In his letter to Sir E. Monson of October 12th,
Lord Salis- bury relates that Baron de Courcel, though his "rhetoric " and his " earnestness " made him indistinct, appeared desirous to say that Major Marchand would be withdrawn if Great Britain would admit the right of France to the navigable portion of the Bahr-el-Ghazel, "so that no frontier could intervene between her commerce and the Nile." Clearly that means that the dominion of France is to stretch from lJbanghi down the valley of the Bahr-el- Ghazel till it touches the main stream, a pretension immensely larger than any claim to Fashoda. It is, in fact, identical with Major Marchand's claim, and we see that in several messages from Paris it is repeated,—in one with great abruptness. It is a claim, we believe, which the British Government is unable to admit, as the valley was part of the original possessions of Egypt in the Soudan. This dispute is, of course, capable of being discussed, or even com- promised, especially as we allow free commerce, but any approach of French " dominion " within a certain distance of the Nile would place our control of the river at the mercy of France, and is therefore inadmissible.
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