The latest information about the character of the Treaty of
Cession for annexing the Congo to Belgium does not inspire much hopefulness. A correspondent of the Times in Brussels says that the proposal earns only the mildest approval even from the professed supporters of the Government. The Socialists will vote against annexation in any form, as they object to a colonial policy. The Liberals will very rightly vote against it unless Parliament is supreme in the manage- ment of the whole colony. Some of the Roman Catholics, but it is uncertain how many, will do the same. The financial question and the maintenance of the Crown Domain are, of course, intimately connected. If forced labour and the other abuses and cruelties, which are permitted chiefly in the Crown Domain, are abolished, will the colony pay its way ? As Mr. Morel points out in a temperate letter which we print else- where, profits at the present rate are assumed. Yet if reforms are to be genuine, no such assumption can be fairly made. The Time correspondent calculates that if the State bought out the King's interests in the Crown Domain, it would have to pay between a hundred and a hundred and sixty-seven millions sterling. That this will be done is ineonceivable.., We can only repeat that we shall not be satisfied unless there is a complete revolution in the methods by which the natives are deprived of the right to Sell their labour freely. And we fail to see how that revolution can be accomplished so long as the Crown Domain is governed solely, or even mainly, in the personal interests of King Leopold.
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