THE MAGAZINES.

THE most interesting article in this month's magazines is Captain Lugard's "England and France in the Nile Valley" in the National Review. Captain Lugard urges, with the knowledge of an expert, what we have repeatedly urged in

these columns on general principles of reason and common- sense, that we should take effective means for gradually occupying, piece by piece, that great tract of Africa, the Nile Valley, which we have, in the most clear and formal way, declared to be within our sphere of influence. We have declared in the face of Europe that whatever part of the Nile Valley is not covered by the legitimate rights of Egypt belongs to Great Britain. No doubt this claim is diplomatically per- fectly sound; but we must consider more than diplomatic claims, however good. We must provide against those diplo- matic claims being acted upon in such a way as to bring us into conflict with France, and proving a source of grave em- barrassment. France, though she does not venture actually to repudiate our claims, does not admit them. Under these circumstances, we must proceed to put our claims into action. It may be safe to leave a piece of valuable property lying about on the roadside when no one thinks of disputing the right of possession. When that right

is disputed, the best, indeed the only, way of avoiding the risk of an ugly quarrel is to take actual possession, —to have the valuable possession in manu. If we had begun this operation five years ago we should not now be worried by the fear of friction with France. Unfortunately, we did not look ahead, but were content to drift. Still, better late than never. If our statesmen are wise, they will now begin

and steadily pursue the policy of making good our claim to the Nile Valley by pressing down the river from the Great Lakes. Captain Lugard shows how this policy may be carried out :-

" The question then arises, what are the immediate steps which should be taken in the present crisis ? I would reply that it is imperative to make an advance from Uganda and occupy the Nile Valley as far as Fashoda, together with the whole of the Bahr Gazal province, which was formerly administered by Gessi and Lupton. This brings us to the confines of the Mandi's country, and would indeed involve an engagement with the Dervishes at Reggaf. This latter post is very far detached from the bulk of the territories which own the Mandi's sway. It is some 350 miles south of Fashoda, which itself is about the same distance from any Dervish garrison post, nor is there any garrison at Fashoda. Simultaneously with the advance from the south it would be advisable to make a forward movement from Egypt. Abu Hamed could be occupied at once, probably with little fighting or expense, before Dervish reinforcements could arrive, and such action would prevent the Mandi from detaching troops from his headquarters and northern frontier, and probably result in leaving an advance from the south unopposed. The probable necessary strength of the force moving with this object, the cost and other data, have long been fairly accurately gauged by the British authorities in Egypt, who await but the authority to act."

Captain Lugard raises a new and most interesting point when he shows that not only is the great waterway of the Nile in danger of being cat in two by a French advance from the upper waters of the Congo, but that,— "There is another power which threatens the Egyptian Soudan from the west—a power more formidable even than Mandism in its zenith. This is the Moslem revival led by the Sid-El-Mandi, whose faction is known as that of the Senoussi. Senoussi the elder had already, in 1859, extended the tenets of his creed over the greater part of the Central Soudan. Since that date his son. whom he declared to be the real Mandi long before the advent of the impostor from Dongola, has obtained an influence over the extremely powerful Sultanate of Wadai, over the fierce nomad Tuaregs of the desert, and throughout Fezzan and Bomu. Lately he has left his seclusion at Jerboub and gone south towards Wadai —it remains to be seen what this movement may portend. Since his propaganda are peaceful it is possible that he would not attempt to interfere with a settled Government in the Nile Valley, but unless such a Government be soon established, it is by no means unlikely that he may be induced to try conclusions with the false Mandi of Khartoum. Once the Senoussi established himself in the Nilo Valley he would be difficult to dislodge. The countless hordes of fanatics ranging over a vast area, who regard him as their religious head, would rise at his command, and as the creed is adaptable, and its first motive is the establishment of a form of government and administration, its extension would not be an ephemeral one. It is, moreover, hostile to all Christian or European influence."

