British East Africa are far behind the Congo Free State. Not more than a third of Uganda is opened up to administrative control. I once spent ten months in Uganda, and visited every station in it, walking 2300 miles and returning down the Nile. The Belgians have got stations everywhere in the Congo practically, and most of the natives, except in one or two areas, are entirely under control. The Uganda native is a fat, lazy chap, who will do no work. There is no industry in Uganda. The Belgians pay the Congo natives for their labour. They realise that the native is a valuable asset in the country, and treat him accordingly. It is surely obvious that it is not to the interest of the Congo administrators to maim the native. All the mutilations and cruelties which have been spoken of took place in the early days of the opening-up process to which the country has been subjected and before the railway was constructed. The men who have been guilty of the atrocities have not been Belgians in all cases. In many instances they have been Italians who have been appointed to the smaller outlying posts, the better and higher positions being kept for Belgians. These Italians and other foreigners who have been given the charge of outlying stations have in some cases perpetrated cruelties in times gone by. These men were not accustomed to exercise power, and this led them to ill-use the natives. That is how the atrocities such as these were originated. But that has all gone now; they are all cleared out. I have seen nineteen such men, chiefly Italians, in prison at Boma on charges of cruelty, which proves that the Belgians are doing their best to put a stop to the kind of thing complained of. The agitation that is now going on about atrocities is exaggerated out of all proportion to the amount of the atrocities that happened at any time. The Belgians are doing everything they can to supersede the men who have acted improperly in the past; they have appointed inspectors for different districts, and they have allowed inspectors appointed by the Italian Government and the Scandinavian Government to go out into the Congo for the purpose of keeping an eye on those of their own nationality in positions of responsibility and control in the Congo Free State. Things in the Congo now are very different to what they were even two or three years ago. The King of the Belgians has sent out Baron Dhanis—who had more to do with opening up the Congo in the early days than anybody else—to reorganise the whole military system of the Congo Free State. There are to be two or three large military centres in the Congo, and the soldiers will be much more highly trained and be more under control. Hitherto the small posts have recruited men from the surrounding villages, and given them a bit of uniform and a rifle, and they have gone about, supposed to be doing their