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STANLEY AS BALAAM.

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STANLEY AS BALAAM. The generous and manly way in which directly Stanley read Lord Salisbury's agree- ment with Germany, he acknowledged that he had wrongfully accused him of neglecting England's interests in Africa, was just what we should have expected of a great man, and we feel proud of our country man. It was natural, however, that the greatest of liviug Welshmen, who had come direct from that Continent, who knows the country as well as his own, and who has had personal ex- periences of German ambition, should be anxious to secure to ourselves and our descendants the possession of that magnificent land which the British African Company first began to colonize and to christianize. There is little doubt that by speaking out so plainly in the great cities of Edinburgh, Dundee, Aberdeen, Glasgow and Newcastle, which have been lately vieing with each other to do him honour, he has strengthened Lord Salisbury's hands in his very difficult negotiations with Germany. The Germans have of late years developed the strongest wishes to found great colonies like our own, and as Mr Stanley explained to his audience at Manchester last week, from clearing a few acres to plant tobacco in, they had gradually crept over the whole of East Africa till they had absorbed 600,000 square miles, and this was a small portion of what they had intended eventually to take, if the Government of this country had allowed it." If the Germans had selected a part of Africa where they would not have come in contact with us, there would have been no reason to interfere; but Major Wissmann, who was at the head of the German Colony there, claimed large tracts of country where British commerce had extended, and Mr Stanley actually found that lie bad issued an order that no more caravans would be permitted to go into the interior of Africa under the English flag, and that the trade routes to the British would be closed. The Germans also claimed Zanzibar, that large island where eight thousand Englishmen 6 ZD are already engaged in commerce, and which y Z5 is so justly looked upon as the key to Africa, that Major Wissmann (who has just returned to Germany from the East), on hearing it has now been surrendered to England, declares it is the death blow to German hopes in Africa, and that now it might as well be handed over to the English altogether. We can see from Z5 the above sketch the terrible possibilities tnere were of a quarrel between England and Germany through their respective Colonists, and almost shudder to think of what a war between the two would mean. Still, on the other hand, no patriotic Government could think of giving up a fertile land, almost un- inhabited, and large enough to support the whole of our population in comfort. Lord Salisbury has done many things for his country, which will be remembered when history is written, but we venture to say that no achievement of his will be considered happier than the document which converts two nations, who were getting more and more suspicious and irritable towards each other, into firm friends and instead of the 150,000 square miles claimed by the British African Company, and which it was feared would be surrendered, gains 500,000 more, with a possible million in addition, and clearly de- fined boundaries. The price to be paid for these untold advantages was most happily thought of. Enough land was left in Africa for Germany to found a magnificent Colony without trenching on English rights; while in Europe, the tiny island of Heligoland, peopled by inhabitants who speak the German tongue, is ceded to her. Heligoland is three hundred acres in extent, half as large as Dynevor Park, with flocks to the extent of thirty sheep and eight cows It is inhabited by 2,000 people, chiefly fishermen, and is a favourite German bathing place. It has no harbour, and its waters t5 are too shallow for men of war. But its value to the Germans is that of sentiment. It stands in the mouths of their great rivers, the Elbe and Weser, and they say that from their coasts they can see the waving of the Union Jack. It wounds their feelings to see the flag of a foreign power within sight of their coasts, and we can understand what it would be to us if we saw a foreign standard planted on the Isle of Dogs in the Thames. There are not half a dozen English on Heligoland, and we pay a Governor L800 a year. It has no senti- mental value to us, for we simply took it from the Danes in 1807, as a punishment for their meditated treachery to our fleets, and is of no use to us as a military position. But the Germans have always coveted it, it is their Pearl of the Sea," and the feeling of satisfaction and gratitude at its acquisition is profound though out Germany. We have, indeed, made friends with her for this generation, and one of the most harassing1 and perplexing disputes with a nation, who are more like ourselves than any other European power, has been settled for our time. The French who had been gloating over our increasing disagreements are terribly chagrined, but all those who wish us well look upon our renovated friendship as the best pledge for the peace of Europe. Nothing could be more hearty and genuine than the way in which Mr Stanley acknowledges the great things Lord Salisbury has thus achieved for England. It must be remembereddistinctly that he was no follower of his-indeed, very much the contrary, and now he says that he hopes he may continue many years as Premier to continue his wise and firm policy, and he told them at Newcastle when presented with the beautiful casket containing the freedom of the city that if they gave him such a large one Z" ZD they should give one ten times as large to Lord Salisbury." It should be remembered that besides the incalculable advantages to our commerce which are derived from this agreement, the more England spreads through Africa the sooner the wicked and accursed slave trade dies, and the thinly scattered natives will know some happiness in life.

CITIZENSHIP.

Society atio personal.

TO OUR CORRESPONDENTS.

CARMARTHEN.

EAST CARMARTHENSHIRE.

LLANARTHNEY.

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