Until recently the political attitude of certain German statesmen toward the Belgian Congo has been to bring about a revision of the Berlin Act of 1885. In announcing a desire to form an international league, Consul Vohsen said that its object should be to induce the Powers party “to revise the Berlin Act and to force the Congo State to respect its provisions.” Europeans suggest that the gentleman probably means, by this contradiction in terms, that the real aim of England, Germany, and France, working in secret combination against the energetic little fellow with the biggest part of Central Africa, is to come to an understanding which will on the part of England realise the prophetic utterance of Mr. Cecil Rhodes[49] and the ambitions of Lord Cromer and Sir Reginald Wingate in the Cape to Cairo schemes; on the part of Germany, establish a new western frontier for German East Africa; and on the part of France, the final adoption of definite settlements in the Soudan and on the east and south banks of the Congo River. In short, the million square miles of immensely rich territory lying within the borders of the Congo Free State can, when rudely wrested from the heroic pioneers of little Belgium, be used by the three European Powers dominant in Africa to enlarge the gouty, the bilious, and the apoplectic tints of the African continent. That such views are abundant throughout Europe, and that the humanitarian pretext on the part of Congo enemies is regarded with derision, is all too evident from the columns of the leading continental journals. European editors have referred to the Congo debate in the British Parliament on May 20, 1903, as a “Parliamentary raid,” and likened it to the Jameson Raid in the Transvaal, which acted on the principle of violating first, negotiating afterwards, but in the end bringing the whole subject within the pale of dispute, speculation, and bargain.