagnie du Lomami (Société Anonyme) Statuts.” Bruxelles: P. Weissenbruch, Imprimerie du Roi, 45 rue du Poincon.
[273] In chapter xxviii. I referred to the constitution of the _Comptoir Colonial français_, which has managed to secure for its subsidiaries such a respectable slice of French Congo. Well, Alexis Mols is one of the Administrators, and so is A. Osterrieth, a shareholder in the _Abir_, and so is A. Lambrechts, also a shareholder in the _Abir_, &c. &c.
[274] I am afraid Sir H. M. Stanley was somewhat premature when, in 1884, he told the London Chamber of Commerce that people “could not appreciate rightly” King Leopold’s philanthropy, because there were “no dividends attaching to it.”
[275] Whip made out of hippo hide—the Congo _sjambok_.
[276] Or was until quite recently.
[277] In Congo circles in Belgium it is suggested that to guard against “attacks which might become too threatening” (by “attacks” is meant exposures in the public Press, and on public platforms in England and Germany) the Congo State should largely increase its standing army.
[278] The author, who may claim to have brought the Rabinek affair to light, is able to state that the British Government is causing specific inquiries to be made through its representatives in Central Africa in connection with the matter. See Appendix.
[279] The trade of the Lower Congo has sensibly diminished since the Congo State came into existence. On August 10 of last year the merchants established in the Lower Congo (of whom there remain a few) petitioned the king to reduce taxation. After pointing out the heavy import and export duty on goods and produce (20_s._ per ton on palm-oil, for instance) and showing how small the existing export trade already was, owing to the taxes and emigration of native labour, due to “the means employed in raising native levies,” the petitioners went on to say: “We do not disguise from ourselves that business in the Lower Congo is practically _nil_.... Each of us,” continues the petition, “consistently hopes for an increase in trade; but these hopes appear to us more and more unreliable, and the Government of the Congo State, instead of coming to aid us, imposes increased and too onerous taxes.”
[280] The figures for 1900 are based upon the known sale on the Antwerp market by the State brokers in 1900 of 1828 tons of rubber and 153,445 kilos. of ivory, worked out at an average of 6 francs per kilo. for rubber (1115 kilos, to the ton) and 18 francs per kilo, for ivory. I believe a proportion of the produce imported was held in stock on account of the poor state of the rubber market.
[281] “There is no trade, properly so called,” says Mr. Codrington, “on the Congo coast of Tanganyika, but all rubber and ivory is regarded as the property of the State, and has to be surrendered by the natives in fixed quantities annually. The natives are, however, continually in rebellion, and the country is unsafe, except in the immediate vicinity of the military garrisons, and within the sphere of influence of the missionaries.”
[282] As was anticipated, the acquirement from Spain for purposes of exploitation of a portion of the Muni territory (which was recently handed over to Spain by France) by the Belgian “clique” has been followed by the usual results. A correspondent, whose name commands universal respect, and who is in a position to speak _de visu_ on the subject, wrote to an English friend recently that “atrocities” were going merrily on; natives being shot down, and villages burnt in the course of “ivory collecting” by the Belgian concessionnaires; “outrages on the villagers are indiscriminate,” the writer adds. The same “clique” is threatening Fernando Po.
[283] Apart from the large quantities of rifles, cap-guns, and ammunition imported into the Congo State for the arming and equipment of the soldiers, regular and irregular, it is morally certain, although not easy to prove, that the agents of the State and the agents of the _Domaine Privé_ Companies encourage some of the biggest and most powerful chiefs of the Upper Congo to obtain ivory for them by presents of repeating-rifles and ammunition. In this connection a M. Léon. C. Berthier, writing from the French Upper Congo to the Paris organ _La Dépêche Coloniale_ (issue July 16, 1902), says: “The M’Bomu (a branch of the Upper Ubanghi, which forms the frontier between the French and Congolese possessions, and which pursues its course to the Bahr-el-Ghazal), here very wide, forms the southern base of the square; this is the route where the ivory passes _sous notre barbe_ to be sold to the Belgians on the other bank, _who pay for it in Albini rifles_, notwithstanding all the Acts of Berlin and Brussels, which forbid even the sale of percussion-cap guns!” The writer goes on to assert that he has documents to prove his statements.
