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AFRICA

[history

the island and created considerable commercial interests. they were fully satisfied that every precaution was taken Away from the coasts the limits and extent of the Sultan’s to ensure that it should in no way conflict with the authority were far from being clearly defined. The interests of the territory that has been taken under Sultan himself claimed that it extended as far as Lake German protectorate,” and Prince Bismarck was practically Tanganyika, but the claim did not rest on any very solid invited to say whether British capitalists were or were not receive the protection of the British Government. The ground of effective occupation. The little-known region to reference in Lord Granville’s despatch was to a proposal of the Great Lakes had for some time attracted the attention of the men who were directing the colonial movement made by a number of British merchants and others who in Germany ; and, as we have seen, a small band of pioneers had long been interested in Zanzibar, and who saw in the actually landed on the mainland opposite Zanzibar in rapid advance of Germany a menace to the interests which November 1884, and made their first “ treaty with the had hitherto been regarded as paramount in the Sultanate. chief of Mbuzini on the 19th of that month. Pushing up In 1884 Mr H. H. Johnston had concluded treaties with the Wami river the three adventurers reached the Usagara the chief of Taveta, and had transferred these treaties to country, and concluded more “treaties,” the net result Mr John Hutton of Manchester. Mr Hutton, with Mr being that when, in the middle of December, Dr Peters (afterwards Sir William) Mackinnon, was one of _ the returned to the coast he brought back with him documents founders of what subsequently became the Imperial British which were claimed to concede some 60,000 square miles East Africa Company. But in the early stages the of country to the German Colonization Society. Dr champions of British interests in East Africa received no Peters hurried back to Berlin, and on the 17th of February support from their own Government, while Germany was 1885 the German Emperor issued a “Charter of Protec- pushing her advantage with the energy of a recent convert tion ” by which His Majesty accepted the suzerainty of to colonial expansion, and had even, on the coast, opened the newly-acquired territory, and “placed under our negotiations with the Sultan of Witu, a small territory Imperial protection the territories in question.” The situated north of the Tana river, whose ruler claimed to be conclusion of these treaties was, on the 6th March, notified independent of Zanzibar. On the 5th May 1885 the to the British Government and to the Sultan of Zanzibar. Sultan of Witu executed a deed of sale and cession to a Immediately on receipt of the notification the Sultan German subject of certain tracts of land on the coast, and telegraphed an energetic protest to Berlin, alleging that later in the same year other treaties or sales of territory the places placed under German protection had belonged were effected, by which German subjects acquired rights on to the Sultanate of Zanzibar from the time of his fathers. the coast-line claimed by the Sultan. Inland, treaties had The German consul-general refused to admit the Sultan’s been concluded on behalf of Germany with the chiefs of claims, and meanwhile agents of the German society were the Kilimanjaro region, and an intimation to that effect energetically pursuing the task of treaty-making. The made to the British Government. But before this occurred Sultan despatched a small force to the disputed territory, the German Government had succeeded in extracting an which was subsequently withdrawn, and in May sent a acknowledgment of the validity of the earlier treaties more imposing expedition under the command of General from the Sultan of Zanzibar. Early in August a powerful Mathews, the commander-in-chief of the Zanzibar army, German squadron appeared off Zanzibar, and on the 14th to the Kilimanjaro district, in order to anticipate the of that month the Sultan yielded to the inevitable, German agents who were reported to be hastening to acknowledged the German protectorate over Usagara and conclude treaties with the chiefs of Chagga and Taveta. Witu, and undertook to withdraw his soldiers. Meanwhile negotiations had been opened for the apMeanwhile Lord Granville, who was then at the Foreign pointment of an International Commission, “for the Office, had taken up an extremely friendly attitude towards the German claims. Prior to these events the Sultan of purpose of inquiring into the claims of the The Zanzibar had, on more than one occasion, practically Sultans of Zanzibar to sovereignty over certain Sultanate invited Great Britain to assume a protectorate over his territories on the east coast of Africa, and of °^anz.f}ar dominions. But the invitations had been declined. ascertaining their precise limits.” The GovernEgyptian affairs were, in the year 1885, causing consider- ments to be represented were Great Britain, France, and able anxiety to the British Government, and the fact may Germany, and towards the end of 1885 commissioners not have been without influence on the attitude of the were appointed. The commissioners reported on the 9th British foreign secretary. On the 25th May 1885, in a of June 1886, and assigned to the Sultan the islands of despatch to the British ambassador at Berlin, Lord Zanzibar, Pemba, Lamu, .Mafia, and a number of other Granville instructed Sir E. Malet to communicate the small islands. On the mainland they recognized as belonging to the Sultan a continuous strip of territory, 10 views of the British Cabinet to Prince Bismarck:— sea miles in depth, from the south bank of the Minengani I have to request your Excellency to state that the supposition river, a stream a short distance south of the Bovuma, to that Her Majesty’s Government have no intention of opposing the Kipini, at the mouth of the Tana river, some 600 miles German scheme of colonization in the neighbourhood ot Zanzibar is absolutely correct. Her Majesty’s Government, on the contrary, in length. North of Kipini the commissioners recognized view with favour these schemes, the realization of which will as belonging to the Sultan the stations of Kismayu, Brava, entail the civilization of large tracts over which hitherto no Meurka, and Magadisho, with radii landwards of 10 sea European influence has been exercised, the co - operation of miles, and of Warshekh with a radius of 5 sea miles. By Germany with Great Britain in the work of the suppression of the slave gangs, and the encouragement of the efforts of the an exchange of notes in October-November 1886 the Sultan both in the extinction of the slave trade and in the Governments of Great Britain and Germany accepted the commercial development of his dominions. reports of the Delimitation Commissioners, to which the In the same despatch Lord Granville instructed Sir E. Sultan adhered on the 4th of the following December. Malet to intimate to the German Government that some But the British and German Governments did more than prominent capitalists had originated a plan for a British determine what territories were to be assigned to the settlement in the country between the coast and the lakes, Sultanate of Zanzibar. They agreed to a delimitation of which are the sources of the White Nile, “and for its their respective spheres of influence in East Africa. The connexion with the coast by a railway.” But Her territory to be affected by this arrangement was to be Majesty’s Government would not accord to these promi- bounded on the south by the Rovuma river, “ and on the nent capitalists the support they had called for, “ unless north by a line which, starting from the mouth of the