British 37 BellaAfrioa ortoa ] EAST AFRICA AND UGANDA attention to the problems of the administration of its possessions fromthe sea to Victoria Nyanza.

(6) The East Africa Protectorate and Uganda since 1891 Nominally thecompany possessed Uganda ; but there were special difficulties inthe way of the development of thiscountry.

Uganda had been first made known to Europe by the Speke and Grant Expedition of 1862. It was visited by Stanley in 1875 ; and,in response to an appeal from King Mtesa, British missionaries were sent thither in the following year. In 1883 Joseph Thom son explored the route from Mombasa to the Victoria Nyanza now followed by the Uganda Railway . In 1892 the native Government was inthe throes of a civil war between Roman Catholics, Protestants, and Moham medans. Circumstances obliged Captain Lugard, the agent of the Company , to intervene in this war, which was bringing the country to utter ruin . For this pur pose he engaged the Sudanese soldiers, formerly em ployed by Emin Pasha in the Equatorial Province.

In these circumstances it was no wonder that the Company soon realized that it had undertaken a task above its capacities ; and notice was given to the Im perial Government of its inability to carry out a work involving such grave responsibility and expenditure.' Sir Gerald Portal was commissioned to report on the whole situation , and he visited Uganda and reported in 1893. He recognised that “ As a political corporation , with powers of government, whether over British subjects or natives of Africa , the work of the Imperial East Africa Company may now be looked upon as ended . . . . The experiment of combining administration and trade in the same hands has proved a failure .” Colonel Rhodes wrote : From what one saw on the road I should say that the en deavour of the British East Africa Company to develop the in terior of East Africa has been a failure from want of funds.

| Africa , No. 7 (1901 ), Sir H. Johnston's Report [Cd . 671 ) .

Ibid ., No. 2 (1894) [Cd . 7303) .

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