[284] Mary Kingsley, in the “Story of West Africa.”
[285] Excluding specie. The figures are taken from the Parliamentary Report, June 1902.
[286] _Sierra Leone Royal Gazette_, April 18th, 1902.
[287] Estimated. Appropriation Ordinance, 1902.
[288] “Railways and Telegraphs,” Appropriation Ordinance, 1902.
[289] Colonial Office Report, No. 324. On page 8 of the same Report the figures a given as £29,126 18s. 7d. I cannot explain the difference.
[290] _Sierra Leone Royal Gazette_, April 18th, 1902.
[291] _Idem._
[292] Estimated.
[293] The figures for 1900 do not include the expenses of the Ashanti expedition.
[294] Including exports of specie.
[295] Ordinary for 1897, 1898, 1899 and 1900; extraordinary for 1897, 1898 and 1899.
[296] Sir Matthew Nathan’s report on the Northern Territories (No. 357—issued July 1902) says: “The expenditure in 1901 has not yet been completely estimated.” Farther on he estimates the expenditure for 1902 at £52,381 11s. 7d. The expenditure is, therefore, largely increasing. The above amount includes £23,038 11s. 7d. or military purposes.
[297] According to Lieutenant-Colonel Morris (C.O. Report, No. 35) the revenue in 1901 was £7415 4s. 3d. It was estimated at £8000; and the estimate for 1902 is also £8000.
[298] Including £97,769 paid back to the Imperial Government for cost of expenditure on Ashanti expedition.
[299] Official statement, dated March 1902:—1st section, 39¼ miles long, open to traffic; and section, of 9¾ miles, “approaching completion.”
[300] Colonial Office Report, No. 344:—Sum borrowed to end 1900, apparently £798,000 (£220,000, 1898; £578,000, 1899).
[301] _Idem._
[302] Railway development, £578,000; harbour works at Accra, £98,000.
[303] Estimated.
[304] Colonial Office Report, No. 348.
[305] _Idem._
[306] If for re-sale.
[307] _Idem._
[308] One mile—1609 metres.
[309] In 1901 there was an increase of 4600 tons of palm oil and kernels exported compared with the previous year.
[310] Wallach.
[311] Late Lieutenant-Colonel Northcote’s estimate. It does not include the portion of the Anglo-German neutral territory, which is eventually to be incorporated within the British sphere, according to the Anglo-German Convention of November 1899.
[312] The principal towns of the Protectorate are Ibadan (population 180,000), Abbeokuta (population 150,000), Oyo (population 50,000).
[313] If we assume the population of Northern Nigeria to be 30 millions, this gives us a rough total, exclusive of Ashanti, of 33,218,324 inhabitants to 645,000 square miles of territory; or not far short of the population of France, in a territory as large as France and Germany, with a good half of Austria-Hungary thrown in.
