ediately after the sitting of the Berlin Congress, and
indeed during it, arrangements were come to by which the respective
claims of England and Germany in South-West Africa were definitely
determined. Almost immediately afterwards a similar process had to
be gone through in order to determine the limits of the respective
"spheres of influence," as they began to be called, of Germany and
England in East Africa. A Chartered Company, called the British East
Africa Association, was to administer the land north of Victoria Nyanza
bounded on the west by the Congo Free State, while to the north it
extended till it touched the revolted provinces of Egypt, of which
we shall soon speak. In South Africa a similar Chartered Company,
under the influence of Mr. Cecil Rhodes, practically controlled the
whole country from Cape Colony up to German East Africa and the
Congo Free State.

The winter of 1890-91 was especially productive of agreements of
demarcation. After a considerable amount of friction owing to the
encroachments of Major Serpa Pinto, the limits of Portuguese Angola
on the west coast were then determined, being bounded on the east
by the Congo Free State and British Central Africa; and at the
same time Portuguese East Africa was settled in its relation both
to British Central Africa on the west and German East Africa on
the north. Meanwhile Italy had put in its claims for a share in
the spoil, and the eastern horn of Africa, together with Abyssinia,
fell to its share, though it soon had to drop it, owing to the
unexpected vitality shown by the Abyssinians. In the same year
(1890) agreements between Germany and England settled the line of
demarcation between the Cameroons and Togoland, with the adjoining
British territories; while in August of the same year an attempt
was made to limit the abnormal pretensions of the French along
the Niger, and as far as Lake Chad. Here the British interests
were represented by another Chartered Company, the Royal Niger
Company. Unfortunately the delimitation was not very definite,
not being by river courses or meridians as in other cases, but
merely by territories ruled over by native chiefs, whose boundaries
were not then particularly distinct. This has led to considerable
friction, lasting even up to the present day; and it is only with
reference to the demarcation between England and France in Africa
that any doubt still remains with regard to the western and central
portions of the