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southern by the first parallel of north latitude to its point of inter- | entered into relations. The limit of Germany's possible extension section with the Muni river.

Division of the Guinea

Apart from this small block of Spanish territory south of Cameroon, the stretch of coast between Cape Blanco and the mouth of the Congo is partitioned among four European powers-Great Britain, France, Germany and Portugal coast. -and the negro republic of Liberia. Following the coast southwards from Cape Blanco is first the French colony of Senegal, which is indented, along the Gambia river, by the small British colony of that name, and then the comparatively small territory of Portuguese Guinea, all that remains on this coast to represent Portugal's share in the scramble in a region where she once played so conspicuous a part. To the south of Portuguese Guinea is the French Guinea colony, and still going south and east are the British colony of Sierra Leone, the republic of Liberia, the French colony of the Ivory coast, the British Gold Coast, German Togoland, French Dahomey, the British colony (formerly known as the Lagos colony) and protectorate of Southern Nigeria, the German colony of Cameroon, the Spanish settlements on the Muni river, the French Congo colony, and the small Portuguese enclave north of the Congo to which reference has already been made, which is administratively part of the Angola colony. When the General Act of the Berlin conference was signed the whole of this coast-line had not been formally claimed; but no time was lost by the powers interested in notifying claims to the unappropriated sections, and the conflicting claims put forward necessitated frequent adjustments by international agreements. By a Franco-Portuguese agreement of the 12th of May 1886 the limits of Portuguese Guinea-surrounded landwards by French territory-were defined, and by agreements with Great Britain in 1885 and France in 1892 and 1907 the Liberian republic was confined to an area of about 43,000 sq. m.

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The real struggle in West Africa was between France and Great Britain, and France played the dominant part, the exhaustion of Portugal, the apathy of the British government and the late appearance of Germany in the field being all elements that favoured the success of French policy. Before tracing the steps in the historic contest between France and Great Britain it is necessary, however, to deal briefly with the part played by Germany. She naturally could not be disposed of by the chief rivals as easily as were Portugal and Liberia. It will be remembered that Dr Nachtigal, while the proposals for the Berlin conference were under discussion, had planted the German flag on the coast of Togo and in Cameroon in the month of July 1884. In Cameroon Germany found herself with Great Britain for a neighbour to the north, and with France as her southern neighbour on the Gabun river. The utmost activity was displayed in making treaties with native chiefs, and in securing as wide a range of coast for German enterprise as was possible. After various provisional agreements had been concluded between Great Britain and Germany, a "provisional line of demarcation was adopted in the famous agreement of the 1st of July 1890, starting from the head of the Rio del Rey creek and going to the point, about 9° 8' E., marked rapids" on the British Admiralty chart. By a further agreement of the 14th of April 1893, the right bank of the Rio del Rey was made the boundary between the Oil Rivers Protectorate (now Southern Nigeria) and Cameroon. In the following November (1893) the boundary was continued from the "rapids" before mentioned, on the Calabar or Cross river, in a straight line towards the centre of the town of Yola, on the Benue river. Yola itself, with a radius of some 3 m., was left in the British sphere, and the Germany in west German boundary followed the circle eastwards from Central the point of intersection as it neared Yola until it Africa. met the Benue river. From that point it crossed the river to the intersection of the 13th degree of longitude with the 10th degree of north latitude, and then made direct for a point on the southern shore of Lake Chad" situated 35 minutes east of the meridian of Kuka." By this agreement the British government withdrew from a considerable section of the upper waters of the Benue with which the Royal Niger Company had