INDEX
Abbeokuta, 199
Abderrahman ben Abdallah ben Imran ben Amir Es-Sa’di, 130
_Abir_, _see_ Congo State
Aborigines Protection Society, 185
Abutshi, 119
Abyssinia, _see_ Christianity
Adamawa, 57, 61, 95, 128, 180
African Association, 28, 38
African Oil Mills Co., 79
Agoult, Comte d’, 290
Agricultural Committee, _see_ German
Ahmed-Baba, 55, 130
Air, 53, 54
Akassa, 56, 75
Allen, Commander, 94, 103
Alvensleben, Count, 176
Amageddi, 111
Anglo-French Convention, _see_ Treaties -German Convention, _see_ Treaties -Portuguese Convention, _see_ Treaties
Angola, 193, 241
Ansorge, Dr., 181
Anton, Dr., 344
_Anversoise_, _see_ Congo State
Apis, 146
Ashanti, 14, 19, 68, 104, 135, 205, 280, 281
Assay, 76
Assinie, 204, 271
Atani, 75
Axim, 204
Baghena, 131, 132
Baghirmi, 57, 258, 259, 262
Bakundi, Lake, 111
Bakunu, 130
Ballay, Dr., 87, 114, 274
Ballot, Governor, 280
Bambarras, 53, 129, 180, 215
Bamboo-palm, 116, 117
Bambuk, 133
Bangalas, 330, 339
Banyo, 111
Baobab, 116
Barbot, 271
Barros, de, 133
Barth, Dr., 40, 44, 52, 54, 55, 59, 60, 62, 70, 71, 72, 118, 126, 131, 133, 136, 209, 214, 221
Basset, Serge, 290
Bathurst, 162 Earl, 39
Battel, Andrew, 241
Bayol, Dr., 139
Belgian policy in West Africa, 176, 307, 311, _see also_ Congo State
Belgians in French Congo, 288, 307 on Muni River, 307, 350
Belgium, King Leopold of, _see_ Congo State
Bello, Emir, 36, 46, 49, 50, 51, 53, 59, 150
Benin, 68, 105, 204
Berlin, Act of, _see_ Treaties
Béthancourt, De, 239
Bilma, 42, 58, 67
Binger, Commandant, 133, 211, 220, 239, 240, 249, 271, 309
Binue, 109, 111, 113, 118, 119, 148, 211, 257
Biru, _see_ Walata
Bismarck, 250, 317
Blyden, Dr., 130, 139, 149, 213, 214, 222, 226, 227, 245, 276
Bohn, M., 173, 247, _see also_ French West African Co.
Bondu, 133, 180
Bonny, 79
Borgu, 9, 49, 251
Bornu, 40, 41, 43, 45, 50, 57, 58, 63, 85, 87, 113, 209, 259
Brass, 79, 80
Brazza, De, 251, 289, 293, 315-316
Bretonnet, Lieut., 259, 260
British Cotton Growing Association, 188, 189, 190
Brown, Dr. Robert, 131
Brüe, Sieur de, 134, 251, 274
Brussels, Act of, _see_ Treaties
Burutu, 64, 75, 76, 86
Bussa, 49, 50
Butter-tree, 114, 115
Ca-de-Mosto, 133
Caix, Count Robert de, 302
Cambyses, 76
Cameroon, 14, 177, 201, 287, 308
Caravan traffic, 41, 62-65
Cardew, Sir F., 283
Cardi, Count de, 80
Cattier, M., 313, 343, 344, 350
Chad, Lake, 38, 41, 42, 43, 48, 58, 63, 67, 70, 118, 136, 256, 259, 260, 262
Chalmers, Sir David, 281, 282
Chama, 204
Chamberlain, Right Hon. Joseph, 12, 25, 59, 169, 278, _see also_ Colonial Office
Christianity, in Abyssinia, 237 in Uganda, 227, 228, 229 in West Africa, 208-37, 256
Clapperton, 35-51, 53, 103, 126, 147, 150
Clarke, Sir Andrew, 83, 258
Clarke, Sir Marshall, 182
Clozel, M., 171, 173, 273
Codrington, Mr. Robert, 349
Colonial Office, 165, 169, 183, 184, 281, 283, _see also_ Chamberlain
_Comptoir Colonial français_, 288, 336
Conakry, 20, 114, 274
