and do not use every means that can be employed to preserve to
Madagascar its independence and its liberties.

JAMES SIBREE, Jun.

FOOTNOTES:

[11] The single act which led to the revival of these long-forgotten
claims upon the north-west coast, was the hoisting of the Queen's flag
by two native Sakalava chieftains in their villages. These were hauled
down, and carried away in a French gun-boat, and the flag-staves cut up.

[12] This last claim must be preferred either in perfect ignorance of
what the 1868 treaty really is, or as an attempt to throw dust in the
eyes of the newspaper-reading public.

[13] It is true that during these seventy years various edicts claiming
the country we issued by Louis XIV.; but as the French during all that
time did not attempt to occupy a single foot of territory in Madagascar,
these grandiloquent proclamations can hardly be considered as of much
value. As has been remarked, French pretensions were greatest when their
actual authority was least.

[14] See "Precis sur les Etablissements Francais formes a Madagascar."
Paris, 1836, p.4.

[15] For fuller details as to the character of French settlements in
Madagascar, their gross mismanagement and bad treatment of the people,
see Statement of the Madagascar Committee; and _Souvenirs de
Madagascar_, par M. le Dr. H. Lacaze: Paris, 1881, p. xviii.

[16] The italics are my own.

[17] See also letter of Bishop Ryan, late of Mauritius, _Daily News_,
Dec. 16.

[18] See _Daily News_, Nov. 30 and Dec. 1; _La Liberte_, Nov. 29, and
_Le Parlement_ of same date. Both these French journals speak of an "Act
by which the Tananarivo Government cancelled the Treaty of 1868" (_Le
Parlement_), and of its being "annulled by Queen Ranavalona of her own
authority" (_La Liberte_). It is only necessary to say that no such
"Act" ever had any existence, save in the fertile brains of French
journalists, and it is now brought forward apparently with a view to
excite animosity towards the Malagasy in the minds of their readers.

[19] _E.g., The Manchester Guardian_, Dec. 1st., 5th., and 6th.

[20] Almost all Malagasy words for military tactics and rank are of
English origin, so are many of the words used for building operations,
and the influence of England is also shown by the fact that almost all
the words connected with education and literature are from us, such as
school, class, lesson, pen, copybook, pencil, slate, book, gazette,
press, print, p