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eastwards was fixed at the basin of the river Shari, and Daríur, Kordofan and the Bahr-el-Ghazal were to be excluded from her sphere of influence. The object of Great Britain in making the sacrifice she did was two-fold. By satisfying Germany's desire for a part of Lake Chad a check was put on French designs on the Benue region, while by recognizing the central Sudan (Wadai, &c.) in the German sphere, a barrier was interposed to the advance of France from the Congo to the Nile. This last object was not attained, inasmuch as Germany in coming to terms with France as to the southern and eastern limits of Cameroon abandoned her claims to the central Sudan. She had already, on the 24th of December 1885, signed a protocol with France fixing her southern frontier, where it was coterminous with the French Congo colony. But to the east German explorers were crossing the track of French explorers from the northern bank of the Ubangi, and the need for an agreement was obvious. Accordingly, on the 4th of February 1894, a protocol—which, some weeks later, was confirmed by a convention- was signed at Berlin, by which France accepted the presence of Germany on Lake Chad as a fait accompli and effected the best bargain she could by making the left bank of the Shari river, from its outlet into Lake Chad to the 10th parallel of north latitude, the eastern limit of German extension. From this point the boundary line went due west some 230 m., then turned south, and with various indentations joined the south-eastern frontier, which had been slightly extended so as to give Germany access to the Sanga river- a tributary of the Congo. Thus, early in 1894, the German Cameroon colony had reached fairly definite limits. In 1908 another convention, modifying the frontier, gave Germany a larger share of the Sanga, while France, among other advantages, gained the left bank of the Shari to 10° 40′ N.

The German Togoland settlements occupy a narrow strip of the Guinea coast, some 35 m. only in length, wedged in between the British Gold Coast and French Dahomey. At first France was inclined to dispute Germany's claims to Little Popo and Porto Seguro; but in December 1885 the French government acknowledged the German protectorate over these places, and the boundary between French and German Exclusion territory, which runs north from the coast to the 11th of degree of latitude, was laid down by the Franco- Germany German convention of the 12th of July 1897. The from the Niger. fixing of the 11th parallel as the northern boundary of German expansion towards the interior was not accomplished without some sacrifice of German ambitions. Having secured an opening on Lake Chad for her Cameroon colony, Germany was anxious to obtain a footing on the middle Niger for Togoland. German expeditions reached Gando, one of the tributary states of the Sokoto empire on the middle Niger, and, notwithstanding the existence of prior treaties with Great Britain, sought to conclude agreements with the sultan of that country. But this German ambition conflicted both with the British and the French designs in West Africa, and eventually Germany had to be content with the 11th parallel as her northern frontier. On the west the Togoland frontier on the coast was fixed in July 1886 by British and German commissioners at 1° 10' E. longitude, and its extension towards the interior laid down for a short distance. A curious feature in the history of its prolongation was the establishment in 1888 of a neutral zone wherein neither power was to seek to acquire protectorates nor exclusive influence. It was not until November 1899 that, as part of the Samoa settlement, this neutral zone was partitioned between the two powers and the frontier extended to the 11th parallel.

The story of the struggle between France and Great Britain in West Africa may roughly be divided into two sections, the first dealing with the Coast colonies, the second dealAngloing with the struggle for the middle Niger and Lake French Chad. As regards the Coast colonies, France was wholly successful in her design of isolating all Great Britain's separate possessions in that region, and of securing for herself undisputed possession of the upper Niger and of the countries lying within the great bend of that river.

rivalry in

West

Africa.

When the British government awoke to the consciousness of | of Sokoto and Gando. But it was impossible to keep his intenwhat was at stake France had obtained too great a start. French governors of the Senegal had succeeded, before the Berlin conference, in establishing forts on the upper Niger, and the advantage thus gained was steadily pursued. Every winter season French posts were pushed farther and farther along the river, or in the vast regions watered by the southern tributaries of the Senegal and Niger rivers. This ceaseless activity met with its reward. Great Britain found herself compelled to acknowledge accomplished facts and to conclude agreements with France, which left her colonies mere coast patches, with a very limited extension towards the interior. On the 10th of August 1889 an agreement was signed by which the Gambia colony and protectorate was confined to a narrow strip of territory on both banks of the river for about 200 m. from the sea. In June 1882 and in August 1889 provisional agreements were made with France fixing the western and northern limits of Sierra Leone, and commissioners were appointed to trace the line of demarcation agreed upon by the two governments. But the commissioners failed to agree, and on the 21st of January 1895 a fresh agreement was made, the boundary being subsequently traced by a mixed commission. Sierra Leone, as now definitely constituted, has a coast-line of about 180 m. and a maximum extension towards the interior of some 200 m.

