M. Moncton; the new Foreign Minister in France, appears - to
be rather anti-English, and to be, moreover, a captive of the Colonial party. He read to the Chamber on Thursday -a declaration in which he affirms that under the Berlin agree- ment of 1885, France received a general right of supervision over the Congo basin, this being involved in her reversionary claim ; and that the Congo Free State, in stepping over the
limits fixed for her, has violated that right. The recent Anglo-Belgian agreement must therefore be considered void. Moreover, the Congo acquisition of Wadelai is contrary to the rights alike of the Khedive and of the Sultan, who has, indeed, protested on his own behalf. Farther, the Congo State has trespassed on French claims to one bank of the Upper Oubanghi, and the Government has ordered troops thither to protect its rights. M. Hanotaux receives with pleasure the assurance that Lord Kimberley is willing to discuss his protests, and hints that he sees a method of solution which he will not yet disclose ; but the tone of his speech shows that the Government is sore, probably not with the terms arranged, but with their arrangement without a previous agreement with France. There has, we fancy, been at this point some forgetfulness on our side, due no doubt to the extreme spitefulness with which France, in order to punish us for accepting a European mission in Egypt, presses every African and Asiatic claim. The Chamber unanimously approved M. Hanotaux's declaration, and the affair will demand careful treatment; but France has, as regards Wadelai, only a manufactured case. Her position on the Oubanghi, which we do not profess fully to understand, may of course be better.
