§ MR. LAWRENCE (Liverpool, Abercromby)I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether the Congo Free State has established any post, military or otherwise, in the Nile Valley, south of Khartoum; whether Her Majesty's Government has expressed to the parties interested any disapproval of such extension on the part of the Free State into a district which was never contemplated as within its area of influence; and whether he will, at an early date, lay upon the Table of the House any correspondence that may have taken place on the subject?
§ *SIR E. GREYHer Majesty's Government, in reply to repeated inquiries, have been informed by the authorities of the Congo Free State that no Report whatever has been received of the establishment of any post in the Nile Valley. Those authorities are aware of the views of Her Majesty's Government on the subject, but they have not admitted that orders inconsistent with those views have been given to the leaders of the expedition which seems to have gone with some undefined object in the direction of the Nile. Papers cannot be laid at present.