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Rh German commission in 1884-1885 for settling the claims of British subjects at Angra Pequena and other parts of the south-west coast. Shippard, while at Oxford in 1878, had discussed with Cecil Rhodes the plan of the projected British advance in south central Africa. He saw in the German annexation of Damaraland and N am aqua land the first step in a design to secure for Germany territory stretching from ocean to ocean-a design which if executed would have been fatal to the British position in South Africa. Consequently when after the Warren expedition of 1885 he was chosen to organize the newly acquired British possessions in Bechuanaland he saw in his appointment an opportunity for forestalling the Germans, and also the Boer adventurers who likewise sought to be beforehand with Britain in the countries north of the Limpopo. From his first establishment in Bechuanaland he kept up a friendly correspondence with the Matabele king Lobengula with the object of attaching him to the British cause. At the end of 1887 he went to Graham's Town with the hope of inducing the high commissioner (Sir Hercules Robinson -afterwards Lord Rosmead) to sanction the conclusion of a treaty with Lobengula binding that ruler not to cede any part of his territory to any other power than England. “I used all my power of persuasion, " Sir Sidney writes, “but failed to induce Lord Rosmead either to act on his own responsibility in the matter or to approach Her Majesty's government on the subject. As a last resource I telegraphed to Mr Rhodes, who was then busily engaged at Kimberley, to come down at once to Graham's Town and try the effect of his eloquence. He came, and by taking upon himself all pecuniary responsibility succeeded in obtaining the requisite sanction ” (see article “ Bechuanaland, " by Sir S. Shippard, in British A frica, London,1899). The treaty was signed and British interests secured. Shippard was thenceforth freer to devote himself to the special interests of Bechuanaland, which he governed with conspicuous success. He held the chief official position there from 1885 to 1895, being administrator, chief magistrate and president of the Land Commission for British Bechuanaland, and resident commissioner for the Bechuanaland Protectorate and the Kalahari. He was created K.C.M.G. in 1887. In 1896 he played an unofficial part in the negotiations between Sir Hercules Robinson and the Johannesburg reformers after the jameson Raid. He then returned to England, where he died on the 29th of March 1902.

SHIPPING. To the floating log and paddle of the primeval fisherman must doubtless be attributed the first beginning of the Early great industry of merchant shipping. The hollowing h, s, o,, y of a. log and the addition of a skin sail would before long serve to convert the embryo craft into a vessel navigable in the smooth and narrow waters which lapped the shores of the Mediterranean and the far distant East. The coastal villages had need of worked stone knives, of beads and of skins for winter coverings, to be obtained by barter for their fish and salt. Passing from settlement to settlement dotted on the shore, the traders found in the local skiffs a convenient alternative to the rough and tedious tracks along the winding or indented coast. In course of time they established themselves at the coastal settlements and built or purchased craft for their own use. As populations and their needs increased, the traders, gaining confidence by experience, built larger vessels and extended the area of their barter, sailing in companies, for mutual safety and defence. Of the early days of this traffic, as developed in the East, we have but little information, but in the Eastern seas, apparently, the Chinese usually came no farther than the coast of Malabar. The Malays seem in all ages to have traded with India and probably with the coast of Africa. In the Indian Ocean the Arabians were the principal carriers. Greatest of all the ancient navigators nearer to the West were the Phoenicians, the hardy sons of Tyre and Sidon. To the remarkable maritime ascendancy of Tyre Ezekiel xxvii. bears eloquent testimony. King Solomon's undertaking for the building of the temple was largely founded on the support of Phoenician Hiram. Much later, but still some 2000 years ago, ships had become a common means of transport and were of no small size, since the centurion charged with the conveyance of St Paul to Rome (Acts xxvii.) found at Myra an Alexandrian ship about to sail with wheat for Italy, which was able to take on board, besides the cargo, the whole of the company, making a total of 276 souls in all. Then, as now, ships were but links in a mighty chain of commerce on the land, a commerce for which the ports are the centres of collection and distribution. The products of India and Europe were conveyed from east and west in stages by inland or coastal routes with which in their entirety India and Europe alike were unacquainted (Vincent). And, generally, in the ancient days ocean commerce ceased with the summer season, and sea-borne goods from the distant east to the remote west found their way from entrepot to entrepot. These entrepots were great trading centres, the advantageous situation of London. for example, having before the days of the Roman conquest marked it out as a convenient emporium for the northern trade. The Phoenicians, especially, for centuries pushed their commerce farther and farther afield, establishing factories and trading ports which in time grew into independent settlements. Cadiz, the ancient Gadir, was one of such, and from Gadir or more northern settlements the Phoenicians visited Britain, bartering merchandise for tin at Cornwall or the Scilly Isles. Amongst the various nations of the south, between whom the great shipping heritage of the Phoenicians was in course of time divided, the Rhodians rose to great importance. By these notable traders was drawn up a code of maritime laws, many of which were embodied in the Roman law, and eventually, at or about the time of Richard I., became a foundation for the Law of Oleron, which is in some part adopted at this day. Emerging from the constant struggles in the Mediterranean and Adriatic, the Venetians, Genoese and Pisans attained to great prosperity and renown, the reputation of the Genoese as shipbuilders creating from time to time a demand for their ships on the part of the nations struggling for maritime supremacy in the channel and the North Sea. The once familiar English word “ argosy U dates from the appreciation of the vessels built at Arguze or Ragusa, a Dalmatian city on the Adriatic. The proximity of Italy to the Holy Land tended greatly to the prosperity of the Italian shipping. In very early days the commerce of northern Europe was principally carried on by inland routes. With the increase and civilization of the populations, the cities on the navigable rivers and on the sea found the advantage of ocean commerce, and strove for supremacy in trade. In Britain many an ancient seaboard town, from Bristol to far north Inverness, largely owing to the enterprise of the Flemish and the German merchants, became important as a trading centre. The English merchants were not without ships, but the foreign traders were enterprising and wealthy, and in their emulation for the renowned, English wool and for English hides were prepared to venture much. In those days and for several centuries later the history of shipping was a history of arbitrary restraints, of claims for exclusive rights of trading and navigation, and of pretexts of various kinds, resulting in captures and' burnings, in embargoes and confiscations in port and in fierce reprisals. The merchantman was a more or less armed vessel prepared alike for aggression or defence, a condition of affairs to which has probably to be attributed the occasional construction of vessels of a tonnage then remarkable. The ships of Spain and Portugal, of England and the Netherlands-of French shipping for a considerable period there was comparatively little-homeward bound from Indian ports and factories and from the New World's trading settlements from time to time were preyed on by one another. The Algerian and Barbary corsairs, with nothing to lose and everything to gain in merchandise and captives, were the dread of all who sailed the seas from Lisbon to Gibraltar-and indeed still farther north-and within the straits. The insurance of the voyagers against capture and the payment of head-money for their ransom was a well-established system of the times. In England, the Cinque ports, in consideration of valuable privileges, were specially engaged to hold vessels at the service of the state, but on need arising the ports at large were called upon for ships and men. These demands at times became oppressive. Thus we read that in 1371 it was complained in parliament A