S. Arnot, an
Englishman, spent two years in the country (1882-1884) and in 1884 a
mission, fruitful of good results, was established by the Societe des
Missions Evangeliques de Paris. Its first agent was Francois Coillard
(1834-1904), who had previously been engaged in mission work in Basutoland
and who devoted the rest of his life to the Barotse. Though always an
admirer of British institutions and anxious that the country should
ultimately fall under British jurisdiction, Coillard in the interests of
his mission was in the first instance anxious to delay the advent of white
men into the country. It was contrary to his advice that Lewanika
petitioned the "Great White Queen" to assume a protectorate over his
dominions, but from the moment Great Britain assumed responsibility and the
advance of European civilization became inevitable, all the influence
acquired by Coillard's exceptional personal magnetism and singleness of
purpose was used to prepare the way for the extension of British rule. Only
those few pioneers who knew the Barotse under the old conditions can fully
realise what civilization and England owe to the co-operation of this
high-minded Frenchman.

Under the Chartered Company's rule considerable progress has been made in
the development of the resources of the country, especially in opening up
the mining districts in the north. The seat of the administration, Kalomo,
is on the "Cape to Cairo" railway, about midway between the Zambezi and
Kafue rivers. The railway reached the Broken Hill copper mines, 110 m. N.
of the Kafue in 1906, and the Belgian Congo frontier in 1910. From Lobito
Bay in Portuguese West Africa a railway was being built in 1909 which would
connect with the main line near the Congo frontier. This would not only
supply Barotseland with a route to the sea alternative to the Beira and
Cape Town lines, but while reducing the land route by many hundred miles
would also supply a seaport outlet 1700 m. nearer England than Cape Town
and thus create a new and more rapid mail route to southern Rhodesia and
the Transvaal. The Zambezi also, with Kebrabasa as its one bar to
navigation between Barotseland and the sea, will supply a cheap line of
communication. (See RHODESIA.)

See David Livingstone, _Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa_
(London, 1857); Major Serpa Pinto, _How I crossed Africa_ (London, 1881);
F. Coillard, _On the Threshold of Central Africa_ (London, 1897); Major A.
St H