Africa

Meanwhile de Brazza was far from idle. He had returned to Africa at the

beginning of 1880, and while the agents of King Leopold were making

treaties and founding stations along the southern bank of the river, de

Brazza and other French agents were equally busy on the northern bank. De

Brazza was sent out to Africa by the French committee of the International

African Association, which provided him with the funds for the expedition.

His avowed object was to explore the region between the Gabun and Lake

Chad. But his real object was to anticipate Stanley on the Congo. The

international character of the association founded by King Leopold was

never more than a polite fiction, and the rivalry between the French and

the Belgians on the Congo was soon open, if not avowed. In October 1880 de

Brazza made a solemn treaty with a chief on the north bank of the Congo,

who claimed that his authority extended over a large area, including

territory on the southern bank of the river. As soon as this chief had

accepted French protection, de Brazza crossed over to the south of the

river, and founded a station close to the present site of Leopoldville. The

discovery by Stanley of the French station annoyed King Leopold's agent,

and he promptly challenged the rights of the chief who purported to have

placed the country under French protection, and himself founded a Belgian

station close to the site selected by de Brazza. In the result, the French

station was withdrawn to the northern side of Stanley Pool, where it is now

known as Brazzaville.

The activity of French and Belgian agents on the Congo had not passed

unnoticed in Lisbon, and the Portuguese government saw that no time was to

be lost if the claims it had never ceased to put forward on the west coast

were not to go by default. At varying periods during the 19th century

Portugal had put forward claims to the whole of the West African coast,

between 5 deg. 12' and 8 deg. south. North of the Congo mouth she claimed

the territories of Kabinda and Molemba, alleging that they had been in her

possession since 1484. Great Britain had never, however, admitted this

claim, and south of the Congo had declined to recognize Portuguese

possessions as extending north of Ambriz. In 1856 orders were given to

British cruisers to prevent by force any attempt to extend Portuguese

dominion north of that place. But the Portuguese had been persistent in

urging their claims, and in 1882 negotiations were again opened with the

British government for recognition of Portuguese rights over both banks of

the Congo on the coast, and for some distance inland. Into the details of

the negotiations, which were conducted for Great Britain by the 2nd Earl

Granville, who was then secretary for foreign affairs, it is unnecessary to

enter; they resulted in the signing on the 26th of February 1884 of a

treaty, by which Great Britain recognized the sovereignty of the king of

Portugal ``over that part of the west coast of Africa, situated between 8

deg. and 5 deg. 12' south latitude,'' and inland as far as Noki, on the

south bank of the Congo, below Vivi. The navigation of the Congo was to be

controlled by an Anglo-Portuguese commission. The publication of this

treaty evoked immediate protests, not only on the continent but in Great

Britain. In face of the disapproval aroused by the treaty, Lord Granville

found himself unable to ratify it. The protests had not been confined to

France and the king of the Belgians. Germany had not yet acquired formal

footing in Africa, but she was crouching for the spring prior to taking her

part in the scramble, and Prince Bismarck had expressed, in vigorous

language, the objections entertained by Germany to the Anglo-Portuguese

treaty.

For some time before 1884 there had been growing up a general conviction

that it would be desirable for the powers who were interesting themselves

in Africa to come to some agreement as to ``the rules of the game,'' and to

define their respective interests so far as that was practicable. Lord

Granville's ill-fated treaty brought this sentiment to a head, and it was

agreed to hold an international conference on African affairs. But before

discussing the Berlin conference of 1884-1885, it will be well to see what

was the position, on the eve of the conference, in other parts of the

African continent. In the southern section of Africa, south of the Zambezi,

important events had been happening. In 1876 Great Britain had concluded an

agreement

British influence consolidated in South Africa.

with the Orange Free State for an adjustment of frontiers, the result of

which was to leave the Kimberley diamond fields in British territory, in

exchange for a payment of L. 90,000 to the Orange Free State. On the 12th

of April 1877 Sir Theophilus Shepstone had issued a proclamation declaring

the Transvaal— the South African Republic, as it was officially

designated—to be British territory (see TRANSVAAL.) In December 1880 war

broke out and lasted until March 1881, when a treaty of peace was signed.

This treaty of peace was followed by a convention, signed in August of the

same year, under which complete self-government was guaranteed to the

inhabitants of the Transvaal, subject to the suzerainty of Great Britain,

upon certain terms and conditions and subject to certain reservations and

limitations. No sooner was the convention signed than it became the object

of the Boers to obtain a modification of the conditions and limitations

imposed, and in February 1884 a fresh convention was signed, amending the

convention of 1881. Article IV. of the new convention provided that ``The

South African Republic will conclude no treaty or engagement with any state

or nation other than the Orange Free State, nor with any native tribe to

the eastward or westward of the Republic, until the same has been approved

by Her Majesty the Queen.'' The precise effect of the two conventions has

been the occasion for interminable discussions, but as the subject is now

one of merely academic interest, it is sufficient to say that when the

Berlin conference held its first meeting in 1884 the Transvaal was

practically independent, so far as its internal administration was

concerned, while its foreign relations were subject to the control just

quoted.

But although the Transvaal had thus, between the years 1875 and 1884,

become and ceased to be British territory, British influence in other parts

of Africa south of the Zambezi had been steadily extended. To the west of

the Orange Free State, Griqualand West was annexed to the Cape in 1880,

while to the east the territories beyond the Kei river were included in

Cape Colony between 1877 and 1884, so that in the latter year, with the

exception of Pondoland, the whole of South-East Africa was in one form or

another under British control. North of Natal, Zululand was not actually

annexed until 1887, although since 1879, when the military power of the

Zulus was broken up, British influence had been admittedly supreme. In

December 1884 St Lucia Bay—upon which Germany was casting covetous eyes—had

been taken possession of in virtue of its cession to Great Britain by the

Zulu king in 1843, and three years later an agreement of non-cession to

foreign powers made by Great Britain with the regent and paramount chief of

Tongaland completed the chain of British possessions on the coast of South

Africa, from the mouth of the Orange river on the west to Kosi Bay and the

Portuguese frontier on the east. In the interior of South Africa the year

1884 witnessed the beginning of that final stage of the British advance

towards the north which was to extend British influence from the Cape to

the southern shores of Lake Tanganyika. The activity of the Germans on the

west, and of the Boer republic on the east, had brought home to both the

imperial and colonial authorities the impossibility of relying on vague

traditional claims. In May 1884 treaties were made with native chiefs by

which the whole of the country north of Cape Colony, west of the Transvaal,

south of 22 deg. S. and east of 20 deg. E., was placed under British

protection, though a protectorate was not formally declared until the

following January.

Meanwhile some very interesting events had been taking place or: the west

coast, north of the Orange river and south of the Portuguese province of

Mossamaede. It must be sufficient here to touch very briefly on the events

that preceded the foundation of the colony of German South-West Africa. For

many years before 1884 German missionaries had settled among the Damaras

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