RECENT CAMPAIGNS IN WEST AFRICA. 766 numbered in all about 3,5Cso officers andmen.

There were 800 of tlae Foreign Legion, 150 marines, a company of engineers, a battery of mountain guns, a transport and ambulance detachment, and a troop of cavalry. There were ten companiesof Senegalese and two of Haussas, each about 150 strong— in all, 1,800 native infantry under French officers. Inorder to land the stores and equipments of the expeditionwithout using the native surf boats, an iron pier was run out into the sea at Cotonou. A system of transport by means of barges,towedby launches,was arranged for the lagoonbehindthe town and down and turning the enemy's position. A feint was made against the fords to keep the enemy occupied,and the work of ferrying the main body across lower down began in the night between October ist and 2nd. On the 3rd,Dodds began to advance up the westbank in two columns to attack the enemy, the gunboats moving on his right flank. But he was himself fiercely attacked on the march, and there was another hard fight. The enfilading fire of the gunboats inflicted heavy loss on the enemy. They carried off their wounded, but left more than 150 dead in the bush, among them seventeenof the Amazon corps, tall, stronglybuiltyoung women. Their breechloading rifles lay beside them, and they had plenty of cartridgesintheir belts. The French had lost six officers and thirtyseven men killed and wounded. Nofurther progress was made that day, and the next was employed in cutting roads in the bush. On the 6th the advance continued,and there was another fight, the enemy defending the crossing of acreek. They were driven off, but this victory cost the expedition the loss lower reaches of the River Oueme. Dodds had decided on advancing along the river from PortoNovo in the extreme east of the colony. Strong garrisons were placed in the coast settlements after driving the Dahomeyans from the neighbourhood. This left about 2,000 men available for the expedition. There was, besides, a transport train of 2,000 native por-It was not till August 17th that all was ready, and the advance inland from Porto Novo began.

GENERAL dodds.

There was no sign of tlaeenemy until after the confluence of the Oueme and the Han Rivers near Dogba was reached on September 14th. The march was slow and difficult, as paths had to be cut through the bush, numerous swamp hollows and streams crossed, andclearings made round the camping-grounds. Here a stockaded fort and entrenched camp was formed to serve as the advancedbase of the expedition. It was fiercely attacked by the Dahomeyans at daybreak on September 19th, and they were only repulsed after three hours' fighting, in which the French lost two officers and three men killed and twenty-seven men wounded.

of three officers and thirty-two men. Progress had been very slow. Dodds had only advanced three miles from the place where he crossed the river.

But now the enemy's defence collapsed. Behanzin was afraid that the French would get between him and his capital, and abandoning his camps on the Oueme, he retreated towards Abomey. No attempt was made to closely pursue him, as the column could not move rapidly without risking a breakdown of its supply arrangements. A camp was formed near the village of Poguessa, where the native guidespointed out a broadtrack runningnorthwestward through the bush as the trade route to Abomey. A depot and fortified porthaving been formed at Poguessa, Doddsadvanced along this track on October 10th. On the 12th and 13th there was continual skirmishing in the bush with the retiring enemy. On the afternoon of the latter day the Koto River was reached. It runs through a valley filled with On September 27th an attempt was made to cross the Oueme by the fords near Gbede, fourteen miles aboveDogba, but the enemywas found to be strongly entrenched in the bush on the west bank, with artillery sweeping the river, which washere too shallow for the gunboats to co-operate. The attempt was abandoned, and preparations were made for crossing lower