BRITISH AND GERMAN EAST AFRICA, AND UGANDA 109
government, and a Colonial Association organized in 1910
by Lord Delamere and Mr. Grogan, has made a valiant fight
for popular government and better colonjal laws. It was an
outgrowth of the Convention of Associations which repre-
sents all branches of agriculture and industry. Trouble and
discontent are liable to prevail in any colony where the
citizens are not given a share in the administration of the
country, or are not taken into the confidence of the ruler.
This is certain to be the case, when a committee in London
supervises the leading matters of administration, takes a
hand in the distribution of the land, and is susceptible to the
influence of large corporations, like the East Africa Syndi-
cate, which received a lease of five hundred square miles of
the best land on April 29, 1904, at an extremely reasonable
figure.! The resignation of Sir Charles Eliot 2 in 1904,
caused by a difference with the Foreign Office on the ques-
tion of land distribution and the control of the Masai, and in
1911 deportation of the Honorable Galbraith Cole 2 because
he fired at and killed a native sheep-stealer, demonstrate the
evil of a too minute supervision of colonial administrations.
It is usually a wiser and saner policy to permit wide discre-
tionary powers to colonial officials — particularly in the
minor affairs of administration — when they are thoroughly
trained, competent, and forceful, like Sir Percy Girouard.,
1 A twenty-five-year lease without rent for seven years and only a
nominal rental of £500 a year for eighteen years, and the privilege of pur-
chasing the whole tract for £5000 at any time within that period.
2 Brit. Parl. Papers, 1904, Africa No. 8, cd. 2099; and introduction to
his book on the East Africa Protectorate, published in 1905. This excellent
volume contains a comprehensive description of the earlier period in the
East African protectorate ; but it has been superseded somewhat by Lord
Cranworth’s work entitled 4 Colony in the M aking. published in 1912.
* Mr. Cole was one of the most respected colonists in East Africa. He
caught the native in the act of stealing, and was afterwards exonerated
from the charge of murder by a jury. The Times (London), September 11,
1911.