Concessions _régime_, _see_ French Congo
Congo State, history of, 312-326 “trade of,” 286, 343-53 taxation in, 327-29, 330, 339, 340, 347, 348 native policy of, 287, 292, 319, 328-29, 337, 345, 352 land policy, 323, 324 commercial policy of, 319, 323, 325, 330, 344, 345 traffic in arms, 351 _Force publique_, 329, 330 _Domaine Privé_, 327-42, 343, 347, 351 privileged Companies in, 330-38 Stokes’ affair, 306 Rabinek affair, 306, 344-49, _see also_ Appendix and Belgian Parliament, 333-334 on Tanganyika, 349 in Nile Valley, 349 slavery in, 296 influence in France, 271, 287, 288, 289, 310
Copal, _see_ Trade in Gums
Copra, 80
Copts, _see_ Gober
Cotton, 59, 117, 180, 181-200, _see also under_ Trade
Cousin, M. Albert, 294
Cousturier, M., 115, 309
Crampbel, Paul, 259
Crown Agents, _see_ Crown Colony System
Crown Colony system, 12, 13, 16, 17, 22, 31, 32, 33, 85, 87, 89, 92, 93, 184, 186, 235, 269, 281
Crowther, Bishop, 97
Currency, 60, 101
Dahomey, _see under_ French
Dakar, 270
Daw, Mr., J. A., 170, 183
Décrais, M., 285, 291, 302
Degama, 75
Delafosse, 173, 273
Denham, 35-51
Dennett, Mr., 289, 317
Denton, Sir George, 194
Desert, the, 38, 41, 64, 70, 111, 209, 253
Dilke, Sir Charles, 276
Dobson, Archbishop, 233
Donovan, Captain, 170
Dubois, M. Félix, 131, 137, 138
Dufferin, Marquis of, 252
Dybowski, M., 259
Ebony, 117, _see also_ Timber
Edrizi, 55
Egga, 76
Eichtal, M. d’, 132, 140
El Bekri, 55, 209
El-Haji-Omar, 129, 223, 252, 261
El-Kuti, 259
Ellis, A. B., 171
Etienne, Eugène, 250-63
Faidherbe, 143, 226, 243, 250, 252, 263
Fans, 293
Ferry, Jules, 243, 244, 249
Finances of British West Africa, 17, 18; _see also_ Appendix of Nigeria, 17, 89, 93; _see also_ Appendix
Finances of Lagos, 267; _see also_ Appendix of Sierra Leone, 274, 275, 284; _see also_ Appendix of French Colonies, 266, 275; _see also_ Appendix
Flatters, 259
Fondère, M., 294
Forcados, 204
Foreign Office, 14, 26, 303
Foureau, M., 254, 259, 261
Freeman, R. Austin, 104, 201, 271
French, exploration and discovery, 238-48 trade, 4, 5, 265-75 policy, 18, 64, 249-84 in French Guinea, 81, 111, 114, 266, 274, 275, 281-84 in Dahomey, 177, 266, 267, 268, 269 in Chad region, 64, 254, 256, 257, 259, 260-64 in Western Sudan, 196, 251, 256, 257 in Senegal, 76, 81, 266, 269, 270 in French Congo, 177, 201, 263, 285-304 in Ivory Coast, 177, 266, 270, 271, 272, 273 and British, 238-48, _see also under_ Nigeria, French policy, and French in French Congo West African Company, 285, _see also_ Bohn
Frey, Colonel, 55
Fulani, origin of, 136-52 history of, 125-29, 130-135 in Yoruba, 125, 126, 135 in Hausa States, 47, 60, 85, 102, 125-30 in Gambia, 130, 134, 141 in Futa-Jallon, 128, 130, 133, 139, 140, 180 in Senegal, 127, 128, 132, 133, 134, 136, 252 in Western Sudan, 128, 147, 148, 253 in Gurma, 134 in Adamawa, 128 in Baghirmi, 262 in Congo Basin, 135 in Segu, 129 in Baghena, 131, 132, 133 in Bornu, 40, 128, 138 in Melle, 131, 132, 133 in Omdurman, 135 in Massina, 129, 134, 214 and Portuguese, 133 and British, 46-50, 152 and French, 134, 147, 148, 152, 252 and Hebrews, 145, 152 characteristics of, 47, 134, 146, 148 religion of, 55, 56, 127, 216, 254 language of, 70, 71, 72, 132
