INTRIGUES. 



473 



dow; and Lieut. -Colonel Hamerton declared that 

 unless more discretion in spreading evil reports 

 were shown he would withdraw British protec- 

 tion from another well-known firm. The son of a 

 Hamburg merchant had written to his father for 

 leave to supply us with sums to be recovered from 

 the Royal Geographical Society. When informed 

 of this peculiar kindness I inquired the object, 

 and the answer was that, intending himself to 

 visit India, he wished to prepare his father for 

 the expense of travel in the East. Certainly 

 knowing all these intrigues, I see no reason why 

 they should not be published. 



The Arabs were as much alarmed at the 

 prospect of opening up the African interior as 

 were the foreign merchants; they knew that 

 Europeans had long coveted a settlement upon 

 the sea-board, and they had no wish to lose the 

 monopoly of the copal coast and the ivory-lands. 

 Nothing indeed would be easier, I repeat, for a 

 European power than to establish itself upon the 

 mainland; and if it followed the wise example 

 of the early Portuguese, who limited their pos- 

 sessions to the principal ports and to the great 

 centres of trade, it would soon monopolize an 

 enriching traffic. With respect to copal, and to 

 the articles most in demand, our commercial 