At the date of the Berlin conference the present colonies of Southern Nigeria and the Gold Coast constituted a single colony under the title of the Gold Coast colony, but on the 13th of January 1886 the territory comprised under that title was erected into two separate colonies-Lagos and the Gold Coast (the name of the former being changed in February 1906 to the colony of Southern Nigeria). The coast limits of the new Gold Coast colony were declared to extend from 5° W. to 2° E., but these limits were subsequently curtailed by agreements with France and Germany. The arrangements that fixed the eastern frontier of the Gold Coast colony and its hinterland have already been stated in connexion with German Togoland. On the western frontier it marches with the French colony of the Ivory Coast, and in July 1893, after an unsuccessful attempt to achieve the same end by an agreement concluded in 1889, the frontier was defined from the neighbourhood of the Tano lagoon and river of the same name, to the 9th degree of north latitude. In August 1896, following the destruction of the Ashanti power and the deportation of King Prempeh, as a result of the second Ashanti campaign, a British protectorate was declared over the whole of the Ashanti territories and a resident was installed at Kumasi. But no northern limit had been fixed by the 1893 agreement beyond the 9th parallel, and the countries to the north-Gurunsi (Grusi), Mossi and Gurma-were entered from all sides by rival British, French and German expeditions. The conflicting claims established by these rival expeditions may, however, best be considered in connexion with the struggle for supremacy on the middle Niger and in the Chad region, to which it is now necessary to turn.

A few days before the meeting of the Berlin conference Sir George Goldie had succeeded in buying up all the French interests on the lower Niger. The British company's influence had at that date been extended by treaties with the native chiefs up the main Niger stream to its junction with the Benue, and some distance along this latter river. But the great Fula states of the central Sudan were still outside European influence, and this fact did not escape attention in Germany. German merchants had been settled for some years on the coast, and one of them, E. R. Flegel, had displayed great interest in, and activity on, the river. He recognized that in the densely populated states of the middle Niger, Sokoto and Gando, and in Bornu to the west of Lake Chad, there was a magnificent field for Germany's newborn colonizing zeal. The German African Company1 and the German Colonial Society listened eagerly to Flegel's proposals, and in April 1885 he left Berlin on a mission to the Fula states This association, formed in 1878 by a union of associations primarily intended for the exploration of Africa, ceased to exist in 1891.

tions entirely secret, and the (British) National African Company
had no desire to see the French rivals, whom they had with so
much difficulty dislodged from the river, replaced by the even
more troublesome German. Accordingly Joseph Thomson, the
young Scottish explorer, was sent out to the Niger, and had the
satisfaction of concluding on the 1st of June 1885 a treaty with
"Umoru, King of the Mussulmans of the Sudan and Sultan of
Sokoto," which practically secured the whole of the trading
rights and the control of the sultan's foreign relations to the
British company. Thomson concluded a similar treaty with
the sultan of Gando, so as to provide against the possibility of
its being alleged that Gando was an independent state and not
subject to the suzerainty of the sultan of Sokoto. As Thomson
descended the river with his treaties, he met Flegel going up the
river, with bundles of German flags and presents for the chiefs.
The German government continued its efforts to secure a footing
on the lower Niger until the fall of Prince Bismarck from power
in March 1890, when opposition ceased, and on the failure of the
half-hearted attempt made later to establish relations with Gando
from Togoland, Germany dropped out of the competition for, the
western Sudan and left the field to France and Great
The Niger
Britain. After its first great success the National Company
African Company renewed its efforts to obtain a granted a
charter from the British government, and on the 10th
of July 1886 the charter was granted, and the company became
"The Royal Niger Company, chartered and limited." In June
of the previous year a British protectorate had been proclaimed
over the whole of the coast from the Rio del Rey to the Lagos
frontier, and as already stated, on the 13th of January 1886 the
Lagos settlements had been separated from the Gold Coast and
erected into a separate colony. It may be convenient to state
here that the western boundary of Lagos with French territory
(Dahomey) was determined in the Anglo-French agreement of
the 10th of August 1889, as far as the 9th degree of north
latitude, where it shall stop." Thus both in the Gold Coast
hinterland and in the Lagos hinterland a door was left wide open
to the north of the 9th parallel.

charter.