Fula, _see_ Fulani
Fulbe, _see_ Fulani
Fulfalde, _see_ Fulani
Futa-Jallon, 9, 14, 20, 66, 139, 245, 274
Gaboon, 298, 299
Gambia, 19, 134, 194, 196, 197, 242, 269, 278
Gambetta, 243, 244
Gando, 57, 95
Gao, 197, 210
Geary, Sir William, 280
_Générale Africaine, Société_, _see_ Congo State
Gentil, Lieut., 254, 258, 259, 260
German, trade, 4, 5, 74, 75, 193, 196, 199 agricultural committee, 23, 24, 196 Colonial advisory board, 23, 24
German Colonial Society, 29, 308
Ghana, 131
Ghanata, _see_ Walata
Gober, 53, 54, 55, 59, 125, 129
Gold Coast, 12, 13, 18, 25, 57, 183, 194, 204, 245
Gold, _see_ Mining Industry; _also under_ Trade
Goldie, Sir George, 9, 39, 68, 104
Grand Bassam, 204, 273
Green, Mrs. J. R., Foreword
Gregory, Professor, 99, 179
Grogan, Mr. H. S., 178, 179, 181, 202, 349
Ground-nut, _see under_ Trade
Guiraudon, Capt. de, 148-50
Gutta-percha, 116
Hamarua, 113
Hanno, 136, 140, 141, 142, 202
Hatton and Cookson, 300
Hausa Association, 70, 71 language, 54, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73 history, 53, 54 religion, 53, 56, 68
Hausas as manufacturers and traders, 57, 63, 67, 68, 69, 111, 117 as travellers, 57, 69, 111, 116 as soldiers, 68, 69 as slave-owners, 55, 63, 112 relations of with Fulani, 53, 55, 56, 68
Helm, Mr. E., 182
Herodotus, 35, 76
Hess, M. Jean, 290
Holt, Mr. John, 300
Horneman, 38
Houdas, M. O., 130, 132
Hourst, 22, 26
Hut-tax in Sierra Leone, _see under_ Taxation in French Congo, _see under_ Taxation
Hutton, Mr. Arthur, 11, 20, 188
Hyksos, 140, 142, 143, 145, 146
Ibi, 111
Idah, 76
Igarras, 56, 118
Ilorin, 68, 96
Illushi, 76
Indigo, 117
In Salah, 65
International Congo Association, 309, 314-20
Islam in West Africa, 208-23 in Bornu, 209, 213 in Hausa States, 53, 55, 56, 101, 213, 214, 221 in Baghirmi, 215 in Kanem, 209, 210 in Gambia, 278 in Yoruba, 208 in Adamawa, 214 in Lagos, 213-15 in Sierra Leone, 213-15 in Futa-Jallon, 215 in Western Sudan, 209, 215, 216, 244, 254 in Kong, 220, 221 in French possessions, 215, 216, 278
Ivory Coast, 57, 206, 220, _see also under_ French
Ivory, _see under_ Trade
Jago, Consul, 64
Jalonkes, 128
Jebba, 76, 119
Johnson, Dr. O., 187
Johnston, Sir H., 70, 141, 202, 227, 228, 265, 349
Joloffs, 128, 147
Jones, Sir Alfred, 20, 188, 192, 235
Kanem, 45, 69, 209, 254, 257
Kano, 45, 46, 52, 57, 58, 59, 60, 62-67, 70, 72, 86, 111, 112, 191, 192
Kanuri, 56, 59, 70, 71, 72, 114, 128
Katamansu, battle of, 28
Katanga Co., _see_ Congo State
Katsena, 54, 55, 59, 62, 72
Kingsley, Miss Mary, 86, 124, 141, 171, 173, 232, 235, 266, 276, 353
Koelle, the Rev., 72
Kola, 57, 116
Kontagora, 98
