WEST AFRICA. 



787 



pany, ousting them, developed its political plans 

 in this region, the French, who had sent out ex- 

 peditions from Senegal in 1860 and 1878, and 

 maintained a military force there from 1880, en- 

 tered upon a vigorous course of military expan- 

 sion in the bend of the Niger, setting out from the 

 colony of Senegambia, and also behind their pos- 

 sessions on the Slave Coast and the Ivory Coast. 

 Long years of costly warfare resulted in the con- 

 quest of Dahomey and the overthrow of Ahma- 

 dou, Samory, and other military chieftains who 

 opposed their progress to Timbuktu and Lake 

 Chad. An agreement with Germany permitted 

 the French to expand in the direction of Lake 

 Chad from the French Congo. The Anglo-French 

 agreement of 1890 recognized as within the French 

 sphere all the region north of a line drawn from 

 Say, on the middle Niger, to Barua, on Lake Chad. 

 The Anglo-French agreement of 1898 gives to 

 France a free hand in the countries of the Soudan 

 east of Lake Chad, and confirms France in the 

 possession of a Hinterland joining French Guinea 

 and the Slave Coast to the French Soudan and 

 Senegambia and these to the French Congo in the 

 south and to Algeria and Tunis in the north, but 

 it shuts France out from political possessions on 

 the maritime Niger, though not from commercial 

 access to it, for Great Britain agreed to lease to 

 France for purposes of commerce a piece of 

 ground on the right bank of the Niger between its 

 confluence with the Moussa and Lealaba, and 

 another on one of the mouths of the Niger, the 

 leases to run thirty years, within which time Brit- 

 ish and French shall have the same treatment as 

 regards person and merchandise in matters of 

 river navigation, commerce, tariffs, and taxes of 

 every description. Capt. Lenfant in the spring of 

 1901 proceeded to the lower Niger to take pos- 

 session of the two enclaves, each of about 200 

 acres, the location of which was settled in the 

 summer of 1900 by Col. Lugard and Major Toutee. 

 One is between Liaba and the river Moussa and 

 the other in the delta of the Niger. 



The Governor-General of French West Africa 

 and Governor of Senegal is N. E. Ball ay. 



The colony of Senegal proper has an area of 

 80,000 square miles, with 1,180,000 inhabitants. 

 St. Louis, the seat of administration, has 20,000 

 inhabitants; Dakar, 12,000; Rufisque, 8,000. 

 About 80,000 of the population of the old colony 

 and all those of the annexed region of the western 

 Soudan are ruled by their own chiefs. The an- 

 nexed region, added to Senegal in January, 1900, 

 extends 900 miles into the interior, having an 

 area of 120,000 square miles and a population of 

 2,020,000. The military force in 1900 was 2,600 

 men, of whom 1,180 were natives. The French 

 Government expended 1,154,960 francs in the new 

 territory in 1901. The original colony in 1900 

 paid its way, raising a revenue of 4,454,611 francs. 

 Millet, rice, corn, and plantains are grown by the 

 natives, and earthnuts, gums, rubber, coconuts, 

 cola, castor-beans, and gums are exported. All 

 the imports, valued at 52,425,000 francs in 1899, 

 came from France, and of the exports, 23,725,000 

 francs in value, three-fourths went to France. 

 There have long been in existence 163 miles of 

 railroad connecting Dakar, St. Louis, and Ru- 

 fisque, and 83 miles from Kayes, the head of navi- 

 gation on the Senegal, to Bafulabe, to be extended 

 to Bammuko, on the Niger. The line was com- 

 pleted as far as Badugu, nearly half the dis- 

 tance of 350 miles between the rivers, in the 

 summer of 1901. The people of Senegal are 

 represented by a Deputy in the French Cham- 

 ber. There are schools in the towns with 67 

 teachers and 1,986 pupils. The making of cloth, 



pottery, and jewelry arc native- industries. There 

 are about 90,000 cattle, 50,000 sheep, 40,000 goats, 

 and 3,000 camels. Gold is found in places, and 

 also silver, copper, and mercury. 



The present .boundaries of Senegal extend oast- 

 ward to Lake Debu in the bend of the Niger. 

 Beyond that are the military territories and 

 Mauritanian protectorates, einl>rrin'_f all the re- 

 gions south of the Algerian Sahara and north of 

 the Ivory Coast, the British Gold Coa-,t, German 

 Togoland, Dahomey, and British Nigeria. French 

 military power has penetrated to the shores of 

 Lake Chad, beyond which the French sphere, ac- 

 cording to the Anglo-French agreement of June 

 14, 1898, includes the semicivilized states of the 

 middle Soudan and the Libyan desert, ending at 

 the confines of Egypt and the Egyptian Soudan. 

 The expenditure of France in the military ter- 

 ritories in 1901 was 13,650,446 francs. The military 

 force was 8,400 men, of whom 4,760 were natives. 

 Gum and rubber are exported from the bend of the 

 Niger, and the people cultivate millet, rice, wheat, 

 and earthnuts. The chief town is Timbuktu, the 

 ancient center of the caravan trade, which has at 

 present about 12,000 inhabitants. In the Shari 

 region a regular military administration has been 

 established, and the population, consisting of the 

 pagan Banda, Mandsha, and Sara tribes, enjoys 

 security of life and property such as has never be- 

 fore been known. They have always been the 

 prey of the slave-hunting and predatory raids of 

 their Mohammedan neighbors, especially from 

 Bagirmi. The French have not yet introduced 

 the hut tax or the tithes collected in the terri- 

 tories of the French Congo. The Bandas have 

 good military qualities and will furnish recruits 

 for the French colonial forces. The country is 

 productive, although the people stand low in the 

 scale of civilization. Cotton, rubber, and ivory 

 are the chief products. Since the overthrow of 

 Rabah in the spring of 1900 the western half of 

 his empire of Bornu has accepted French military 

 rule with content. The people of Bornu are the 

 most civilized, though the least warlike, of the 

 races of the central Soudan. Their former feudal 

 system was upset and destroyed by Rabah, and 

 he devastated and ruined the country so thor- 

 oughly that many years of peaceful development 

 are necessary for its renovation. The French rec- 

 ognized as Sultan of Bornu after the death of 

 Rabah a descendant of the old reigning family 

 named Ahmasinda. Bornu is not in the French 

 sphere as defined in the Anglo-French agreement 

 of 1898. In the agreement of 1890 Socoto and 

 Bornu were expressly acknowledged to be Eng- 

 lish on the ground of treaties which the British 

 Niger Company pretended to have with their 

 rulers. In the agreement of 1898 the line from 

 Say to Barua dividing the French from the Eng- 

 lish sphere was changed for a line starting on the 

 Niger at the Dallul Mauri watercourse, which is 

 100 miles below Say. This it follows up to a 

 point 100 miles from the city of Socoto. It circles, 

 on that radius till it strikes the parallel of 14 a 

 to the east of Socoto, and follows that to Lake- 

 Chad, with a large indentation to the southward 

 which is 250 miles long and 40 or 50 miles bi*oad r 

 so as to include in the French sphere the town 

 and district of Zinder. West of the Niger the 

 frontier between the British and French spheres 

 was delimited by Col. Lang and Commandant 

 Toutee. Starting at the intersection of the Ok- 

 para river by the parallel 9 of north latitude, at 

 the boundary between Dahomey and Lagos, it 

 runs northerly, with an eastern deflection so as 

 to leave Nikki and other districts to France, and 

 strikes the Niger 10 miles above Gere, the port 



