134 
EUROPE AND AFRICA 
Binger, Director of African Affairs in the Ministry for the 
Colonies, ably represented France; while Martin Gosselin, 
Secretary of the British Embassy, and Colonel William 
Everett supported the British interests as skillfully as Edwin 
Egerton and Sir Joseph Crowe had done in the earlier 
treaties. The results of their negotiations were summed 
up in two “notes” presented by England and France re- 
spectively on February 18 and 24 ! and embodied in the con- 
vention of June 14, 1898,2 referred to above as settling the 
Nikki-Boussa dispute. 
In this treaty the northern boundary of the British Gold 
Coast colony was pushed up from lat. 9° N. to 11°, the 
“debatable” Borgu-Boussa district was practically divided 
between France and Great Britain, and the French claims 
to the “septentrionale et orientale’ shores of Lake Chad, 
were confirmed. France did not get Boussa, or as much of 
a hold on the Lower Niger as she aspired to; but a hundred 
miles of cataracts between her “claims” and the navigable 
part of that river reconciled her to this concession. As a 
compensation, she was permitted to rent two pieces of land 
for trading purposes, one on the Lower Niger opposite the 
chief trading center of northern Dahomey and one at the 
mouth of the Niger. Nor did Great Britain secure Say, or 
all the territory to which she laid claim in the Say-Borgu 
country; but she was more than compensated by her gains 
on the Gold Coast frontier, and in the advantages incident 
to the settlement of the whole question of the boundary 
lines between the French and British spheres of influence 
in West Africa. Thus the first stage of French expansion 
was complete. Her colonial possessions reached from the 
Atlantic, via the Senegal and the Niger Rivers, to Lake 
Chad; and with this vast tract she had safely and securely 
L Arch. Dip., 1899, part 1, pp. 188-93. 
t Ibid., pp. 195-201; and Brit. and For. St. Papers, vol. 91, pp. 88-54.