Africa

in Portugal, and the government, unable to obtain its ratification by the

chamber of deputies, resigned. In October the abandonment of the convention

was accepted by the new Portuguese ministry as a fait accompli; but on the

14th of November the two governments signed an agreement for a modus

vivendi, by which they engaged to recognize the territorial limits

indicated in the convention of 20th August ``in so far that from the date

of the present agreement

British and Portuguese spheres defined.

to the termination thereof neither Power will make treaties, accept

protectorates, nor exercise any act of sovereignty within the spheres of

influence assigned to the other party by the said convention.'' The

breathing-space thus gained enabled feeling in Portugal to cool down, and

on the 11th of June 1891 another treaty was signed, the ratifications being

exchanged on the 3rd of July, As already stated, this is the main treaty

defining the British and Portuguese spheres both south and north of the

Zambezi. It contained many other provisions relating to trade and

navigation, providing, inter alia, a maximum transit duty of 3% on imports

and exports crossing Portuguese territories on the east coast to the

British sphere, freedom of navigation of the Zambezi and Shire for the

ships of all nations, and stipulations as to the making of railways, roads

and telegraphs. The territorial readjustment effected was slightly more

favourable to Portugal than that agreed upon by the 1890 convention.

Portugal was given both banks of the Zambezi to a point ten miles west of

Zumbo—the farthest settlement of the Portuguese on the river. South of the

Zambezi the frontier takes a south and then an east course till it reaches

the edge of the continental plateau, thence running, roughly, along the

line of 33 deg. E. southward to the north-eastern frontier of the

Transvaal. Thus by this treaty Portugal was left in the possession of the

coast-lands, while Great Britain maintained her right to Matabele and

Mashona lands. The boundary between the Portuguese sphere of influence on

the west coast and the British sphere of influence north of the Zambezi was

only vaguely indicated; but it was to be drawn in such a manner as to leave

the Barotse country within the British sphere, Lewanika, the paramount

chief of the Marotse, claiming that his territory extended much farther to

the west than was admitted by the Portuguese. In August 1903 the question

what were the limits of the Barotse kingdom was referred to the arbitration

of the king of Italy. By his award, delivered in June 1905, the western

limit of the British sphere runs from the northern frontier of German South-

West Africa up the Kwando river to 22 deg. E., follows that meridian north

to 13 deg. S., then runs due east to 24 deg. E., and then north again to

the frontier of the Congo State.

Before the conclusion of the treaty of June 1891 with Portugal, the

British government had made certain arrangements for the administration of

the large area north of the Zambezi reserved to British influence. On the

1st of February Sir Harry Johnston was appointed imperial commissioner in

Nyasaland, and a fortnight later the British South Africa Company intimated

a desire to extend its operations north of the Zambezi. Negotiations

followed, and the field of operations of the Chartered Company was, on the

2nd of April 1891, extended so as to cover (with the exception of

Nyasaland) the whole of the British sphere of influence north of the

Zambezi (now known as Northern Rhodesia). On the 14th of May a formal

protectorate was declared over Nyasaland, including the Shire highlands and

a belt of territory extending along the whole of the western shore of Lake

Nyasa. The name was changed in 1893 to that of the British Central Africa

Protectorate, for which designation was substituted in 1907 the more

appropriate title of Nyasaland Protectorate.

At the date of the assembling of the Berlin conference the German

government had notified that the coast-line on the

Germany's share of South Africa.

south-west of the continent, from the Orange river to Cape Frio, had been

placed under German protection. On the 13th of April 1885 the German South-

West Africa Company was constituted under an order of the imperial cabinet

with the rights of state sovereignty, including mining royalties and

rights, and a railway and telegraph monopoly. In that and the following

years the Germans vigorously pursued the business of treaty-making with the

native chiefs in the interior; and when, in July 1890, the British and

German governments came to an agreement as to the limits of their

respective spheres of influence in various parts of Africa, the boundaries

of German South-West Africa were fixed in their present position. By

Article III. of this agreement the north bank of the Orange river up to the

point of its intersection by the 20th degree of east longitude was made the

southern boundary of the German sphere of influence. The eastern boundary

followed the 20th degree of east longitude to its intersection by the 22nd

parallelof south latitude, then ran eastwards along that parallel to the

point of its intersection by the 21st degree of east longitude. From that

point it ran northwards along the last-named meridian to the point of its

intersection by the 18th parallel of south latitude, thence eastwards along

that parallel to the river Chobe or Kwando, and along the main channel of

that river to its junction with the Zambezi, where it terminated. The

northern frontier marched with the southern boundary of Portuguese West

Africa. The object of deflecting the eastern boundary near its northern

termination was to give Germany access by her own territory to the upper

waters of the Zambezi, and it was declared that this strip of territory was

at no part to be less than 20 English miles in width.

