22 FEBRUARY 1952, Page 10

" Ebe )iirttator," februarp 21St, 1852.

L4GOS has been chastised for daring to resist British dictation, and has been destroyed. In the fulness of philanthropy, tke missionaries and officers of the British Government had called upon the potentate of that African town to discontinue slave- trading : perhaps on account of his compliance, be was dethroned, and his brother reigned in his stead. The unseated majesty of Lagos took refuge with the British, and they resolved to restore him. Repulsed in November, they returned with greater force in December, defeated King Kosoko with great slaughter, and reinstated Atikoye. It was bloody work on both sides; though the Africans suffered most from the British compassion for the Negro. Conscience obliged Commodore Bruce to suspend the Christian labour on Christmas Day. However, it is done : Anti-slavery is enthroned at Lagos, British honour is rehabilitated, and we are pledged to keep on propping Atikoye on his precarious seat of power. What if Kosoko were to invoke foreign aid, and were to reappear with a French contingent ? That appeal to the lex talionis might transfer the quarrel to London and Paris. Louis Napoleon might not covet that transfer—at present. If our squadron does not meet with some check of that sort, it will probably be eneaged to prop up pretenders all along the coast; and in that case it would need considerable reinforcements.