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Further concessions to France. agreed, as part of the settlement of the French shore question in
Newfoundland, to deflect the frontier line more to the south. The new boundary was described at some length, but provision was made for its modification in points of detail on the return of the commissioners engaged in surveying the frontier region. In 1906 an agreement was reached on all points, and the frontier at last definitely settled, sixteen years after the Say-Barrua line had been fixed. This revision of the Niger-Chad frontier did not, however, represent the only territorial compensation received by France in West Africa in connexion with the settlement of the
Newfoundland question. By the same convention of April 1904 the British government consented to modify the frontier between Senegal and the Gambia colony ``so as to give to France Yarbutenda and the lands and landing- places belonging to that locality,'' and further agreed to cede to France the tiny group of islands off the coast of French Guinea known as the Los
Islands.
Meantime the conclusion of the 1898 convention had left both the British and the French governments free to devote increased attention to the subdivision and control of their West African possessions. On the 1st of
January 1900 the imperial authorities assumed direct responsibility for the whole of the territories of the Royal Niger Company, which became henceforth a purely commercial undertaking. The Lagos protectorate was extended northwards; the Niger Coast protectorate, likewise with extended frontiers, became Southern Nigeria; while the greater part of the territories formerly administered by the company were constituted into the protectorate of Northern Nigeria—all three administrations being directly under the Colonial Office In February 1906 the administration of the
Southern Nigerian protectorate was placed under that of Lagos at the same time as the name of the latter was changed to the Colony of Southern
Nigeria, this being a step towards the eventual

Organization of the British and French protectorates. amalgamation of all three dependencies under one governor or governor- general. In French West Africa changes in the internal frontiers have been numerous and important. The coast colonies have all been increased in size at the expense of the French Sudan, which has vanished from the maps as an administrative entity. There are carved out of the territories comprised in what is officially known as French West Africa five colonies—Senegal,
French Guinea, the Ivory Coast, Dahomey and the Upper Senegal and Niger, this last being entirely cut off from the sea—and the civil territory of
Mauritania. To the colony of the Upper Senegal and Niger is attached the military territory of the Niger, embracing the French Sahara up to the limit of the Algerian sphere of influence. Not only are all these divisions of French West Africa connected territorially, but administratively they are united under a governor-general. Similarly the French Congo territories have been divided into three colonies—the Gabun, the Middle Congo and the
Ubangi-Shari-Chad—all united administratively under a commissioner-general.
There are, around the coast, numerous islands or groups of islands, which are regarded by geographers as outliers of the

Ownership of the African Islands.
African mainland. The majority of these African islands were occupied by one or other of the European powers long before the period of continental partition. The Madeira Islands to the west of Morocco, the Bissagos
Islands, off the Guinea coast, and Prince's Island and St Thomas' Island, in the Gulf of Guinea, are Portuguese possessions of old standing; while in the Canary Islands and Fernando Po Spain possesses remnants of her ancient colonial empire which are a more valuable asset than any she has acquired in recent times on the mainland. St Helena in the Atlantic, Mauritius and some small groups north of Madagascar in the Indian Ocean, are British possessions acquired long before the opening of the last quarter of the
19th century. Zanzibar, Pemba and some smaller islands which the sultan was allowed to retain were, as has already been stated, placed under British protection in 1890, and the island of Sokotra was placed under the
``gracious favour and protection'' of Great Britain on the 23rd of April
1886. France's ownership of Reunion dates back to the 17th century, but the
Comoro archipelago was not placed under French protection until April 1886.
None of these islands, with the exception of the Zanzibar group, have, however, materially affected the partition of the continent, and they need not be enumerated in the table which follows. But the important island of
Madagascar stands in a different category, both on account of its size and because it was during the period under review that it passed through the various stages which led to its becoming a French colony. The first step was the placing of the foreign relations of the island under French control, which was effected by the treaty of the 17th of December 1885, after the Franco-Malagasy war that had broken out in 1883. In 1890 Great
Britain and Germany recognized a French protectorate over the island, but the Hova government declined to acquiesce in this view, and in May 1895
France sent an expedition to enforce her claims. The capital was occupied on the 30th of September in the same year, and on the day following Queen
Ranavalona signed a convention recognizing the French protectorate. In
January 1896 the island was declared a French possession, and on the 6th of
August was declared to be a French colony. In February 1897 the last vestige of ancient rule was swept away by the deportation of the queen.
Thus in its broad outlines the partition of Africa was begun and ended in the short space of a quarter of a century. There are still many finishing touches to be put to the structure. The southern frontiers of Morocco and
Tripoli remain undefined, while the mathematical lines by which the spheres of influence of the powers were separated one from the other are being variously modified on the do ut des principle as they come to be surveyed and as the effective occupation of the continent progresses. Much labour is necessary before the actual area of Africa and its subdivisions can be accurately determined, but in the following table the figures are at least approximately correct. Large areas of the spheres assigned to different
European powers have still to be brought under European control; but this work is advancing by rapid strides.

BRITISH— Sq. m.

Cape Colony . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 276,995

Natal and Zululand . . . . . . . . . . . 35,371

Basutoland . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10,293

Bechuanaland Protectorate . . . . . . . 225,000

Transvaal and Swaziland . . . . . . . . 117,732

Orange River Colony . . . . . . . . . . 50,392

Rhodesia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 450,000

Nyasaland Protectorate . . . . . . . . . 43,608

British East Africa Protectorate . . . . 240,000

Uganda Protectorate . . . . . . . . . . 125,000

Zanzibar Protectorate . . . . . . . . . 1,020

Somaliland . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68,000

Northern Nigeria . . . . . . . . . . . 258,000

Southern Nigeria (colony and protectorate) 80,000

Gold Coast and hinterland . . . . . 82,000

Sierre Leone (colony and protectorate) . 34,000

Gambia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4,000

Total British Africa . . . . . . . 2,101,411

Egypt and Libyan Desert . . . . . . . . 650,000

Anglo-Egyptian Sudan . . . . . . . . . . 950,000

1,600,000

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