cial may be discharged at once by the Governor-General on the ground
of unfitness for service in Africa; and the man, when discharged, has no
means of gaining redress. The natural result is the growth of a habit of
almost slavish obedience to the authorities, not only in regard to the
written law, but also to private and semi-official intimations[476].

[Footnote 476: Cattier, _Droit et Administration . . . du Congo,_ pp.
243-245.]

Another blot on the record of the Congo Free State is the exclusive
character of the trading corporation to which it has granted
concessions. Despite the promises made to private firms that early
sought to open up business in its land, the Government itself has become
a great trading corporation, with monopolist rights which close great
regions to private traders and subject the natives to vexatious burdens.
This system took definite form in September 1891, when the Government
claimed exclusive rights in trade in the extreme north and north-east.
At the close of that year Captain Baert, the administrator of these
districts, also enjoined the collection of rubber and other products by
the natives for the benefit of the State.

The next step was to forbid to private traders in that quarter the right
of buying these products from natives. In May 1892 the State monopoly in
rubber, etc., was extended to the "Equator" district, natives not being
allowed to sell them to any one but a State official. Many of the
merchants protested, but in vain. The chief result of their protest was
the establishment of privileged companies, the "Societe Anversoise" and
the "Anglo-Belgian," and the reservation to the State of large areas
under the title of _Domaines prives_ (Oct. 1892)[477]. The apologetic
skill of the partisans of the Congo State is very great; but it will
hardly be equal to the task of proving that this new departure is not a
direct violation of Article V. of the General Act of the Berlin
Conference of 1885, quoted above.

[Footnote 477: For a map of the domains now appropriated by these and
other privileged "Trusts," see Morel, _op. cit._ p. 466.]

A strange commentary on the latter part of that article, according full
protection to all foreigners, was furnished by the execution of the
ex-missionary, Stokes, at the hands of Belgian officials in 1895--a
matter for which the Congo Government finally made grudging and
incomplete reparation[478]. Another case was as bad. In 1901 an Austrian
trad