To complete the survey of the political partition of Africa south of the

Zambezi, it is necessary briefly to refer to the events

Fate of the Dutch Republics.

connected with the South African Republic and the Orange Free State. In

October 1885 the British government made an agreement with the New

Republic, a small community of Boer farmers who had in 1884-85 seized part

of Zululand and set up a government of their own, defining the frontier

between the New Republic and Zululand; but in July 1888 the New Republic

was incorporated in the South African Republic. In a convention of July-

August 1890 the British government and the government of the South African

Republic confirmed the independence of Swaziland, and on the 8th of

November 1893 another convention was signed with the same object; but on

the 19th of December 1894 the British government agreed to the South

African Republic exercising ``all rights and powers of protection,

legislation, jurisdiction and administration over Swaziland and the

inhabitants thereof,'' subject to certain conditions and provisions, and to

the non-incorporation of Swaziland in the Republic. In the previous

September Pondoland had been annexed to Cape Colony; on the 23rd of April

1895 Tongaland was declared by proclamation to be added to the dominions of

Queen Victoria, and in December 1897 Zululand and Tongaland, or

Amatongaland, were incorporated with the colony of Natal. The history of

the events that led up to the Boer War of 1899-1902 cannot be recounted

here (see TRANSVAAL, History), but in October 1899 the South African

Republic and the Orange Free State addressed an ultimatum to Great Britain

and invaded Natal and Cape Colony. As a result of the military operations

that followed, the Orange Free State was, on the 28th of May 1900,

proclaimed by Lord Roberts a British colony under the name ``Orange River

Colony,'' and the South African Republic was on the 25th of October 1900

incorporated in the British empire as the ``Transvaal Colony.'' In January

1903 the districts of Vryheid (formerly the New Republic), Utrecht and part

of the Wakkerstroom district, a tract of territory comprising in all about

7000 sq. m., were transferred from the Transvaal colony to Natal. In 1907

both the Transvaal and Orange River Colony were granted responsible

government.

On the east coast the two great rivals were Germany and Great Britain.

Germany on the 30th of December 1886, and Great

Anglo-German rivalry in East Africa.

Britain on the 11th of June 1891, formally recognized the Rovuma river as

the northern boundary of the Portuguese sphere of influence on that coast;

but it was to the north of that river, over the vast area of East or East

Central Africa in which the sultan of Zanzibar claimed to exercise

suzerainty, that the struggle between the two rival powers was most acute.

The independence of the sultans of Zanzibar had been recognized by the

governments of Great Britain and France in 1862, and the sultan's authority

extended almost uninterruptedly along the coast of the mainland, from Cape

Delgado in the south to Warsheik on the north—a stretch of coast more than

a thousand miles long—though to the north the sultan's authority was

confined to certain ports. In Zanzibar itself, where Sir John Kirk,

Livingstone's companion in his second expedition, was British consul-

general, British influence was, when the Berlin conference met, practically

supreme, though German traders had established themselves on the island and

created considerable commercial interests. Away from the coasts the limits

and extent of the sultan's authority were far from being clearly defined.

The sultanhimself claimed that it extended as far as Lake Tanganyika, but

the claim did not rest on any very solid ground of effective occupation.

The little-known region of the Great Lakes had for some time attracted the

attention of the men who were directing the colonial movement in Germany;

and, as has been stated, a small band of pioneers actually landed on the

mainland opposite Zanzibar in November 1884, and made their first

``treaty'' with the chief of Mbuzini on the 19th of that month Pushing up

the Wami river the three adventurers reached the Usagara country, and

concluded more ``treaties,'' the net result being that when, in the middle

of December, Karl Peters returned to the coast he brought back with him

documents which were claimed to concede some 60,000 sq. m. of country to

the German Colonization Society. Peters hurried back to Berlin, and on the

17th of February 1885 the German emperor issued a ``Charter of Protection''

by which His Majesty accepted the suzerainty of the newly-acquired

territory, and ``placed under our Imperial protection the territories in

question.'' The conclusion of these treaties was, on the 6th of March,

notified to the British government and to the sultan of Zanzibar.

