ABSTRACT
It has been truly remarked that more permanent good can be accomplished “by tact and gold with Mohammedan chiefs in West Africa than by the Maxim and the rifle.” That is a policy which has had much to do with our great and striking success in India. Its application to Afghanistan has within recent years been amply justified by results. Why should it not be followed in Northern Nigeria? Which is cheaper, an output of £5000 per annum in subsidies, or the expenditure of much larger sums in military operations? What is more likely to conduce to the prosperity of a vast densely populated tropical estate where the white man cannot settle, to gain your own ends peaceably, albeit not so speedily as might be desired, or to use force and face the dislocation of the existing social system which violent measures entail? Few people, if they will but calmly consider the matter, can fail to endorse the quotation given above. In Northern Nigeria the question is not merely one of expediency; it affects the honour of England.
