On Monday Lord Cromer, who has been paying a visit
to Khartoum, addressed a speech to the Sheikhs and notables of the Soudan which lays down with the speaker's usual clearness and statesmanship the course which this country means to pursue in those regions. He strikes the keynote of his policy when he says that "low taxation must be placed before every other interest." In other words, though the Soudan wants better communications and a hundred other things, it wants still more low taxation, and Lord Cromer does not intend that the paraphernalia of civilisation, how- ever desirable in the abstract, shall be purchased by taking from the Sondanese people an undue proportion of their wealth. The decision not to force the pace is most wise. To make our rule strong and efficient it must, in the long run, be based, we will not say on the love of the inhabitants, but on their acquiescence. But there is no form of government in which men acquiesce so readily as that which taxes them at a low rate. Our rule cannot be sympathetic to a savage and fanatical population of Mahommedans, but if we do not ask for too much in the way of taxes, we shall obtain an appreciation and support almost as valuable as loyalty.
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