Immediately on receipt of the notification the sultan telegraphed an

energetic protest to Berlin, alleging that the places placed under German

protection had belonged to the sultanate of Zanzibar from the time of his

fathers. The German consul-general refused to admit the sultan's claims,

and meanwhile agents of the German society were energetically pursuing the

task of treaty-making. The sultan (Seyyid Bargash) despatched a small force

to the disputed territory, which was subsequently withdrawn, and in May

sent a more imposing expedition under the command of General Lloyd Mathews,

the commander-in-chief of the Zanzibar army, to the Kilimanjaro district,

in order to anticipate the action of German agents. Meanwhile Lord

Granville, then at the British Foreign Office, had

Lord Granville's complaisance towards Germany.

taken up an extremely friendly attitude towards the German claims. Before

these events the sultan of Zanzibar had, on more than one occasion,

practically invited Great Britain to assume a protectorate over his

dominions. But the invitations had been declined. Egyptian affairs were, in

the year 1885, causing considerable anxiety to the British government, and

the fact was not without influence on the attitude of the British foreign

secretary. On the 25th of May 1885, in a despatch to the British ambassador

at Berlin, Lord Granville instructed Sir E. Malet to communicate the views

of the British cabinet to Prince Bismarck:—

I have to request your Excellency to state that the supposition that Her

Majesty's Government have no intention of opposing the German scheme of

colonization in the neighbourhood of Zanzibar is absolutely correct. Her

Majesty's Government, on the contrary, view with favour these schemes, the

realization of which will entail the civilization of large tracts over

which hitherto no European influence has been exercised, the co-operation

of Germany with Great Britain in the work of the suppression of the slave

gangs, and the encouragement of the efforts of the Sultan both in the

extinction of the slave trade and in the commercial development of his

dominions.

In the same despatch Lord Granville instructed Sir E. Malet to intimate

to the German government that some prominent capitalists had originated a

plan for a British settlement in the country between the coast and the

lakes, which are the sources of the White Nile, ``and for its connexion

with the coast by a railway.'' But Her Majesty's government would not

accord to these prominent capitalists the support they had called for,

``unless they were fully satisfied that every precaution was taken to

ensure that it should in no way conflict with the interests of the

territory that has been taken under German protectorate,'' and Prince

Bismarck was practically invited to say whether British capitalists were or

were not to receive the protection of the British government. The reference

in Lord Granville's despatch was to a proposal made by a number of British

merchants and others who had long been interested in Zanzibar, and who saw

in the rapid advance of Germany a menace to the interests which had

hitherto been regarded as paramount in the sultanate. In 1884 H. H.

Johnston had concluded treaties with the chief of Taveta in the Kilimanjaro

district, and had transferred these treaties to John Hutton of Manchester.

Hutton, with Mr (afterwards Sir William) Mackinnon, was one of the founders

of what subsequently became the Imperial British East Africa Company. But

in the early stages the champions of British interests in East Africa

received no support from their own government, while Germany was pushing

her advantage with the energy of a recent convert to colonial expansion,

and had even, on the coast, opened negotiations with the sultan of Witu, a

small territory situated north of the Tana river, whose ruler claimed to be

independent of Zanzibar. On the 5th of May 1885 the sultan of Witu executed

a deed of sale and cession to a German subject of certain tracts of land on

the coast, and later in the same year other treaties or sales of territory

were effected, by which German subjects acquired rights on the coast-line

claimed by the sultan. Inland, treaties had been concluded on behalf of

Germany with the chiefs of the Kilimanjaro region, and an intimation to

that effect made to the British government. But before this occurred the

German government had succeeded in extracting an acknowledgment of the

validity of the earlier treaties from the sultan of Zanzibar. Early in

August a powerful German squadron appeared off Zanzibar, and on the 14th of

that month the sultan yielded to the inevitable, acknowledged the German

protectorate over Usagara and Witu, and undertook to withdraw his soldiers.