Kotonu, 268
Krause, the Rev., 70
Kuka, 41, 43, 48, 63
Labat, 134, 240
Labour, native, 76, 77, 170-87, 197 Ordinance in Gold Coast, 13
Lagos, 18, 19, 49, 162, 164, 186, 193, 199, 201, 204, 206, 245, 267, 268, 269
Lahou, 204, 271
Lamy, Lieut.-Colonel, 254, 259, 261
Lamy, _see under_ Trade
Lander, Richard, 40, 41, 48, 51
Land-tenure, in West Africa, 170-87 in Sierra Leone, 278 in Ivory Coast, 171 in French Congo, 291, 292 in Congo State, _see_ Congo State
Lansdowne, Lord, 302, 303, 310
Lau, 111
Laveran, 163
Leather-ware, 58, 59, 60
Leo Africanus, 59, 131, 137, 209
Lepsius, Professor, 143
Leucæthiopes, _see_ Fulani
Liberia, 57, 220, 229
Liquor traffic, 179, 235
Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, 20, 163, _see also_ Ross
Logon River, 43
Lokoja, 76
_Lomami_, _see_ Congo State
London School of Tropical Medicine, 20
Lucas, 38
Lugard, Sir Frederick, 9, 83, 85, 87, 88, 89, 99, 104, 127
Lyon, 38
Macdonald, Sir Claude, 11
MacGregor, Laird, 28, 94 Sir William, 19, 22, 32, 33, 162, 163, 164, 168, 170, 187, 189
Maclaud, Dr., 138
Mahogany, _see under_ Trade (Timber)
Maistre, M., 259
Makrizi, 210
Malaria, 12, 153-69
Manatus, 55, 211
Mandara, 39
Mandingoes, 53, 128, 131, 133, 150, 195, 211
Maritime Zone, 290
Marmol, 133
Maroba, 97
Méline, M., 247
Melle, 131, 132, 195, 210
Mendis, 69, 123, 278
Merchants, British, in West Africa, 8, 22, 23, 25, 30, 238, 239, 246, 252, 257 in French Congo, 286, 291, 298-304, 306 and liquor traffic, 235 German, in West Africa, 23, 24 in French Congo, 291 French, early exploits of, 240-42 in Senegal, 81 in Ivory Coast, 81
Mille, M. Pierre, 81, 330
Mining industry, in Gold Coast, 12, 29, 182-83, _see also_ Appendix in Ivory Coast, 270-71
Misahöhe, 196
Missionaries, _see_ Christianity
Mitchi, 118
Mohammed-el-Kanemy, 45, 51
Mohammed Lebo, 129
Mohammedans, _see_ Islam
Moloney, Sir Alfred, 203
Mongolia, atrocities in, _see_ Congo States
Monopoly, _see_ Congo State and French in French Congo
Monteil, Lieut.-Colonel, 57, 59, 70, 96, 118, 251
Moor, Sir Ralph, 90
Moore, Francis, 130, 147
Mosis, 9, 131, 251
Mosquitoes, _see_ Malaria
Muni River, 307, 350
Murzuk, 38, 41, 42
Nachtigal, 118
Nathan, Sir Matthew, _see_ Appendix
National African Company, _see_ Niger Company
Natron, 58, 61
Navarette, 239
New Calabar, 79
N’Gaundere, 111
Niger Coast Protectorate, _see_ Nigeria
Niger Company, 9, 67, 75, 88, 90, 91, 95, 96, 111, 112, 118
Niger, _see_ Nigeria
Nigeria, discovery of Northern, 35-51 inhabitants of, 84, 180 trade of, 59, 60-66, 84, 91-93 finances of, 89, 93 administration of, 18, 19, 83-88, 255, 257, 258 forest ordinances in, 184-87 national industry in, 74, 82 and the French, 66, 85
Nikki, 9
Northcott, Lieut.-Colonel, 107, 108
Nupe, 50, 58, 61, 68, 95, 97, 104
Ogowe, 293, 299, 303
Ogute Lake, 75
Old Calabar, 79
Onitsha, 75
Orashe River, 75
Osogbo, 126, 135
Othman Fodio, 45, 53, 55, 57, 125, 126, 129, 222
