I was so protected when it was uncertain whether I had sustained any grievance or not. Now it has been established, and I have recovered substantial damages for that grievance, I surely am entitled to a continuation of that protection.
Mr. Justice Ridley: I shall make it perpetual.
Thereupon counsel for defendants in the remaining cases of Chaltin versus Captain Burrows and Everett & Co., and Dubreucq versus the same, agreed to submit to a verdict in favour of the plaintiffs for £50 damages and costs. The jury returned verdicts for this sum, and the Court made perpetual the injunction against the publication of the book.
So resulted the first opportunity Belgian officers in the service of the Congo Free State have had to vindicate their characters during the long campaign which certain persons have, from varying motives, waged against the youngest and most progressive State in Africa.
CHAPTER XXX
THE CONGO CAMPAIGN IN ENGLAND
Some English Traits.
THE English are an admirable people, who have excelled in every department of human effort; but the evidence of the more critical among them, with whom love of fair play counts for as much as pride of race, has never failed to reveal in the national character (as of course in the character of every nation) a goodly number of weak spots whereat the critic and the wit may profitably direct their shafts. John Bull, the trader, is a keen-eyed, hard-headed bargainer. Good; it behoves every merchant to be no less. He regards the whole world as his farm by right divine, and resents his exclusion from any part of it. When his remonstrance is met by counter-remonstrance, he points to his home markets and his colonies, and emphasises the fact that these British markets are open (long after his own trade has been firmly established therein) to the traders of the world.
A Beautiful Spot in Mayumbe.
But it is in his ultra-sentimental mood that John Bull is seen at his worst. Has there been a conflict between some semi-barbarous tribes in that seething cauldron of discontent, the Balkans, and the Sultan’s troops have thrashed them indiscriminately and dispersed them, John Bull, or at least that part of him which wears white ties and is described as “reverend,” rushes off to Exeter Hall and demands the prayers of the churches and the forces of his Government for the suppression of the inhuman atrocities which he denounces. (Incidentally, but in unmistakable terms, he at the same time calls the attention of his audience to the joyful fact that it is their duty and privilege to assist in this good work by giving liberally of their money.) Of course it is but a section of the English people which approves and supports this sort of thing, and a still smaller section that exploits it. But in a country politically constituted as England is, where the suffrage is almost universal, it is sufficiently large and influential to influence from time to time the conduct of the British Government. This is more particularly the case where the interests of the pseudo-humanitarians and those of the traders happen to coincide. On such occasions, fortunately somewhat rare, the spectacle of Cant and Commerce in alliance is enough to bring a smile to the face of a sphinx.