revenue was 149,550 dollars against an expenditure of 142,831 dollars. The Presidential message for 1866 alludes, with just pride, to the foundation of the Liberian College, and lays down a plan for national education. There can be no doubt that this well-ordered and well-governed community will play a great part in the civilisation of Africa. The present state of matters in America will lead to a considerable accession of strength, 600 emigrants having been despatched in the course of 1866, and 942 in 1867. The American Colonization Society, which founded the settlement in 1820, now regularly employ a vessel in the conveyance of emigrants. The settlers have already been able to repel all attacks from the natives, and as they gain strength, will become aggressive, and extend their influence inward.'

"1

Dr. Horton's account is less satisfactory. He observes"For the last twenty years, the people of Liberia have enjoyed an independent political existence. Experiments have been assiduously made in the various branches of the political affairs of the nation, and at present the Constitution, as it now stands, is found to be lamentably deficient in many points of vital importance to the State; and however sacred and venerable the document may be, the national existence and prosperity demand that it should receive a thorough revision."2

And again" First appearance aids considerably in our diagnosis of the character of a person, place, or thing. The entrance to Monrovia, the capital of the Liberian Republic, reminds one of the entrance to a purely native town, where the light of civilisation has never reached; and it gives to a casual observer the idea of a want of a firm government, a want of revenue, a want of developmental power, and the existence of great inertia in the municipal authority of Mon

1 Paper on Trade with the Coloured Races of Africa. By Archibald Hamilton, Esq., in the Journal of the Statistical Society of London, March 1868, page 28.

2 West African Countries and Peoples, and a Vindication of the African Race. By James Africanus B. Horton. London, 1868.

H

rovia. At the very entrance of the town, as one jumps out of his boat, he first meets with a number of cane fishing-huts, occupied by an almost naked crowd of kroomen and women; the children wretchedly tattooed, squatting about in perfect nudity."

MOROCCO.-Sailing slowly to the north, we make a step up in the scale of civilisation, and pass from savagery to barbarism as we enter the Empire of Morocco, which fills up the whole north-west corner of Africa and extends over some 230,000 square miles, is, that is to say, about seven times the size of Scotland. Morocco is thinly peopled, but the real amount of the population is not accurately known, the estimates of the best authorities differing very widely.

The government is a despotism with all the worst features of Oriental rule. An intelligent merchant, largely engaged in trade with the Empire, wrote to me lately that there has been considerable improvement in the management of financial and fiscal arrangements since the Spanish indemnity and the negotiation of a loan in England necessitated the appointment of Spanish and British officials to watch over the customs revenues.

Our knowledge of the country is not very great, although some of the principal towns have been frequently described, as by Lemprière in 1791, by Callié in 1830, and by Sir Arthur Brooke in 1831. For more recent information we may go to Sir J. Drummond Hay's light and sparkling little book, or to the sketch by M. Xavier Durrieu in Longman's Travellers' Library. Both these belong, however, to the period before the Spanish War of 1860, and since that war I am not aware of any account of Morocco having been published, unless it be Rohlf's Travels, printed in Petermann's Mittheilungen, which, however, I have not seen, and the reports of our own consular officials. These are stationed at Mogador, Saffee, Mazagan, Dar-el-Baida, Rabat, Arzila, and Laraiche on the Atlantic, at Tangier on the straits, and Tetuan on the Mediterranean, the

second last of these places being much the most important, and the seat of our minister-resident. The last accounts which lie before me, and refer to the year 1867, are the reverse of satisfactory. Mr. Consul White writes from Tangier under date May 23d, 1868 :—

"From what has been stated in the present report, it follows that, so far as concerns the empire of Morocco, the year 1867 was marked by much internal distress, consequent upon a bad harvest, by a very considerable falling off in its export trade, and by a slight decrease in its imports. To these facts must also be added a troubled and disorganized condition of the country, caused by the supineness and apathy of its rulers, combined with great corruption and rapacity. It can hardly be expected that trade and commerce will prosper under conditions so adverse to their growth. Morocco possesses many great natural advantages, an admirable geographical position, a hardy, patient, and industrious population, a climate healthy and temperate, plains and valleys of great extent, and a soil of extreme fertility; but a just and enlightened government to encourage industry and foster commerce is wanting. When the rulers of the country shall be possessed of intelligence and energy, and guided by a spirit of justice, and shall evince some appreciation of the benefits of civilisation, Morocco may be expected to take a higher place among commercial nations, but until then its capabilities will continue to be disturbed, industry will languish, and trade and commerce be paralysed.'