Notwithstanding her strenuous efforts, France, in her advance down the Niger from Senegal, did not succeed in reaching Sego on the upper Niger, a considerable distance above Timbuktu, until the winter of 1890-1891, and the rapid advance of British influence up the river raised serious fears lest the Royal Niger Company should reach Timbuktu before France could forestall her. It was, no doubt, this consideration that induced the French government to consent to the insertion in the agreement of the 5th of August 1890, by which Great Britain recognized France's protectorate over Madagascar, of the following article: The Government of Her Britannic Majesty recognizes the sphere of influence of France to the south of her Mediterranean possessions up to a line from Say on the Niger to Barrua on Lake Chad, drawn in such a manner as to comprise in the sphere of action of the Niger Company all that fairly belongs to the kingdom of Sokoto; the line to be determined by the commissioners to be appointed.

The commissioners never were in fact appointed, and the proper meaning to be attached to this article subsequently became a subject of bitter controversy between the two countries. An examination of the map of West Africa will show what possibilities of trouble were left open at the end of 1890 by the various agreements concluded up to that date. From Say on the Niger to where the Lagos frontier came to an abrupt stop in 9° N. there was no boundary line between the French and British spheres of influence. To the north of the Gold Coast and of the French Ivory Coast colony the way was equally open to Great Britain and to France, while the vagueness of the Say-Barrua line left an opening of which France was quick to avail herself. Captain P. L. Monteil, who was despatched by the French government to West Africa in 1890, immediately after the conclusion of the August agreement, did not hesitate to pass well to the south of the Say-Barrua line, and to attempt to conclude treaties with chiefs who were, beyond all question, within the British sphere. Still farther south, on the Benue river, the two expeditions of Lieutenant Mizon-in 1890 and 1892-failed to do any real

French advance to

months to adjust the conflicting claims. Fortunately, by the tact and forbearance of the officers on both sides, no local incident occurred to precipitate a collision, and on the 14th of June 1898 a convention was signed by Sir Edmund Monson and M. G. Hanotaux which practically completed the partition of this part of the continent.

harm to British interests. In 1892 an event happened which | and in Paris, and in the latter capital a commission sat for many had an important bearing on the future course of the dispute. After a troublesome war with Behanzin, king of the native state of Dahomey, France annexed some Timbuktu. portion of Dahomeyan territory on the coast, and declared a protectorate over the rest of the kingdom. Thus was removed the barrier which had up to that time prevented France from pushing her way Nigerwards from her possessions on the Slave Coast, as well as from the upper Niger and the Ivory Coast. Henceforth her progress from all these directions was rapid, and in particular Timbuktu was occupied in the last days of 1893.

