Those, however, who expected too much from the treaty were greatly disappointed when, a few months later, reports reached England that the slave trade was as flourishing as ever. No suspicion was entertained of the sincerity of the Zanzibar prince, for upon every occasion involving the punishment of the slavers he proved his honesty by permitting the law, without protest, to be applied. The objects of the treaty were being, however, evaded by the enterprising Arabs on the mainland, who marched their caravans northward along the coast to points whence at favorable opportunities they could ship their captives to ports in southern Arabia or in the Egyptian protectorate. To counteract these new proceedings of the Arabs, another large meeting was convened at Stafford House in May, 1874, for the consideration of other means of suppression of the trade. I suggested at that meeting that commissioners should be appointed at various ports along the coast whose duty it would be to keep a record of the number of persons attached to all caravans bound for the interior, as well as of the material of their equipment; that each caravan leader, before receiving permission to set out, should be compelled to bind himself not to engage in the slave trade, and that such leader on returning to the coast should, upon being convicted of having evaded or broken his obligations, forfeit his bond and be fined $5000; that each captain of a slave-vessel, upon conviction that he was engaged in the transport of slaves, should receive capital punishment; that trading depots should be established on Lakes Nyassa and Tanganika to encourage legitimate commerce in the natural products of the interior; and that the lake coasts should be patrolled by flotillas of steam-launches. The above were the main features of a plan which I still believe would have been adequate in meeting the wishes of the principal speakers in that assembly. Those who know what has since been done by the imperial German government along that same coast and on the lakes will perceive how closely the suggestions are paralleled to-day by the actions of the German commissioners and the trading depots on the lakes belonging to the African Lakes Company. No caravan is permitted to leave without search; gunpowder and arms are confiscated; slave-traders are tried, and hanged after conviction (the chief judge on the German coast lately sentenced seventeen Arabs to be hanged at Lindi). The trading depots of the African Lakes Company are pre-eminently successful in subserving the antislavery cause by suppressing the odious trade in slaves. Had the British done then what is being done now, no other power could have usurped her rights in the immense territory lately abandoned to the Germans.