From Laraiche we hear of apprehensions of a famine from the drought. From Mazagan come tidings of a great decrease both in imports and exports, and from Mogador, of swarms of locusts, which have devoured the leaves and buds of the olivetrees, as well as of a local insurrection, which the Government has punished by cutting down the almond-trees. From Rabat, close to Salee of piratical memory, we hear of the bar at the

1 Morocco and the Moors. London: Murray.

the Slave-Trade Reports, laid before Parliament this year, it will beseen that certain Englishmen at Zanzibar own slaves to a very large extent, an altogether anomalous state of things, the glaring impropriety of which is commented on in the actingconsul's report, and which contrasts strangely with the efforts which are being made by our cruisers in those seas to put down the slave-trade. Very copious details of their operations undertaken for this purpose are to be found in Class A of the SlaveTrade Reports.

MADAGASCAR.-Pursuing our voyage, we reach Madagascar, where we have a consul, who seems from the SlaveTrade Reports to have recently had some trouble about the attempt to get up a trade in involuntary passengers between the port of Tamatave and the French colony of Réunion.

The beautiful island of Madagascar, larger than the United Kingdom, fertile and inhabited by an intelligent people, will in all probability become in the future of considerable commercial importance. Hitherto its chief interest for us has arisen from the strange fate of the Christian converts during the reign of the ferocious Queen Ranavalo, of which you will find a sketch in the Edinburgh Review for October 1867. Queen Ranavalo died in 1861, and was succeeded by her son Radama II., whose policy towards the Christians was entirely different, but whose amiable character was crossed by a vein of weakness, if not of madness, and who, after a reign of a single twelvemonth, was succeeded by his queen, Rasoherina, who was likewise tolerant of her Christian subjects. She died this spring, and has been succeeded by her cousin, also a woman. I have seen statements in the newspapers to the effect that the policy of the new sovereign is even more friendly to the Christians than that of her predecessor, but I do not know whether they are made on any sufficient authority.

WEST COAST OF AFRICA.-Giving, before we turn

from Eastern Africa, one thought to Livingstone, who bears, I believe, a consul's commission, and is, I trust, still pursuing his explorations in safety, we double the Cape of Storms, and sail northward past the Portuguese colony of St. Paul de Loanda, where we have an establishment for the suppression of the slave-trade, to the Spanish island Fernando Po, the residence of the consul who looks after our interests on the coasts of the Bight of Biafra. Pushing on, we pass the embouchure of the Niger, which also forms part of a consular district; and still holding on, we pass Monrovia, the capital of Liberia, and our own colony of Sierra Leone, at which last place we have another establishment for the suppression of the slave-trade.

Happily, from all this West African coast, the news of the decay of that hateful traffic is becoming more and more positive. Legitimate trade is springing up. The barracoons and signalstations are going to ruin, and if once the Cuban slave-trade were finally put an end to—as it bade fair soon to be even before the outburst of the Spanish revolution, we may hope to get rid of most of our African squadron, and of many of our responsibilities and expenses in this part of the world.

Our colonial connexion with Western Africa is so important, that any discussion of our policy there would seem to belong rather to a lecture on our colonial, than on our foreign relations; but I wish, before I leave that district, to call your attention to a curious book just published by Dr. Africanus. Horton, a native of Sierra Leone, which is full of information and speculation upon the politics of all these countries.

The select Committee which sat on West Africa in 1865, resolved, inter alia,—

1. "That it is not possible to withdraw the British government wholly or immediately from any settlements or engagements on the West African coast.

3. "That all further extension of territory or assumption of government, or new treaties offering any protection to the native tribes, would be inexpedient, and that the ob