In 1894 it appears to have been suddenly realized in France that, for the development of the vast regions which she was placing under her protection in West Africa, it was extremely desirable that she should obtain free access to the navigable portions of the Niger, if not on the left bank, from which she was excluded by the Say-Barrua agreement, then on the right bank, where the frontier had still to be fixed by international agreement. In the neighbourhood of Bussa there is a long stretch of the river so impeded by rapids that navigation is practically impossible, except in small boats and at considerable risk. Below these rapids France had no foothold on the river, both banks from Bussa to the sea being within the British sphere. In 1890 the Royal Niger Company had concluded a treaty with the emir and chiefs of Bussa (or Borgu); but the French declared that the real paramount chief of Borgu was not the king of Bussa, but the king of Nikki, and three expeditions were despatched in hot haste to Nikki to take the king under French protection. Sir George Goldie, however, was not to be baffled. While maintaining the validity of the earlier treaty with Bussa, he despatched Captain (afterwards General Sir) F. D. Lugard to Nikki, and Lugard was successful in distancing all his French competitors by several days, reaching Nikki on the 5th of November 1894 and concluding a treaty with the king and chiefs. The French expeditions, which were in great strength, did not hesitate on their arrival to compel the king to execute fresh treaties with France, and with these in their possession they returned to Dahomey. Shortly afterwards a fresh act of aggression was committed. On the 13th of February 1895 a French officer, Commandant Toutée, arrived on the right bank of the Niger opposite Bajibo and built a fort. His presence there was notified to the Royal Niger Company, who protested to the British government against this invasion of their territory. Lord Rosebery, who was then foreign minister, at once made inquiries in Paris, and received the assurance that Commandant Toutée was a private traveller." Eventually Commandant Toutée was ordered to withdraw, and the fort was occupied by the Royal Niger Company's troops. Commandant Toutée subsequently published the official instructions from the French government under which he had acted. It was thought that the recognition of the British claims, involved in the withdrawal of Commandant Toutée, had marked the final abandonment by France of the attempt to establish herself on the navigable portions of the Niger below Bussa, but in 1897 the attempt was renewed in the most determined manner. In February of that year a French force suddenly occupied Bussa, and this act was quickly followed by the occupation of Gomba and Illo higher up the river. In November 1897 Nikki was occupied. The situation on the Niger had so obviously been outgrowing the capacity of a chartered company that for some time before these occurrences the assumption of responsibility for the whole of the Niger region by the imperial authorities had been practically decided on; and early in 1898 Lugard was sent out to British the Niger with a number of imperial officers to raise a settlement local force in preparation for the contemplated change. of 1898. The advance of the French forces from the south and west was the signal for an advance of British troops from the Niger, from Lagos and from the Gold Coast protectorate. The situation thus created was extremely serious. The British and French flags were flying in close proximity, in some cases in the same village. Meanwhile the diplomatists were busy in London

The Franco

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The settlement effected was in the nature of a compromise. France withdrew from Bussa, Gomba and Illo, the frontier line west of the Niger being drawn from the 9th parallel to a point ten miles, as the crow flies, above Giri, the port of Illo. France was thus shut out from the navigable portion of the middle and lower Niger; but for purely commercial purposes Great Britain agreed to lease to France two small plots of land on the riverthe one on the right bank between Leaba and the mouth of the Moshi river, the other at one of the mouths of the Niger. By accepting this line Great Britain abandoned Nikki and a great part of Borgu as well as some part of Gando to France. East of the Niger the Say-Barrua line was modified in favour of France, which gained parts of both Sokoto and Bornu where they meet the southern edge of the Sahara. In the Gold Coast hinterland the French withdrew from Wa, and Great Britain abandoned all claim to Mossi, though the capital of the latter country, together with a further extensive area in the territory assigned to both powers, was declared to be equally free, so far as trade and navigation were concerned, to the subjects and protected persons of both nationalities. The western boundary of the Gold Coast was prolonged along the Black Volta as far as latitude 11° N., and this parallel was followed with slight deflexions to the Togoland frontier. In consequence of the acute crisis which shortly afterwards occurred between France and Great Britain on the upper Nile, the ratification of this agreement was delayed until after the conclusion of the Fashoda agreement of March 1899 already referred to. In 1900 the two patches on the Niger leased to France were selected by commissioners representing the two countries, and in the same year the AngloFrench frontier from Lagos to the west bank of the Niger was delimited.

to France.

