21 JANUARY 1938, Page 6

The other eightieth birthday I have in mind is Lord

Lugard's. It is particularly apposite to mention it now, for a collection is being made of survivors of the march to Kandahar in 1880. One name has not figured there so far, for the young subaltern called Frederick Lugard, who first saw active service in Afghanistan in 1879, is much more in the habit of writing letters on African natives' needs than letters on his own experiences or achievements. For it is, of course, with Africa that Lord Lugard's name is primarily associated, though he has, among other things, been Governor of Hong-kong. Not only primarily, but so far as one can see imperishably, associated, for as long as native development in Africa is written about at all the system of administration initiated by Sir Frederick Lugard in Uganda and Nigeria will be recorded as the starting-point of a new relationship. It is nearly twenty years since Lord Lugard left Africa, but in his retirement in a Surrey village he works harder than most men who travel to the City every day, receiving visitors— administrators, missionaries, anthropologists, natives—keeping posted in every latest development of African problems, coping with a formidable correspondence from all quarters of the world on native questions. No Englishman, probably, has done more for Africa.