That She Will Always Keep
It I Believe, Because I Believe That It Is Impossible That This
Phase Of Emotionalism
- No, it is not hypocrisy, my French friends,
it is only a sort of fit - will last, and we shall
Soon be back in
our clear senses again and say to the world, "We do this thing
because we think it is right; because we think it is best for those
we do it to and for ourselves, not because of the wickedness of war,
the brotherhood of man, or any other notion bred of fear."
The way in which the present ideas acting through the Government do
harm in Africa are many. English Government officials have very
little and very poor encouragement given them if they push inland
and attempt to enlarge the sphere of influence, which their
knowledge of local conditions teaches them requires enlarging,
because the authorities at home are afraid other nations will say we
are rapacious landgrabbers. Well, we always have been, and they
will say it anyhow; and where after all is the harm in it? We have
acted in unison with the nations who for good sound reasons of their
own have cut down Portuguese possessions in Africa because we were
afraid of being thought to support a nation who went in for slavery.
I always admire a good move in a game or a brilliant bit of
strategy, and that was a beauty; and on our head now lie the affairs
of the Congo Free State, while France and Germany smile sweetly,
knowing that these affairs will soon be such that they will be able
to step in and divide that territory up between themselves without a
stain on their character - in the interests of humanity - the whole of
that rich region, which by the name of Livingstone, Speke, Grant,
Burton, and Cameron, should now be ours.
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