In the course of an address recently delivered by Mr. Stanley before the members of the chamber of commerce in Manchester, he very cleverly referred to the coming demands for cotton cloths alone in the Congo valley, his remarks creating most enthusiastic applause. As a result of the showing made by Mr. Stanley, several manufacturers of cotton goods have dispatched agents to the Congo to investigate and report upon the possibility of their being able to realize the hope which has thus been inspired. I quote as follows, from Mr. Stanley's address:

I was interested the other day in making a curious calculation, which was, supposing that all the inhabitants of the Congo basin were simply to have one Sunday dress each, how many yards of Manchester cloth would be required, and the amazing number was 320,000,000 yards, just for one Sunday dress. Proceeding still further with these figures, I found that two Sunday dresses and four everyday dresses would in one year amount to 3,840,000,000 yards, which, at 2d. per yard, would be of the value of £16,000,000. The more I pondered upon these things, I discovered that I could not limit these stores of cotton cloth to day dresses. I would have to provide for night dresses also, and these would consume 160,000,000 yards. Then the grave clothes come into mind, and, as a poor lunatic who burned Bolobo Station destroyed 30,000 yards of cloth in order that he should not be cheated out of a respectable burial, I really feared for a time that the millions would get beyond measurable calculation. However, putting such accidents aside, I estimate that, if my figures of population are approximately correct, 2,000,000 die every year, and to bury these decently, and according to the custom of those who possess cloth, 16,000,000 yards will be required, while the 40,000 chiefs will require an average of 100 yards each, or 4,000,000 yards. I regarded these figures with great satisfaction, and I was about to close my remarks upon the millions of yards of cloth that Manchester would perhaps be required to produce, when I discovered that I had neglected to provide for the family wardrobe or currency chest, for you must know that in Lower Congo there is scarcely a family that has not a cloth fund of about a dozen pieces of about 24 yards each. This is a very important institution; otherwise how are the family necessities to be provided for? How are the fathers and mothers of families to go to market to buy greens, bread, oil, ground nuts, chickens, fish, and goats, and how is the petty trade to be conducted? How is ivory to be purchased, the gums, rubber, dye powders, gunpowder, copper slugs, guns, trinkets, knives, and swords to be bought without a supply of cloth?

Now, 8,000,000 families at 300 yards each will require 2,400,000,000. You all know how perishable such currency must be; but if you sum up these several millions of yards, and value all of them at the average price of 2d. per yard, you will find that it will be possible for Manchester to create a trade, in the course of time, in cottons in the Congo basin, amounting in value to about £26,000,000 annually. I have said nothing about Rochdale savelist, or your own superior prints, your gorgeous handkerchiefs with their variegated patterns, your checks and striped cloths, your ticking and twills. I must satisfy myself with suggesting them; your own imagination will no doubt carry you to the limbo of immeasurable and incalculable millions.

I ask your attention particularly to the inclosures numbered 1 to 6, being, 1, map of Equatorial Africa, from the latest surveys and reports, made by the agents of the International Association; 2, names of the presidents of the branch National Committee of the Industrial Association; 3, list of treaties concluded by agents of the International Association and districts wherein territory has been ceded; 4, table showing river and sea coast frontage within the territory of the association, with distances from station to station; 5, names of stations belonging to the International Association, with number of men employed, &c.; 6, manifests of the International Association.

I have, &c.,

19 FOR

W. P. TISDEL.

Treaties concluded by the agents of the International Congo Association with the chiefs of tribes in the basin of the Congo and the Niado Kwilu.

NOTE.-One hundred and eighteen white men, 1,249 laborers and police, 8 steamboats, 3 sailing-vessels, 4 steel lighters, 6 wooden lighters, 2 gigs, 112 boatnien; porters innumerable and employed as found necessary.

[Inclosure 5.]

Manifesto of the International Association.

The Association have declared to the Government of the United States that they have resolved to levy no customs duties whatever upon goods imported into their territories, whether by land or water, the sole object being to enable commerce to follow the Association's advance into inner equatorial Africa; that a guarantee is given to foreigners settling in their territories of the right to purchase, sell, or lease lands and buildings situated therein, to establish commercial houses, and trade upon the sole condition of obedience to the laws of the State. The Association pledge themselves also not to grant to the citizens of one nation any advantages without extending the same to the citizens of all other nations, and to do all in their power to prevent the slave trade. The Secretary of State of the Government of the United States acknowledged the receipt of the foregoing notification, and declared that the Government of the United States announced its sympathy with, and approval of, the humane and benevolent purposes of the Association, administering, as it does, the interests of the Free States

there established, and will order the officers of the United States both on land and sea to recognize the flag of the Association as the flag of a friendly Government.

From the date of these reciprocal declarations the Congo territory became open to free commerce, and the forces at the disposal of the Association were able to insure order and tranquillity in the country.

The headquarters of the Association are established in Brussels, because from thence flow the financial resources which have sustained the enterprise for the last six years. Liberia was upheld financially for thirty-nine years by the American Colonization Society. When the new State shall have been recognized by Europe the fountainhead will continue to furnish supplies, which are a substitute for the customs dues which have been publicly renounced. It is reasonably hoped that commerce will be attracted by the exceptional advantages to be found in the new State, and that a considerable impulse will be given to trade, thus enhancing the hitherto undeveloped natural resources of the country and creating public wealth. The European traders on the Congo are unanimous in their desire that the present condition of things shall not be disturbed, by which all can freely enter into commercial negotiations with the natives. Full satisfaction to this desire is given by the Association; absolute freedom of trade is insured, with the advantage of a civilized power to assist them in case of necessity. However it may be, the Association does not press England to recognize their sovereignty. They simply say "examine this work impartially, and judge of its merits, and until you are satisfied make no engagements which shall close forever the commercial liberty in the Congo Valley for which we are striving."

