"Pray, grant me a patient hearing for a moment or two while I explain definitely to you your position here. The whole system of Egyptian extension up to the Albert Nyanza was wrong. In theory it was beautiful, and it was natural. What more natural than that the Government established at the mouth of a river should desire to extend its authority up along the banks to its source, and such a source as the Nile has. Unhappily, however, it was an Egyptian Government, which, however honest in its intentions, could only depend upon officials of the lowest moral quality and mental calibibre. It is true the chief official in these regions has been a Baker, or a Gordon, or an Emin, but all the subordinates were Egyptians or Turks. As you multiplied your stations and increased your posts, you lessened your own influence. While in the centre of your orbit there might be a semblance of government; the outer circles remained under the influences of Turkish and Egyptian officers of some Cairene Pasha, or Bey, or Effendi, whose conduct was licentious and capricious. By military force the country was taken and occupied, and by force the occupation has been maintained ever since. A recognized Government, even if it be that of Egypt, has a legal and moral right to extend its authority and enlarge its domain. If it executes its will effectively, so much the better. Civilization will be benefited, and all peoples are better under a constituted Government than under none. But was there an effective Government? As far as Lado and Gondokoro, near the White Nile Cataracts, it was tolerable I admit. Steamers could steam from Berber as far as Lado, and the chief official could superintend such sub-Governments as were established, but when, before making roads or preparing and ensuring the means of communication, the Egyptian Government approved the acts of expansion undertaken over the immense, trackless, inaccessible area of the extreme Soudan, it invited the catastrophe that happened. When Mohammed Achmet fired the combustible material that the extortionate subordinates had gathered, the means for extinguishing the flames were scattered over an area of about 500,000 square miles. The Governor-General was slain, his capital taken; one province after another fell; and their governors and soldiery, isolated and far apart, capitulated; and you, the last of these, only saved yourself and men by retreating from Lado. Expanded on the same system, and governed only by the presence of military, these former Egyptian acquisitions, if retaken would invite a similar fate. If the military occupation were effective, and each sub-Government cohered to the other, the collapse of the Government need not be feared; but it can never be effective under Egypt. Neither her revenues nor her population can afford it. In the absence of this, only self-interest of the peoples governed can link these distant territories to the Government of Egypt; and this