Baron de Courcel (France) said: “The new State owes its origin to the generous aspirations and the enlightened initiation of a prince surrounded by the respect of Europe.” Other members of the Conference were as warm as the representatives of Great Britain and France in their eulogy of the great work achieved by King Leopold, and their opinions of his Majesty’s life-work were admirably summed up by Prince Bismarck in his speech closing the Conference, in the course of which he referred to the consolidation of the Congo Free State as a “precious service to the cause of humanity.”
Central Africa had now become in all essential respects a State. It had been recognised as such by the United States on April 22, 1884, seven months before the opening, and ten months before the close, of the Berlin Conference, but now its geographical limits were defined, its political status fixed, its neutrality assured. The large part played by Leopold, King of the Belgians, in its creation had received full and complete acknowledgment from the foremost geographers and statesmen of the world, who had united in lauding the King, not only for his wonderful achievement, but for the high humanitarian motive stimulating his Majesty through all the years of its difficult accomplishment.
Hard Work Ahead.
But let no one suppose that it followed, as a necessary consequence of all this, that the future government of Central Africa was to be as plain sailing in smooth water. A new State had been created, it is true, and it had had as its sponsors the great Powers of the world, who had recognised Leopold II., King of the Belgians, as its Sovereign ruler. But it is beyond the ability of States, just as it is beyond the ability of individuals, to exist without money, and to be entrusted with the government of a territory nearly a million square miles in extent—about a fifth the size of Europe, or a third of the United States—inhabited by twenty millions or so of semi-barbarous tribes, was no light task. The “African Exploration Fund” of the Geographical Society of London contributed £250, and the Belgian Committee collected among their countrymen 500,000 francs—a generous gift, but utterly inadequate for such a colossal task as the civilisation of Central Africa. Belgians, as a people, were in no degree liable for the expense of the philanthropic colonial enterprise entered upon by Leopold, their King, as an individual. The magnitude of that expense will be apparent to anybody who gives the subject a moment’s thought. The payment of explorers,—men of the first rank in intellectual attainment, such as Stanley,—the cost of their equipment (stores, carriers, lake steamers, etc.), the carving out of routes, establishment of stations, purchases of land from native chiefs, conciliatory gifts, and so forth, had seriously depleted the large private fortune of King Leopold.
Though all civilised countries were more or less interested in the opening up of Central Africa, less than twenty thousand dollars was subscribed outside Belgium for that object. It had, therefore, some years before the Berlin Conference, become necessary to raise money for the continuation of the work. On November 25, 1878, the Comité d’Études du Haut-Congo was formed in Brussels, with King Leopold as honorary president and Colonel Strauch as president. The Comité was really a company, and it had a capital of a million francs. Thanks no less to its wise direction than to its sufficient capital, the operations of the Comité were attended with so much success that it soon usurped the place of the International African Association as principal agent of the civilising crusade undertaken by King Leopold. The work of the Comité was consolidated and greatly accelerated by the General Act of the Berlin Conference, assuring the Sovereignty of the Congo State to King Leopold, it being no more than natural that Belgians should have increased confidence in a State secure under the rule of their own King, and be disposed to invest their money therein more freely than when the form of its government was matter of doubt. Though much still remained to be done, the Congo Free State had now been founded, and that fact of itself was sufficient to inspire confidence everywhere, but particularly among the Belgian people, whose King was its founder.
Making a Road (175 Kilometres) for Automobiles (Kwango).
CHAPTER IV
EARLY BELGIAN EXPEDITIONS
Cartography and Civilisation.
Having narrated the principal political circumstances which eventuated in the founding of the Congo Free State, it now becomes necessary to revert to an earlier period, and sketch briefly the various Belgian expeditions to whose labours are so largely owing our knowledge of the geography of Central Africa, the suppression of the slave trade there, and the establishment of civilising and humanitarian government by Belgians.