On the 24th May the goal of our expedition was reached, and the object of our mission attained a very few days after. No time was then lost in proceeding to Gandu, where similar success met our efforts; and then with treaties written in Arabic, sealed with the seals of the two Sultans, and signed by their respective wazirs, practically placing their two empires under a British Protectorate, and giving all commercial privileges to the National African Company, we commenced, with no small elation, our return home. The one unpleasant occurrence which marked our journey coastwards was the stealing of my journals and personal effects, though happily the precious treaties remained safe. Rabba was duly reached, and thence we continued our way down the river in canoes to Lokoja. On the way the German expedition, which had meanwhile been set afoot with a view to forestalling other nations in the regions we had just quitted, was met moving up the river, all unconscious of the fact that not a yard of ground from Timbuktu to Akassa, or from Bornu to Yoruba, had been left on which to plant the flag of the Fatherland. Within seven months after leaving Liverpool I was back home again, my work successfully accomplished in a much shorter time than at the outset I had dared to hope. Next year our Government, now awake to the errors of the past, and recognising the incontestable claims and magnificent patriotic enterprise of the National African Company, granted it a Royal Charter, and the right to the title of Royal Niger Company, which it now bears. The Right Honourable Lord Aberdare was its first Governor, and Sir George Goldie--to whose diplomatic genius and untiring industry this country as well as the Company owes so much--was the Deputy-Chairman. Around these gathered as counsellors and advisers many who had been among the pioneers of British trade and influence on the Niger, and had assisted in preparing the way for the magnificent national undertaking they have lived to see inaugurated. Among these are the Messrs. Miller, Mr. Edgar, and Mr. Croft, whose names cannot but find an honourable place in the annals of the Company. Of the career, bright with promise, upon which the Company has thus entered, it is unnecessary to speak at length. Already good results are flowing from the new administration. The gin traffic has been taken in hand, suppressed where possible, and restricted elsewhere by enormous duties. Arms and gunpowder are also no longer sold wholesale to the savage natives. The resources of the country are being tested and developed as they never were before, and with the most gratifying results. [Illustration: HAUSSA VILLAGE.]