When it first became known to the world that his Majesty Leopold II., King of the Belgians, had seriously determined to suppress the slave trade in Central Africa, the news provoked but little comment. “Is there any slave trade carried on in Central Africa?” people asked one another—for notwithstanding the wide dissemination of records of travel by Livingstone and Stanley, and the numerous reports from missionaries belonging to every religious sect, all affirming it, the great bulk of civilised mankind, too busy to regard them, rested content in the delusion that the iniquitous traffic was a thing of the past. This apathy, if apathy it may be called to be indifferent where the facts are not properly known, had to be fought and overcome by King Leopold, first among his own countrymen, and afterwards in the other countries of Europe and in America. By many the King’s enterprise was regarded as quixotic, impossible of achievement; some continued indifferent, and yet others commended the King warmly, and lent their moral support in furtherance of his scheme. The material support, however, which was proffered to amplify his Majesty’s own huge outlay came almost entirely from Belgians. On the whole, it was an uphill fight; but King Leopold won all along the line. As we have seen, his Majesty, by his wise initiative, patient labour, and lavish expenditure, first created the Congo State, and afterwards obtained from the great powers their recognition of the State so created, and of his own sovereignty of that State, accompanied by their hearty approval of what had from the first been King Leopold’s main object in the founding of the Congo State, viz., the suppression of slavery. [Sidenote: King Leopold’s Mandate.]