Meanwhile negotiations had been opened for the appointment of an

international commission, ``for the purpose of inquiring

Partition of the sultanate of Zanzibar.

into the claims of the sultans of Zanzibar to sovereignty over certain

territories on the east coast of Africa, and of ascertaining their precise

limits.'' The governments to be represented were Great Britain, France and

Germany, and towards the end of 1885 commissioners were appointed. The

commissioners reported on the 9th of June 1886, and assigned to the sultan

the islands of Zanzibar, Pemba, Lamu, Mafia and a number of other small

islands. On the mainland they recognized as belonging to the sultan a

continuous strip of territory, 10 sea-miles in depth, from the south bank

of the Minengani river, a stream a short distance south of the Rovuma, to

Kipini, at the mouth of the Tana river, some 600 m. in length. North of

Kipini the commissioners recognized as belonging to the sultan the stations

of Kismayu, Brava, Marka and Mukdishu, with radii landwards of 10 sea-

miles, and of Warsheik with a radius of 5 sea-miles. By an exchange of

notes in October—November 1886 the governments of Great Britain and Germany

accepted the reports of the delimitation commissioners, to which the sultan

adhered on the 4th of the following December. But the British and German

governments did more than determine what territories were to be assigned to

the sultanate of Zanzibar. They agreed to a delimitation of their

respective spheres of influence in East Africa. The territory to be

affected by this arrangement was to be bounded on the south by the Rovuma

river, ``and on the north by a line which, starting from the mouth of the

Tana river, follows the course of that river or its affluents to the point

of intersection of the equator and the 38th degree of east longitude,

thence strikes direct to the point of intersection of the 1st degree of

north latitude with the 37th degree of east longitude, where the line

terminates.'' The line of demarcation between the British and the German

spheres of influence was to start from the mouth of the river Wanga or Umba

(which enters the ocean opposite Pemba Island to the north of Zanzibar),

and running north-west was to skirt the northern base of the Kilimanjaro

range, and thence to be drawn direct to the point on the eastern side of

Victoria Nyanza intersected by the 1st degree of south latitude. South of

this line German influence was to prevail; north of the line was the

British sphere. The sultan's dominions having been thus truncated, Germany

associated herself with the recognition of the ``independence'' of Zanzibar

in which France and Great Britain had joined in 1862. The effect of this

agreement was to define the spheres of influence of the two countries as

far as Victoria Nyanza, but it provided no limit westwards, and left the

country north of the Tana river, in which Germany had already acquired some

interests near the coast, open for fresh annexations. The conclusion of the

agreement immediately stimulated the enterprise both of the German East

African Company, to which Peters's earlier treaties had been transferred,

and of the British capitalists to whom reference had been made in Lord

Granville's despatch. The German East African Company was incorporated by

imperial charter in March 1887, and the British capitalists formed

themselves into the British East Africa Association, and on the 24th of May

1887 obtained, through the good offices of Sir William Mackinnon, a

concession of the 10-miles strip of coast from the Umba river in the south

to Kipini in the north. The British association further sought to extend

its rights in the sphere reserved to British influence by making treaties

with the native chiefs behind the coast strip, and for this purpose various

expeditions were sent into the interior. When they had obtained concessions

over the country for some 200 m. inland the associated

Formation of British East Africa.

capitalists applied to the British government for a charter, which was

granted on the 3rd of September 1888, and the association became the

Imperial British East Africa Company (see BRITISH EAST AFRICA).

The example set by the British company in obtaining a lease of the coast

strip between the British sphere of influence and the sea was quickly

followed by the German association, which, on the 28th of April 1888,

concluded an agreement with the sultan Khalifa, who had succeeded his

brother Bargash, by which the association leased the strip of Zanzibar

territory between the German sphere and the sea. It was not,however, until

August that the German officials took over the administration, and their

want of tact and ignorance of native administration almost immediately

provoked a rebellion of so serious a character that it was not suppressed

until the imperial authorities had taken the matter in hand. Shortly after

its suppression the administration was entrusted to an imperial officer,

and the sultan's rights on the mainland strip were bought outright by

Germany for four millions of marks.

Events of great importance had been happening, meanwhile, in the country

to the west and north of the British sphere of influence. The British

company had sent caravans into the interior to survey the country, to make

treaties with the native chiefs and to report on the commercial and

agricultural possibilities. One of these had gone up the Tana river. But

another and a rival expedition was proceeding along the northern bank of

this same river. Karl Peters, whose energy cannot be denied, whatever may

be thought of his methods, set out with an armed caravan up the Tana on the

pretext of leading an expedition to the relief of Emin Pasha, the governor

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