Oudney, Dr., 35-51
Overweg, 70
Palm-oil industry, in Southern Nigeria, 74-82, 110 in Dahomey, 268 in Lagos, 67, 268 in Sierra Leone, 123, _see also under_ Trade -kernels industry, in Southern Nigeria, 76 in Dahomey, 268, _see also under_ Trade in Lagos, 268
Park, Mungo, 36, 37, 150
Paw-paw, 114, 115, 116
Peddie, Major, 37
Peuhl, _see_ Fulani
Pickersgill, Consul, 317
Pilcher, Lieut.-Colonel, 69
Pliny, 35
Polygamy, _see_ Islam
Porto Novo, 268
Portugal and the Congo and the Fulani, _see_ Fulani and Great Britain, _see_ Treaties
Portuguese discoveries in West Africa, 239, 240, 259 Church in West Africa, 216, 217, 218
Potash, 118
Prempreh, 26, 280
Prince Henry the Navigator, 240
Ptolemy, 141
Punitive expeditions, 19, 87, 98, 279
Puttkamer, Herr von, 96
Quadriyah, 219, 220
Rabba, 50
Rabah, 63, 64, 256, 258, 259, 261, 262
Rabinek, _see under_ Congo State
Racka, 48, 49, 50
Railways, in British West Africa, 12, 18, 22, 32, 193, 267, 284, _see also_ Appendix in French Guinea, 20, 32, 66, 274, _see also_ Appendix in Dahomey, 66, 267, _see also_ Appendix in Senegal, 270, _see also_ Appendix in Northern Nigeria, 8, 66, _see also_ Appendix Matadi, Stanley Pool, 37, 69, 287, 348, _see also_ Appendix
Reclus, Élisée, 118
Religion, _see_ Christianity and Islam
Richardson, James, 55, 70, 96 Rev. J., 86
Ripon, Marquis of, 12
Ritchie, 38
“Rivers,” the, _see_ Nigeria
Robinson, John A., 70 Canon, 54, 70, 71, 72, 231
Rollit, Sir Albert, 318, 323
Ross, Major R., 20, 152-69
Roume, M., 196
Rubber, in Nigeria, 67, 110, 119-24 in French Congo, 298 in Lagos, 82, 123
Rubber, in Congo State, _see_ Congo State
Russell, Lord John, 94, 103
Sahara, _see_ Desert
Salisbury, Lord, 252, 253, 297, 303
Salmon, C. S., 20, 170
Salt, 58, 62, 167
Samory, 256, 261
Sandford, General, 316
Sangha, 57, 293
Sanitation, 153-69
Sapelli, 117, 204
Sarbah, 171, 184
Schön, 70, 71
Schurz, 98
Sekondi, 204
Senegal, 25, 82, 132, 197, 243, 252, 269, 270, _see also under_ French
Senussi, 64, 257
Sette Camma, 299
Shari, 43, 44, 45, 57, 63, 215, 258, 259, 261
Shea-butter, 113
Sherbro, 82
Shongo, 76
Shuwa, 75, 180, 254, 262
Sierra Leone, 14, 18, 19, 27, 28, 74, 82, 164, 194, 201, 242, 245, 252, 274, 275, 277, 278, 279
Silver, 118
Slavery, in West Africa, 100, 218 over-sea, 228, 255, 297, 298 domestic, 94-109 in Sierra Leone, 283 in Northern Territories of the Gold Coast, 107, 108 in Nupe and Ilorin, 109 in Congo State, 296, _see also_ Congo State the “New Slavery,” 177, 307, _see also_ Congo State
Slave-raiding, 87, 94-109, 171, 219, 319
Slaves, “White Slaves of England,” 107
Sokoto, treaties with, _see under_ Treaties under Bello, 41, 45, 47, 49, 50, 126, _see also under_ Fulani
Songhays, 53, 55, 56, 131, 197, 209, 210, 211, 253, 236
Soninkes, 211
Stanley, Sir H. M., 297, 312, 315, 319, 321, 337
Stewart, Captain Donald, 281
Stokes, _see under_ Congo State
Strachan, Dr., 163