East of the Niger the frontier, even as modified in 1898, failed to satisfy the French need for a practicable route to Lake Chad, and in the convention of the 8th of April 1904, to which reference has been made under Egypt and Morocco, it was agreed, as part of the settlement of the French shore Further question in Newfoundland, to deflect the frontier line conmore to the south. The new boundary was described cessions at some length, but provision was made for its modification in points of detail on the return of the commissioners engaged in surveying the frontier region. In 1906 an agreement was reached on all points, and the frontier at last definitely settled, sixteen years after the Say-Barrua line had been fixed. This revision of the Niger-Chad frontier did not, however, represent the only territorial compensation received by France in West Africa in connexion with the settlement of the Newfoundland question. By the same convention of April 1904 the British government consented to modify the frontier between Senegal and the Gambia colony "so as to give to France Yarbutenda and the lands and landing-places belonging to that locality," and further agreed to cede to France the tiny group of islands off the coast of French Guinea known as the Los Islands.

Meantime the conclusion of the 1898 convention had left both the British and the French governments free to devote increased attention to the subdivision and control of their West African possessions. On the 1st of January 1900 the imperial authorities assumed direct responsibility for the whole of the territories of the Royal Niger Company, which became henceforth a purely commercial undertaking. The Lagos protectorate was extended northwards; the Niger Coast protectorate, likewise with extended frontiers, became Southern Nigeria; while the greater part of the territories formerly administered by the company were constituted into the protectorate of Northern Nigeria-all three administrations being directly under the Colonial Office. In February 1906 the administration of the

British

and French

Southern Nigerian protectorate was placed under that of Lagos
at the same time as the name of the latter was changed to the
Colony of Southern Nigeria, this being a step towards the eventual
amalgamation of all three dependencies under one
Organiza governor or governor-general. In French West Africa
tion of the changes in the internal frontiers have been numerous
and important. The coast colonies have all been in-
creased in size at the expense of the French Sudan,
pro- which has vanished from the maps as an administrative
tectorates.
entity. There are carved out of the territories com-
prised in what is officially known as French West Africa five
colonies-Senegal, French Guinea, the Ivory Coast, Dahomey
and the Upper Senegal and Niger, this last being entirely cut off
from the sea-and the civil territory of Mauritania. To the col-
ony of the Upper Senegal and Niger is attached the military
territory of the Niger, embracing the French Sahara up to the limit
of the Algerian sphere of influence. Not only are all these divisions
of French West Africa connected territorially, but administra-
tively they are united under a governor-general. Similarly the
French Congo territories have been divided into three colonies-
the Gabun, the Middle Congo and the Ubangi-Shari-Chad-all
united administratively under a commissioner-general.

There are, around the coast, numerous islands or groups of islands, which are regarded by geographers as outliers of the Ownership African mainland. The majority of these African

of the African

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FRENCH

Algeria and Algerian Sahara
Tunisia

French West Africa

Senegal

French Guinea.

Ivory Coast

Dahomey

Upper Senegal and Niger, and Maur

itania (including French West
African Sahara)

French Congo.

French Somaliland
Madagascar

GERMAN

East Africa

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Total French Africa

74,000

107,000

129,000

40,000

Sq. m. 276,995 35,371

10,293

225,000

117,732

50,392

450,000

43,608

240,000

125,000

1,020

68,000

258,000

80,000

82,000

34,000

4,000

2,101,411

650,000

950,000

1,600,000

945,000 51,000

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islands were occupied by one or other of the European powers long before the period of continental partition. islands. The Madeira Islands to the west of Morocco, the Bissagos Islands, off the Guinea coast, and Prince's Island and St Thomas' Island, in the Gulf of Guinea, are Portuguese possessions of old standing; while in the Canary Islands and Fernando Po Spain possesses remnants of her ancient colonial empire which are a more valuable asset than any she has acquired in recent times on the mainland. St Helena in the Atlantic, Mauritius and some small groups north of Madagascar in the Indian Ocean, are British possessions acquired long before the opening of the last quarter of the 19th century. Zanzibar, Pemba and some smaller islands which the sultan was allowed to retain were, as has already been stated, placed under British protection in 1890, and the island of Sokotra was placed under the " gracious favour and protection" of Great Britain on the 23rd of April 1886. France's ownership of Réunion dates back to the 17th century, but the Comoro archipelago was not placed under French protection until April 1886. None of these islands, with the exception of the Zanzibar group, have, however, materially affected the partition of the continent, and they need not be enumerated in the table which follows. But the important island of Madagascar stands in a different category, both on account of its size and because it was during the period under review that it passed through the various stages which led to its becoming a French colony. The first step was the placing of the foreign relations of the island under French control, which was effected by the treaty of the 17th of December 1885, after the Franco-Malagasy war that had broken out in 1883. In 1890 Great Britain and Germany recognized a French protectorate over the island, but the Hova government declined to acquiesce in this view, and in May 1895 France sent an expedition to enforce her claims. The capital was occupied on the 30th of September in the same year, and on the SPANISHday following Queen Ranavalona signed a convention recognizing the French protectorate. In January 1896 the island was declared a French possession, and on the 6th of August was declared to be a French colony. In February 1897 the last vestige of ancient rule was swept away by the deportation of the queen.

