438 
APPENDIX. 
Your Lordship will observe that we do not now, for the first 
time, urge the necessity of acquiring sovereignty. In the 
observations of Sir Fowell Buxton, addressed to the Marquis of 
Normanby, and in the Right Honourable Stephen Lushington’s 
letter to his Lordship, 31st July, 183.9, the same doctrine is 
maintained, and British sovereignty is represented as the most 
effectual instrument for accomplishing the great purposes of the 
Government ; and the only difference is, that we now propose 
that British power should be confined within much narrower 
limits than those which were formerly suggested by us. Our 
opinions are unaltered that the acceptance of voluntary offers of 
sovereignty extending over whole kingdoms will be found the 
greatest boon which we can confer upon Africa, and the surest as 
well as the speediest mode of effecting the eradication of the 
Slave 7Vade. As, however, it is considered premature, at all 
events before the return of the Expedition, to resolve on any very 
important and decided mode of proceeding, we very reluctantly, 
and with a clear sense of the delay which it will occasion, and of 
the impediments not now existing which may arise, forbear to 
press upon your Lordship tlie immediate acceptance of any such 
offer, should it be made. 
We hope, however, no objection will be entertained to the 
Commissioners becoming the bearers of conditional proposals of 
this nature, subject to the approval or rejection of the British 
Government, in order that they may be considered under the 
light which the Expedition is expected to throw upon the state 
of Africa. The objections which are supposed to exist to the 
acquisition of sovereignty upon a large scale, do not, we con- 
ceive, apply to the voluntary cession, on the part of African 
Chiefs, of portions of Territory comparatively small. Our 
proposal is then, that the Commissioners be instructed to 
purchase on the part of the Government,, the sovereignty of a 
territory not exceeding one hundred miles square, bounded as far 
as may be by natural objects, commencing beyond the limits of 
the Delta, and running into the interior in the direction of the 
Niger, so as to keep the river well in the centre. The Agent of 
the Agricultural Society will also be instructed to purchase for 
the Company, in fee simple, the most eligible spot to be found 
