RECENT CAMPAIGNS IN WEST AFRICA. 762 hundred horsemen, well armed and mounted.

The Prophet-Sultan awaitedthem throned on a divan covered withmany-coloured carpets. He wore a veryplain robe of black and white,with a large turban,the ends of which were joined under hischin. Peroz describes him as a man of about forty, strongly built, with regular features and a pleasant, intelligent expression. The simplicity ofhis own attire wascompensated for by the splendour of his surroundings. To right and left stood two warriors with pantherskin headdresses,bearing a silver axeand mace, the insignia ofhis authority. His counsellors,in bright robes, sat around him, and nine of his wives,loadedwith a mass of ornaments in gold and silver, reclined lower down on the divan. Five picked menof his bodyguard kept watch, rifle inhand,just behindhim. The background of thisgroup wasformedby a semicircle of armed men, horse and foot, some thousands strong.

The chiefs of Samory's ownarmy weremounted, wearing silver helmets,with silver axeshanging from their saddles. The chiefs of hisallies were on foot. Fronting this armed array a great multitude of spectators extended far along the plain.

hostile policy by the fact that the French were again at war with Ahmadu,north of the river.

After a short period of peace a quarrel had broken out on account of his trying to levy contributions on French trade caravans, and the Government had decided that the time had come to completelybreak up his power.

Nor were these the only native wars the French had on their hands in West Africa £t the beginning of 1890. The king of Dahomey wasquarrelling with the Governor of theFrench West Coast colonies. He refused to accept the interpretation put by the French on trade treaties, and declared that they had taken under their protection chiefs who were his subjects and vassals. Efforts were made to settle these questions by friendly negotiations, but these proved in the end a failure, and the Dahomeyansbegan to raid the coast settlements.

Thus in1890 France had three colonial wars in progressin West Africa: with Ahmadunorthof the Niger, with Samory south of it, and with Behanzin,the negro king of Dahomey,on the Guinea coast.

Colonel Achinard,whocommandedintheFrench West African possessions,nowknownunder the general nameof the French Soudan,dealt first withAhmadu. Inorder to cut him off from the Niger he attacked and captured the town of Segu on April 6th,1890. It had formerly been the capital of a kingdom of the Bambarra negroes. One of the tribe was nowproclaimed king,with a Frenchresident to take care of him, and the town wasmade the headquarters of the Niger flotilla. During the summer the French columns working,some northwards from Segu, others eastwardfromKayes,cleared the country of Ahmadu'sadherents. By the end of the year they were closing in on the town of Kioro,his northern capital. On theapproach of Achinard, Ahmadu abandoned the place on January ist, 1891, and it was immediately occupied by the French. They pursued the enemy, and came upwithandsurprised themat Youri on January 3rd. Ahmadu'speople made a desperate resistence, most of his chieftains fell in the fight, and he fled into the desert with only a handful of followers.

The envoys spent a month withSamory, and a treaty of " perpetual amity and peace" with France was duly signed. When the French officers returned to the Senegal they brought with them a son of Samory, whopaid a visit to Paris, inorder thathe might be impressed with the greatness and power of France. For two years thepeace continued,Samory spending the timeinreducing some moreof his black neighbours to subjection. But difficulties with the French began again in 1888, and gradually developed into war. It seems that he could not restrain the plundering, slave-hunting instincts of his chiefs on the border of the French possessions, and he was himself jealous of the steady progress of the white soldiers in the Niger region, and not unwilling to try the fortune of war with them again. "Perpetual amity" had given way to occasional fighting. In 1889 Samory was induced to make peace again, andsigned a treatyrecognising as French territory all the districts on the north bank of the Niger. But within three months he sent back the treaty and declaredhe could not abide by it. The French accepted thechallenge,and thus at the beginningof the 'nineties they were again at war with their chief native rival for the rule of the Niger region.

Meanwhile there had been a native insurrection in thedistrict ofSegu. Lieutenant Hourst, with thegunboats, hadrunup theBani,a tributary of the Niger, to assist in restoring order, but he was besieged by superior numbers in the village of Diena. Colonel Achinard, turning southward from Nioro, reached Nyamina, on Samory had been encouraged to adopt this