To Effect This Grand Reform It Would Be Necessary To Annex The Nile Basin, And To Establish A Government In Countries That Had Been Hitherto Without Protection, And A Prey To The Adventurers From The Soudan.

To convey steel steamers from England, and to launch them upon the Albert Lake, and thus open the resources

Of Central Africa; to establish legitimate trade in a vast country which had hitherto been a field of rapine and of murder; to protect the weak and to punish the evil-doer, and to open the road to a great future, where the past had been all darkness and the present reckless spoliation - this was the grand object which Ismail, the Khedive of Egypt, determined to accomplish.

In this humane enterprise he was firmly supported by his two Ministers, Nubar Pacha and Cherif Pacha (an Armenian and a Circassian). The young princes his sons, who are well-educated and enlightened men, took the greatest interest in the undertaking; but beyond these and a few others, the object of the expedition was regarded with ill-concealed disgust.

Having received full powers from the Khedive, I gave orders for the following vessels to be built of steel by Messrs. Samuda Brothers: -

No. 1. A paddle steamer of 251 tons, 32-horse power. No. 2. A twin screw high-pressure steamer of 20-horse power, 108 tons. No. 3. A twin screw high-pressure steamer of 10-horse power, 38 tons. Nos. 4, 5. Two steel lifeboats, each 30 ft.

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