Strachir, Monsignor, 227
Strauch, Colonel, 315
Susus, 278, 279
Tanganyika, 349
_Tarik_, 130, 131, 132, 133, 134, 209, 211, 214
Taxation, in Sierra Leone, 14, 18, 27, 82, 135, 277, 278, 281, 284 in Lagos, 269 in Dahomey, 269, 279, 280 in Ashanti, 279-81 in Gambia, 280 in French Guinea, 274, 277, 278, 281-84 in Congo State, _see_ Congo State in French Congo, 293, 295, 301 in Hausa States, 127 direct in West Africa, 280
Terrier, Auguste, 262, 302
Thomson, Joseph, 9, 39, 56, 58, 95, 97, 118, 126, 211, 221
Thys, Colonel, 37, 288, 325, 348
Tibati, 111
Tijaniyah, 129, 219
Timber, _see under_ Trade
Timbo, 139
Timbuctoo, 38, 59, 65, 128, 131, 210, 253
Tin, 118
Togoland, 193, 196, 199
Trade, British trade with British West Africa, 2, 3, 4 French West Africa, 4, 5, 6, 297 German West Africa, 4, 5 Portuguese West Africa, 4, 5 Congo State, 297 of Gambia, 4, 194 Gold Coast, 4, _see also_ Appendix Lagos, 4, 267-69, _see also_ Appendix Sierra Leone, 284, _see also_ Appendix of Kano, 60, 61, 62, 65 of Nigeria, 4, 74-82, 91-93 of French possessions, 265-75 of Congo State, 286, 343-53 early in West Africa, 238-48 in ivory, 38, 61, 67, 118, 202, 203, 271, 272, 298 in Gold, 38, 63, 118, 202, 203, 271, _see also_ Mining Industry and Appendix in ostrich-feathers, 38 in kola, 57, 116 in benni-seed, 117 in skins, 38, 63 in “lamy,” 115 in timber, 117, 201-207, 271, 272, 298, _see also_ Appendix in bees-wax, 67 in gums, 67, 112 in shea-butter, 113, 114 in cottons, 59, 67, 111, 269 in palm-oil, 74-82, 110, 268, 272, 298 in palm-kernels, 74-82, 268, 272 in ground-nuts, 76, 81, 194, 269, 270 in rubber, 67, 82, 110, 111, 119-124, 298, 299 piassava, 117
Treaties, Anglo-French, 24, 67, 246, 247 Anglo-German, 111 Anglo-Portuguese, 316, 318, 319 Franco-German, 111 with Fulani Emirs (Sokoto), 9, 85, 86, 95, 97, 257-58 Berlin Act, 177, 297, 299, 300, 301, 303, 306, 307, 308, 314, 318, 319, 321, 323, 343, 344, 345 Brussels Act, 303, 323, 324, 325 of Vienna, 243
Trentinian, Général de, 196
Tripoli, 33, 41, 42, 58, 62, 63, 64, 65, 213
Trotter, Captain, 94, 103
Tuareg, 53, 56, 58, 71, 85, 128, 253, 260
Tuckey, Captain, 37
Tugwell, Bishop, 86
Tukulors, 129, 131, 253, 254
Twin Rivers, 204
Ubanghi, 57, 215, 262
Uganda, 181, 227
United States, 200, 204, 309, 310, 316, 318
Unyoro, 179
Verneau, Dr., 138
Viera, 239
Villadestes, 132
Villaut de Bellefonds, 240
Vohsen, Consul, 308
Volta, 193
Wadai, 57, 64, 254, 257, 263
Wahuma, 144, 180
Wa-Kavirondo, 181
Walata, 131, 133, 134, 137, 209, 210
Waldeck-Rousseau, 244, 285
Washington, Booker T., 199
Wauters, A. J., 312
West African Frontier Force, 86
Western Sudan, 35, 129, 130, 147, 209, 210, 272
Winterbottom, 147
Woermann, 197
Yola, 111, 119
Yoruba, 193
Za Dynasty, 209
Za-Kasai, 209, 210
Zaky, _see_ Othman Fodio
Zanfara, 55
Zaria, 57
Zeg-Zeg, 54, 55
Zimmerman, Dr. A., 175
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