94 A COLONY IN THE MAKING chap. 



the shore of Lake Victoria Nyanza is at least as suit- 

 able for plantation land as any on the coast. More- 

 over, even if it were possible to separate entirely 

 plantation land and agricultural land, it is hardly 

 possible to find an area on the Highlands as small 

 even as 100,000 acres in which the land is of so 

 similar a character that the same legal conditions can 

 be tortured into applying to the whole block. 



It is undoubtedly this extraordinary diversity of 

 land that proved in the past the great stumbling block 

 to a satisfactory and uniform code of land laws ; and no 

 one can deny the very great difficulty the problem 

 presented. At the same time, even when every allow- 

 ance is made, it is to be feared that no unprejudiced 

 person can deny that, until the appointment of the 

 present land officer, the land laws were both conceived 

 and administered in such a way as to delay very seriously 

 the advance of the Protectorate. The reason of this 

 faulty administration in the past is not far to seek. 

 The officers in charge of the land department were not 

 selected for their knowledge of either land conditions 

 or even of agriculture in its simplest forms, but for 

 proved ability in some other sphere. The heads of 

 the Land Office were in a word absolutely ignorant of 

 what they were expected to do or how to do it. This 

 ignorance caused the deepest suspicion of every 

 candidate who applied for land. He was at once 

 looked on as a criminal in disguise, and the crime 

 of which he was suspected was a desire to make money ! 

 It may not receive credence but many will bear me 

 out that some five or six years ago or even later 

 the suspicion that an applicant had the audacity 

 to hope to make his holding pay would have 

 very seriously prejudiced his chance of obtaining the 



