§ MR. LABOUCHERE (Northampton)I beg to ask the Solicitor General whether the Chartered Company of South Africa has any right to the land of Matabeleland, beyond that defined in the concession of Lobengula to Mr. Lippert, and subsequently acquired by the Company, by the terms of which the concessionnaires are allowed to acquire for their uses unoccupied land within the sphere of the operations of the Company; whether this sphere of operations is limited to the mining operations of the Company, as defined in the mining concessions granted by Lobengula to Mr. Rodd and others, and explained in letters from Her Majesty to Lobengula; whether any British subjects can acquire any proprietary rights in a country by conquest, though waging a defensive war, and whether such rights (if any) belong to the State, until they have been specifically made over to individuals, or to any aggregate of individuals calling itself a company; and whether, in the Charter conferred on the South Africa Company, any rights, whether as to laud, mining, or jurisdiction over any portion of South Africa within British influence, were ever granted to the Company beyond those already obtained or subsequently obtained by concessions from the Native rulers?
§ THE SOLICITOR GENERAL (Sir J. RIGBY,) ForfarNo case has arisen which has rendered it necessary or expedient to consult the Law Officers with reference to any of the matters referred to in the question of the hon. Gentleman, and the Law Officers have no knowledge of the facts that would enable them to answer the question. The third paragraph of the question raises a speculative question which it is not within the province of the Law Officers to answer, but it can do no harm to say that British subjects cannot acquire for themselves 1141 proprietary rights in any country by conquest.