116 National Geographic Magazine. 



of the Negro against the foreigner. In this they are aided by 

 the Mahdi. The work of the Mahdi is largely a missionary 

 enterprise. The dervishes who acconipany his army are religious 

 fanatics, and desire the overthrow of the Christians and Emin 

 Pacha as earnestly as the slave-trader. Religious fanaticism is 

 therefore united with the greed of the slave-trader to drive out 

 the Christians from the lake region. 



Aroused by these reports, and influenced by these views. 

 Cardinal Lavigerie, for twenty years Bishop of Algiers and now 

 Primate of Africa, last summer started a new crusade in Belgium 

 and Germany against slavery and the slave-trade. The cardinal 

 has organized societies, and is raising a large fund to equip two 

 armed steamships for Lake Tanganyika and Lake Nyassa, the 

 headquarters of the slave-trade, and offers, if necessary, to head 

 the band himself. The Pope has engaged in the work, has con- 

 tributed liberally to this fund, and sent three hundred Catholic 

 missionaries to Central Africa. The slave-trade is carried on 

 with arms and ammunition furnished by European traders. 

 Without these arms, the slave-trade could not be successfully 

 carried on, for the Negroes could defend themselves against 

 slave-traders armed like- themselves. While the demand for 

 slaves continues, the slave-trade will exist, and will not cease 

 until the factories of European nations are planted in the interior 

 of Africa. 



Mineral Wealth of Africa. 



We are told in Phillips's " Ore Deposits " that the precious 

 metals do not appear to be very generally distributed in Africa. 

 More thorough research may show that this view is incorrect, 

 and that there are large deposits of iron, copper, gold, and other 

 metals in many parts of the continent. Gold is found on the 

 Gold Coast, in the Transvaal, in the Sudan, and in Central 

 Africa, but is only worked in surface diggings, excepting in the 

 Transvaal ; but near all these washings, gold nuggets of large 

 size, and the quartz rock, have been discovered. In Transvaal 

 the mines were worked a long time ago, probably by the Portu- 

 guese, then abandoned and forgotten. Recently they have been 

 rediscovered, and worked by the English. In the Kaap gold- 

 field in the Transvaal, three years ago, the lion and zebra, ele- 

 phant and tiger, roamed undisturbed in the mountain solitudes, 

 where there is now a population of 8,000, with 80 gold-mining 



