CHAPTER LIII THE DEVELOPMENT OF TRADE From the point of view of a development which should bring the country into touch with the outer world, the trade of Northern Nigeria may at once be divided into two branches, the internal and the external. In proportion as the internal trade is active and widespread, local life will evidently be nourished, and the native populations will attain to a prosperity in which, if they desire to do so, they can restore the old position of Negroland, by attracting, for the gratification of their own wants, a steady volume of trade from other nations.

We have seen that in the Middle Ages the trade of the West African Soudan bore no mean proportion to the relatively limited trade of the civilised world.

It is probable that, as the nations of the Soudan recover their ancient prosperity under a just and enlightened rule, they may contribute again in equal proportion to the now enlarged volume of the world's commercial movements.

Clearly, if we look to the millions of Nigeria to become our customers, it is of great importance that they should be rich and prosperous themselves. From this point of view the internal trade movements of the country have a general, as well as a local interest, and it is satisfactory to find that with every year of British administration the value and convenience of open roads is being more widely appreciated by local traders, and trade is proportionately increasing. It consists largely, as in other parts of the world, of an exchange of the manufactures of the towns for the raw material of the 491