CONGO FREE STATE

CONGO FREE STATE embraced most of the basin of the Congo, touching British territory in Uganda and Rhodesia, with a very narrow outlet to the Atlantic at the river mouth. It is under the sovereignty of Leopold II. of Belgium, who, in 1890, made over his rights to Belgium with power to annex the State in 1900. It is nine times the size of Great Britain, and continual native unrest gives great trouble to its administrators. Its waters are open to all nations, and traders exchange manufactured goods for ivory, palm-oil, coffee and caoutchouc, bees-wax and fruits. The climate is tropical, on the lower levels malarial. The centre of administration is Boma, 80 m. from the sea.