With regard to the question how it is proposed to govern the Congo States, the legislation of the Congo territory, subject to the supervision and control of the Association, shall be based upon the principles of law recognized by civilized nations, and upon the philanthropic principles set forth in the well-known plan of the Association, whose aim is to civilize Africa by encouragement given to legitimate trade. At first, account will be taken of the actual state of the native population; administration and judicial organization will march in a parallel line with the progress of these populations. Meanwhile the country will be governed, as it is at present, by an administrator-general, who will have at his disposal the necessary means for the maintenance of public order. It may be asked, how do you propose to support the Government without customs duties? Far from constituting the only resources of a state, the customs duties only represent a part of its revenue and the least important portion of it. Eminent economists condemn customs from a fiscal point of view. They admit their usefulness only as a temporary means for the protection of some newborn trade with a future before it. In any other case they regard customs in the light of a tax that is more costly than productive, because by thwarting commercial liberty it burdens the production of wealth. This doctrine is also that of Richard Cobden and John Bright, and has been adopted by the Association. They consider, like these two illustrious representatives of the Manchester school, that when two nations freely exchange the produce of their countries they both increase respectively their capital and derive benefit from the transaction. The exchange of produce between two nations is generally followed by interchange of ideas, and it will then be seen how judicious was the decision taken by the Association not to establish customs on their frontiers and it will then be understood how deserving is the Association of the congratulations of those who take an interest in the moral and material progress of the African races. By granting entire freedom to trade, and by abolishing customhouse vexations, the Association wish to attract to their territories commerce and capital. The Congo region abounds in produce of various kinds now lost to the world, although industry might turn it to such marvelous account. Thanks to trade, all this produce will enter into circulation; the counterpart of its value will return to Africa, for which it will prove a source of prosperity. The Congo State will then be in the same circumstances as all civilized countries we know, and will then be able to bear the expenses of its public services by and through the wealth obtained by its natural resources.

The Association possess a capital at their disposal of which the interest has sufficed hitherto to cover the expenses of their work. As soon as the State shall have been recognized by the civilized nations, and its political existence assured, this capital will be employed to endow the new State which will then have been founded. The interest derived from this endowment fund will be equal to the revenue which might be obtained by a system of custom-house duties. It will suffice to defray all expenses of the new State until such time as the increase of public wealth, the natural increase in the white population, will allow of its fulfilling all its engagements, as has just been explained.

Thus the future of the new State has been secured, and the death of its founders would no more imperil its existence than that of King Leopold I imperilled the existence of Belgium or the death of George Peabody imperilled the endowment fund that bears his name.

When a large number of white men shall have permanently settled in the country, will they, it may also be asked, have any part in the government? The legislation given to the new State will decide after what manner the divers interests are to be represented in the Government. It is impossible to give more precise information as to what will be the legislation of the future, just as it is impossible to predict the changes that will be introduced into the constitution of the different nations of the world. The first laws given will be nearly similar to those adopted for the colonies of the British Crown. The central power will reside in Belgium so long as the revenues emanate from the headquarters of the Association. By that power shall be chosen the functionaries for the different posts in Europe or in Africa. The selection will be made without reference to nationality, competency being the principal requirement.

When the new State is definitely established, the direction in Africa shall consist of a governor-general, assisted by a legislative council and an executive committee. The judicial organization is to comprise commercial courts of justice, inferior courts for civil causes, a superior court, and a court of appeal.

The cases which may be referred to the central power are fully determined by law. The natives are admitted on an equality with the Europeans before the law, provided they fulfill the obligations prescribed by law. Every sensible and practical man will understand that the authorities will have to show some consideration for the habits and the ideas of the natives in matters of administration and justice. Before laying down new laws and regulations applicable to them, a period of transition must be allowed to pass, during which they may continue to follow their own customs as long as these are not atrocious and inhumau.

The new State has formally declared that there shall be no customs duties established. The revenue derived from the endowment fund will be in lien of the funds which the customs dues would have furnished. To obtain the complementary resources which will be necessary to insure the regular working of the public services, the new State will have recourse to the same expedients, when necessary, as those employed by other civilized Governments, though for the present such considerations are altogether premature. The right to settle, purchase, or sell or lease lands and buildings, establish houses and trade freely has been formally granted in the declaration to the United States Government. Provisionally differences between natives will be settled according to existing local customs. Quarrels and disputes between Europeans and natives are to belong to the jurisdiction of the law courts that will be established.

No. 6.]

Ne. 226.

Mr. Frelinghuysen to Mr. Tisdel.

[Extract.]

DEPARTMENT OF STATE,

Washington, December 12, 1884.

SIR: When you were designated as agent to the States of the Congo Association it was not intended, either by this Department or by Congress, to actually accredit you to the Government of the States of the Congo Association, as it was well known here that those States, as a political entity, did not exist.

You were charged with introducing and extending the commerce of the United States in the Congo Valley, and in order to definitely fix the scope of your mission, you were designated as agent to the States of the Congo Association, because it was believed here that the resi dents of the region adjoining and including the Congo Valley seemed on the verge of establishing constitutional States by progressive movement in that direction.

Your designation was geographical rather than political.

I am, &c.,

FRED'K T. FRELINGHUYSEN.