Published under the sanction and at the Offices of

The Anti-Slavery & Aborigines Protection Society

51, Denison House, Vauxhall Bridge Road

London, S.W.

Anti-Slavery Reporter and Aborigines' Friend.

The Annual Meeting.

APRIL, 1916.

Quarterly Motes.

THE Society's meeting this year will, owing to the continuance of war conditions, be, like last year's, of a somewhat informal character. The time fixed is Tuesday, April 11, at 3.30 at the Westminster Palace Hotel, when our new President, Sir Victor Buxton, will take the chair for the first time in this capacity. We hope for a large attendance of members and friends of the Society to welcome him, especially as we are to have the great satisfaction of hearing the United States Ambassador, Dr. Page, who has kindly consented to come and speak on the character and work of the late Dr. Booker Washington, in which he took a deep interest. We hope also that the Postmaster-General, who is an old friend and Vice-President of the Society, will take part in the meeting.

Native Soldiers in the War.

A GOVERNMENT report has been issued on the fine service rendered by the Nigerian regiments, to which the African Mail has called attention. "The average Englishman," it

says," knows nothing of what native troops have performed in this war, except for scrappy details which have been permitted to filter through the Censor's office, and it will help them to realize, when this account is perused, that our black soldiers, too, have made sacrifices to the common cause. It may be that it will help him reform his opinion of the lazy nigger.

In a recent interview with Mr. Bonar Law, published in a New York paper, we read that "The Colonial Secretary has no scruples about the employment of coloured troops, whose discipline under British officers compares favourably with that of any other soldiers. . . . The British Empire has many millions of coloured men. Some of the Africans are superb fighters, but the number who can be trained to take part in European warfare is limited."

Lewanika.

LEWANIKA, Chief of Barotseland, whose death was reported last month, was an interesting and enlightened ruler in many respects. His action in setting free all the slaves in his country in 1906 has been recalled in most of the obituary notices, and on that occasion the Anti-Slavery Society forwarded to the chief a congratulatory address, engrossed and illuminated, assuring him of the deep interest with which the Society had heard of his courageous and right-minded policy. A later occasion, which we have not seen referred to, when Lewanika took a similar

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course towards slavery, was in 1913, when there was some revival of slave trading in Barotseland. The king called an assembly together, which was attended by over 1,100 people, to warn them against trading in slaves with the Portuguese over the border, when the Resident Magistrate and two of the chief headmen made strong speeches. Twenty-one persons were sentenced to imprisonment for this slave dealing.

The Late King LORD REDESDALE, in his recent book of Memories, makes of the this serious statement with regard to the late King Leopold II :

Belgians.

"It was a fortunate thing for the world that he died when he did. Had he lived till now, Belgium would hardly have played the heroic part which she did in August and September, 1914. It is whispered-indeed, it is an open secret-that documentary evidence exists to show that King Leopold was deeply engaged to Germany and that he was prepared, not without reward, to allow Germany to invade France through Belgium."

Native Race Protection in Peru.

THE Society known as the Asociacion Pro Indigena in Lima sends us from time to time leaflets relating to its work, which we are glad to know is being actively carried on. From a recent report we learn that the association receives many complaints of ill-treatment of natives in different parts of Peru. In Urcon successful appeals have been made to the Government for protection of natives against an attempt to exact rent for native lands, while in the district of Puno the more virile race of the Aymaras are said to be leaving their own territory for Chile and Bolivia, in order to escape from oppression.

Our New President.

WE reported briefly in our last issue the acceptance by Sir T. F. Victor Buxton of the post of President of the Society to which he had been invited by a unanimous resolution of the Committee.

Sir Victor wrote at the end of December :

"I have now had time to give the matter my serious consideration and am sincerely glad that I am able to accept the position to which the Committee have invited me. . . . I feel it a very great honour to be invited to fill it, and to join the Committee in their labours for the benefit of the weaker races of the world. It will be not only a duty but the highest privilege and pleasure to take up this task, and to have an active part in the work of a Society which has done so much in the past for the cause of freedom and justice."

As was mentioned in our last issue, Sir Victor has travelled repeatedly in both East and West Africa in the interests of the Church Missionary Society, with which he is closely associated, and is therefore familiar with problems relating to African peoples. He has for some time been a Vice

President of our Society and has more than once presided at meetings of the Committce. There is a general consensus of opinion that alike by family tradition, training, and personal characteristics, no fitter man could have

J7V Anatow

been chosen to succeed Sir Fowell Buxton as President of the Anti-Slavery Society than his eldest son.

The Disturbances in Ceylon.

MR. P. RAMANATHAN, K.C., C.M.G., elected Ceylonese member of the Legislative Council of Ceylon, met some of the Society's Parliamentary Committee at the House of Commons in January, and three members of Parliament subsequently had an interview with Mr. Bonar Law. The Colonial Secretary is, unfortunately, disinclined to grant an inquiry on the ground that it would revive the religious controversies now dying down. It is not proposed, however, that the inquiry should be into the riots, but into the proceedings which took place after the riots had ceased.

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