Thus in its broad outlines the partition of Africa was begun and ended in the short space of a quarter of a century. There are still many finishing touches to be put to the structure. The southern frontiers of Morocco and Tripoli remain undefined, while the mathematical lines by which the spheres of influence of the powers were separated one from the other are being variously modified on the do ut des principle as they come to be surveyed and as the effective occupation of the continent pro

ITALIAN

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In East as in West Africa operations were started by agents of the Belgian committee, but with less success than on the Congo, The first new journey of importance on this side was made (1878-1880) on behalf of the British African Ex1,600,000 ploration Committee by Joseph Thomson, who after the 3,866,950 death of his leader, Keith Johnston, made his way from

Sq. m. 2,101,411

910,150
200,000

Opening

up East Africa.

the coast to the north end of Nyasa, thence to Tanganyika, on 787,500 both sides of which he broke new ground, sighting the north end 79,800 of Lake Rukwa on the east. In 1882-1884 the French naval 900,000 lieutenant Victor Giraud proceeded by the north of Nyasa to 400,000 613,000 Lake Bangweulu, of which he made the first fairly correct map. North of the Zanzibar-Tanganyika route a large area of new ground 11,458,811 was opened in 1883-1884 by Joseph Thomson, who traversed the whole length of the Masai country to Lake Baringo and (J. S. K.) Victoria Nyanza, shedding the first clear light on the great East African rift-valley and neighbouring highlands, including Mounts Kenya and Elgon. A great advance in the region between Victoria Nyanza and Abyssinia was made in 1887-1889 by the Austrians, Count Samuel Teleki and Lieut. Ludwig von Höhnel, who discovered the large Basso Norok, now known as Lake Rudolf, till then only vaguely indicated on the map as Samburu. At this time Somaliland was being opened up by English and Italian travellers. In 1883 the brothers F. L. and W. D. James penetrated from Berbera to the Webi Shebeli; in 1892 Vittorio Bottego (afterwards murdered in the Abyssinian highlands) started from Berbera and reached the upper Juba, which he explored to its source. The first person, however, to cross from the Gulf of Aden to the Indian Ocean was an American, A. Donaldson Smith, who in 1894-1895 explored the headstreams of the Webi Shebeli and also explored the Omo, the feeder of Lake Rudolf.

VI. EXPLORATION AND SURVEY SINCE 1875 In giving the history of the partition of the continent, the later work of exploration, except where, as in the case of de Brazza's expeditions, it had direct political consequences, has of necessity not been told. The results achieved during and after the period of partition may now be indicated. Stanley's great journey down the Congo in 1875-1876 initiated a new era in African exploration. The numbers of travellers soon became so great that the once marvellous feat of crossing the continent from sea to sea became common. With increased knowledge and much ampler means of communication trans-African travel now presents few difficulties. While d'Anville and other cartographers of the 18th century, by omitting all that was uncertain, had left a great blank on the map, the work accomplished since 1875 has filled it with authentic topographical details. Moreover surveys of high accuracy have been made at several points. As the work of exploration and survey progressed journeys of startling novelty became impossible-save in the eastern Sahara, where the absence of water and boundless wastes of sand render exploration more difficult, perhaps, than in any other region of the globe. Within their respective spheres of influence each power undertook detailed surveys, and the most solid of the latest accessions to knowledge have resulted from the labours of hard-working colonial officials toiling individually in obscurity. Their work it is impossible here to recognize adequately; the following lines record only the more obvious achievements.