We quite agree with Captain Lugard in thinking that it would be a most dangerous occurrence for Egypt, and so for England, if for the waning and indeed almost effete influence of the Mandi, were substituted the virile and well-ordered fanaticism of the great religious order of the Senoussi. It

would be almost as bad to have the Middle Nile in the hands of the French as in those of these Knights Templars of the

Mahommedan world. We must leave our readers to study the rest of Captain Lugard's article as a whole. It is packed full of information, conveyed, however, with a true sense of moderation and statesmanship. There is not a syllable that could fairly be regarded as offensive to France. A word must be said as to the perfectly admirable map which accompanies the article. Its production reflects great credit on all con- cerned in its production. Nothing so clear and informing in the way of maps of the Nile Valley has been published elsewhere, and we very much doubt if even the Foreign Office could produce anything so trustworthy, so up-to-date,

and so accurate. The engraving and colouring are excel- lent. Taking a view of the matter as a whole, we can only say that it is greatly to be hoped that the new Government will do their best to come to a clear understanding with France on all outstanding African questions. If France shows herself reasonable in East Africa, there is no reason why we should not act generously towards her in the West.

—Another interesting article in the National Review is Lord Houghton's "Ireland Unvisited." It is a plea for Ireland as a tourist resort, and shows that Ireland has now brought her

accommodation up to a high level, and can give the tourist, not only exquisite scenery, and good fishing, and rough shooting, but dinners, and beds, and breakfasts, such as are

provided in Scotland or England. For a reasonably cheap holiday, no place offers greater attractions than Ireland. Let us hope the effort will succeed. If Ireland were once to be. come the playground of the United Kingdom, and the national home of the walking-tour, the Irish question would be half settled. Solvitur amlndanclo.

The Nineteenth Century opens with a poem on Cromwell by Mr. Swinburne. Though one misses the splendour of melody to be found in the poet's earlier verse, there is a fine patriotic

note in the poem. In the first of the two following stanzas, Mr. Swinburne urges, as we urged a fortnight ago, that Crom- well was the typical Englishman—the man in whom the might, majesty, and dominion of England came to flower :—

" Incarnate England in his warrior hand

Smote, and as fire devours the blackening brand Made ashes of their strengths who wrought her wrong, And turned the strongholds of her foes to sand.

His praise is in the sea's and Milton's song; What praise could reach him from the weakling throng That rules by leave of tongues whose praise is shame— Him, who made England out of weakness strong ? "

A readable article is Sir Herbert Maxwell's on " Intellectual Detachment." He points out how much Burns gained by

his power of intellectual detachment, and how much Burke lost. Sir Herbert Maxwell goes on to give a modern instance and a very good one :—

" Among the letters of one who recently and effectively led the House of Commons there remains one little missive, wherein is sounded a note so melodious amid the harsh clangour of party politics as to remind one of a lark's song in the lull between blasts of a tempest. It was written by W. H. Smith, only a few months before his death, to his lieutenant in the House, Mr. Akers-Douglas, the Conservative Whip, and runs in this wise :- Harcourt asks me to dinner on the 15th of April to meet Glad- stone, and I am very much inclined to go. Would it frighten our friends ? ' In effect, this dinner never took place ; it seems to have been thought that ' our friends' might have viewed it with displeasure. Significant this of the nature of relations existing at the time between political parties. Smith's life was one of extraordinary activity. He was wholly engaged till well into middle age in the conduct of a commercial concern of great complexity and rapid expansion. More wealth than he ever ex- pected or desired flowed in upon him. This in itself has many times proved a fatal frost to the finer attributes of character. When the business had approached its height, Smith was drawn into the vortex of Parliamentary life, and many a wife, many a friend, might testify to the potency of that influence to suck away sympathy from domestic or social intercourse. Mr. Glad- stone has been—was, at that time—the most powerful statesman since the death of Lord Palmerston in 1865; more powerful for ill to his country, as Conservatives believed, and dreaded as more dangerous, than any leader since the days of Fox. They feared Mr. Gladstone, and in how few minds is there any perceptible frontier between fear and hate ! Smith was in genius so greatly inferior to Burke that it may appear almost grotesque to name the two men in the same sentence, yet Smith bore himself in a loftier attitude to his adversary than it was possible for Burke to maintain towards Fox. In virtue of his faculty of detachment, Smith was able to maintain relations with two Gladstones—Glad- stone the accomplished scholar, the repository of half-a century of Parliamentary lore, the facile, versatile, genial acquaintance, and Gladstone the reckless opportunist, the unstable demagogue, the torch of political war. That Smith possessed a large share of this faculty of mind goes to prove that it is to a great extent inherent in certain natures, although to some extent it may be imparted or acquired."

