114 
MADAGASCAR 
possession of land under long leases. Liberty of religious 
worship was to be recognized; in addition the Hova 
government had to pay ten millions of francs to satisfy 
the civil claims, and to cede the Bay of Diego Suarez to 
the French. A garrison was to remain in Tamatave till 
the payment of the debt. 
It was a delusive peace and did not last ten years. 
In the spring of 1886 Le Myre de Vilers took up his 
position as Resident-General, but the Hova government 
was in no hurry to carry out the terms of the treaty, 
and it was only when he threatened to take his depart¬ 
ure that the Ministry of Madagascar gave way. On that 
occasion I enjoyed the curious spectacle of seeing the 
Hova generals and colonels arrive in their fantastic 
uniforms in order to set about the delimitation of Diego 
Suarez, which they did only reluctantly. New differences 
soon arose; the Queen was not willing to confine her¬ 
self to the conduct of internal affairs, attempts on French 
subjects became more • frequent. It was asserted that 
even a nephew of the Queen had taken part in these. 
The situation of the French residents was becoming 
more and more alarming^. 
The French government sent Le Myre de Vilers to 
Madagascar in order to make an impartial investigation 
into these occurrences and to obtain the strict carrying 
out of the treaty of 1885. He was also to insist that 
no concession of lands or trade privileges should be made 
over the head of the Resident-General. The Hova 
Government answered these demands with arrogant, and 
to some extent ridiculous, counter-claims, thus showing no 
desire to reform its conduct. Le Myre de Vilers drew 
up an Ultimatum, but received no answer and set off 
for the east coast on the 26th of October, 1894. There 
he received a reply, sent after him by the Queen, that 
the French conditions were refused. 
After experiments had been made in Madagascar for 
