Mr. Stanley's discoveries, and the enterprise of the "Committee for the Study of the Upper Congo"--which was the real name of the company under which he was sent out--soon attracted universal attention, and that, too, of a most practical kind. It became evident that the Congo Valley must have a fixed and potent government. King Leopold did not desire to assume the sole responsibility, nor, indeed, would the other European powers have agreed to his transform so large a slice of the African continent into a Belgian colony. Accordingly, an international conference was summoned to meet at Berlin, and the result of its deliberations was the erection of the entire valley into a potentially independent commonwealth, called the Congo Free State. On February 25th, 1885, treaty was signed by the representatives of the United States and the chief European powers. A Constitution and Government were provided for the new state, with King Leopold at its head, under the protection of the treaty-signing powers. Thenceforward civilization made rapid progress. The state was admitted to the International Postal Union, and post-offices were opened at Banana, Boma, Vivi, and elsewhere. Courts, schools, etc., were also established. A railroad has been constructed over the route of Mr. Stanley's roads around the cataracts, connecting with the steamer routes, and making an unbroken line of steam transportation from Stanley Falls to the Atlantic Ocean. The entire area of the Congo basin is estimated by Mr. Stanley at one million five hundred and eight thousand square miles. Some of it is claimed by France, some by Portugal, and some is yet unapportioned. But the overwhelming bulk, one million sixty-five thousand and two hundred square miles, belongs to the Congo Free State. It has not all yet been surveyed, of course, but its character is pretty well known. It has vast forests, extensive and fertile plains, and unsurpassed systems of lakes and rivers. Its lakes cover thirty-one thousand seven hundred square miles; among them being Lakes Leopold II., Muta Nzige, Tanganyika, Bangweola, and Mweru. The Congo, of course, is the principal river. It is one of the five or six longest streams in the world, and in point of volume surpasses all but the Amazon. Unlike the Amazon, Mississippi, Nile, Ganges, Volga, and, indeed, almost all other great rivers, the Congo has no delta. It discharges itself by a single unbroken estuary seven miles and a half broad, in many places over two hundred fathoms deep, and with a current of from five to seven knots an hour. The volume of water brought down has been variously estimated; the lowest estimate being two million cubic feet per second. The Mississippi, when at the height of its March flood, has an outflow of one million one hundred and fifty thousand cubic feet per second; so that its volume must be very greatly exceeded by that of the Congo.