The Contemporary contains a plea by Mr. G. F. Scott Elliot for making our route into Uganda not a Mombassa railway, but a highway, half to railways and half of rivers and lakes vie/ Nyassaland. He would make the merchant and his bales on the way to Uganda, go first by steamer up the Zambesi and Shire Rivers to the Shire highlands. Thence, by a railway one

hundred and twenty miles long, to be constructed to Metope, from which point the upper Shire is navigable, and goods can be carried to the north end of Lake Nyassa. Here another railway (two hundred and forty miles) would lead to Lake Tanganyika. Tanganyika gives a clear waterway of four hundred miles to its northern end. Then another railway to the Karega River, and finally, down the Karega River to the Victoria Nyanza. In favour of this route Mr. Scott-Elliot urges two things. It would coat about half-a-million less than the Mombassa railway, and it would kill two birds with one stone,—that is, while opening up Uganda, it would also open up the already flourishing settlements of British Central Africa, and make a beginning of the Cape-to-Cairo route. The proposal is a fascinating one, and will no doubt be carried out some day; but whether it ought to be done instead of— not as well as—the Mombassa railway, we cannot profess to decide. That is a matter not for us, but for experts like Captain Lugard and Colonel Colville.

The Fortnightly's first article is by Lieutenant Harley, and gives, with the aid of a map, a plain and soldierly account of the defence of Chitral. The courage displayed by the native

troops under English officers was beyond praise. When

Lieutenant Harley led the sortie to blow up the mine, he found that the mouth of the mine was a shaft 8 ft. wide and

6 ft. deep, with a tunnel running out from it at the bottom.

Down this Lieutenant Harley jumped, followed by his Sikhs, and there despatched the enemy as they ran out of the mine. That was a very trying thing to do. Remember, the mouth of the mine was outside the fort, but in the middle of the enemy's works, and under a heavy fire.

Blackwood is full of good matter as usual. " Our Last War

with the Mahsuds " is a most spirited account of frontier soldiering.—" A Boer Pastoral" is a verbal impression of a party of Boers on the "trek," conceived with no small literary skill. It brings up the scenery and the Boer type of face, figure, and mental character with extraordinary vividness. — " Mr. William Watson's Serious Verse" is a pleasantly written article, but affords a curious example of the timidity of the critic. The writer evidently feels keenly the strength and beauty of Mr. Watson's verse, but he does not dare let himself obey his instinct. He has got it into his head that the main duty of the critic is to say that " the second temple was not like the first," and so at the end of the article he declares that Mr. Watson " is not, nor has he ever claimed to be, a poet of the higher rank, and those who have made this claim on his behalf may live to see it reversed by the verdict of time." This strikes us as very ineffective. Most assuredly Mr. Watson's poems claim both by their themes, their manner, and the thoughts that are in them to be poetry of the highest rank. They are either that or gross failures. We do not, of course, seek to assign Mr. Watson an exact place in the hierarchy of song.

That attempt cannot be made for many years. We have, however, little sympathy with the critics who always play for safety in their verdicts, and consider that "just the chill off," but not warm, is the proper temperature for criticism. Even weak tea is better hot than tepid.