CHAPTER VL 
AFRICA~A SKETCH. 1, 
CiviivizATiON Taken Root—Parceled Out Among Many 
European Countries—General Characteristics—The 
River Nile. 
A ERICA is one of the three great divisions of the Old World, 
^ and the second in extent of the five principal continents of the 
globe forms a vast peninsula joined to Asia by the Isthmus of Suez. 
It is of a compact form, with few important projections or 
indentations. 
The continent extends from 37 degrees north latitude, to 35 
degrees south latitude, and the extreme points. Cape Blanco and 
Cape Agulhas, are nearly 5,000 miles apart. From west to east, 
between Cape Verde, longitude 18 degrees west, and Cape Guarda- 
fui, longitude 51 degrees east, the distance is about 4,600 miles. 
The area is estimated at 11,508,793 square miles, or more than three 
times that of Europe. The islands belonging to Africa are few; 
they include Madagascar, Madeira, the Canaries, Cape Verde 
Island, Fernando Po, Prince’s Island, St. Thomas, Ascension, St. 
Plelena, Mauritius, Bourbon, the Comoros and Cocotra. 
The desperate struggle among the European powers for 
colonial possessions in Africa is of comparatively recent origin. 
While the earliest explorations began in 1553, when a body of 
British merchants sent out in search of trade a few vessels to 
Guinea, there was no thought of anything more than an effort to 
find a new market for English productions. 
It was more than forty years later, in 1595, that the Dutch 
followed the English merchants in the attempt to establish a trading- 
station on the coast of Guinea. About the same time that the British 
traders began the exploration of the Guinea coast the French set 
out on the same errand and located at what is now known as French 