the Congo

The relations of the Congo basin to the neighbouring river systems was brought out by the journeys of many travellers. In 1877 an important expedition was sent out by the Portuguese government under Serpa Pinto, Brito Capello and Roberto Ivens for the exploration of the interior of Angola. Work in The first named made his way by the head-streams of basin. the Kubango to the upper Zambezi, which he descended to the Victoria Falls, proceeding thence to Pretoria | and Durban. Capello and Ivens confined their attention to the south-west Congo basin, where they disproved the existence of Lake Aquilunda, which had figured on the maps of that region since the 16th century. In a later journey (1884-1885) Capello and Ivens crossed the continent from Mossamedes to the mouth of the Zambezi, adding considerably to the knowledge of the borderlands between the upper Congo and the upper Zambezi. More important results were obtained by the German travellers Paul Pogge and Hermann von Wissmann, who (1880-1882) passed through previously unknown regions beyond Muata Yanvo's kingdom, and reached the upper Congo at Nyangwe, whence Wissmann made his way to the east coast. In 1884-1885 a German expedition under Wissmann solved the most important geographical problem relating to the southern Congo basin by descending the Kasai, the largest southern tributary, which, contrary to expectation, proved to unite with the Kwango and other streams before joining the main river. Further additions to the knowledge of the Congo tributaries were made at the same time by the Rev. George Grenfell, a Baptist missionary, who (accompanied in 1885 by K. von François) made several voyages in the steamer "Peace," especially up the great Ubangi, ultimately proved to be the lower course of the Welle, discovered in 1870 by Schweinfurth. I

In the region north-west of Victoria Nyanza the greatest additions to geographical knowledge were made by H. M. Stanley in his last expedition, undertaken for the relief of Emin Pasha. The expedition set out in 1887 by way of the Congo to carry supplies to the governor of the old Egyptian Equatorial province. The route lay up the Aruwimi, the principal tributary of the Congo from the north-east, by which the expedition made its way, encountering immense difficulties, through the great equatorial forest, the character and extent of which were thus for the first time brought to light. The return was made to the east coast, and resulted in the discovery of the great snowy range of Ruwenzori or Runsoro, and the confirmation of the existence of a third Nile lake discharging its waters into the Albert Nyanza by the Semliki river. A further discovery was that of a large bay, hitherto unsuspected, forming the south-west corner of the Victoria Nyanza.

Africa.

Great activity was also displayed in completing the work of earlier explorers in North and West Africa. Morocco was in 1883-1884 the scene of important explorations by Expedi de Foucauld, a Frenchman who, disguised as a Jew, tions in crossed and re-crossed the Atlas and supplied the North and first trustworthy information as to the orography of West many parts of the chain. In 1887-1889 Louis Gustave Binger, a French officer, made a great journey through the countries enclosed in the Niger bend, and in 1890-1892 Col. P. F. Monteil went from St Louis to Say, on the Niger, thence through Sokoto to Bornu and Lake Chad, whence he crossed the Sahara to Tripoli. Meantime explorers had been busy in the region between Lake Chad, the Gulf of Guinea and the Congo. The Sanga, one of the principal northern tributaries of the Congo, was reached from the north by Lieut. Louis Mizon, a French naval officer, who drew the first line of communication between the Benue and the Congo (1890-1892). In 1890 Paul Crampel, who in the previous year had explored north of the Ogowé, undertook a great expedition from the Ubangi to the Shari, but was attacked and killed, with several of his companions, on the borders of the Bagirmi. Several other expeditions followed, and in 1896 Emile Gentil reached the Shari, launched a steamer on its waters and pushed on to Lake Chad. Early in 1900 Lake Chad was also reached by F. Foureau, a French traveller, who had already devoted twelve years to the exploration of the

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