A dinner given on Wednesday in London by the officers
of the Ashanti Expedition was remarkable for the interest of the speeches delivered by the chairman, Sir James Willcocks, and the guests of the evening. Perhaps the best was the chairman's, who once more bore testimony to the value of the negro soldiers, who if supplied with an unusual proportion of white officers are equal to almost any troops in the world. They shared everything on hungry marches with their officers, and not only fought splendidly, but kept order and helped to spread civilisation, so that, says Sir James, when in 1898 a party of slaves in Borgu marched past the British camp they fled into it for shelter, because they had heard that with the British slaves were free. The virtues are sometimes paid for, and there can be no doubt that the British hostility to slavery has made a deep impression on negroes throughout the world. Neverthe- less it is necessary to remember that permanently to benefit both ourselves and them we must keep power in our own hands, must use only white artillery, and must never forget that in the last resort it is ourselves, and our- selves only, upon whom we depend.
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