NIGERIAN ENTERPRISE 
153 
Coast, and the Niger. The agents of the company per- 
formed excellent service, not only in developing trade, but 
also in maintaining order, protecting traders and missiona- 
ries, and in securing treaties from the native chiefs. The 
British Government, finding that the new corporation, with 
commendable zeal, intelligence, and resourcefulness, was 
succeeding in keeping open the trade routes, stopping the 
slave trade, and preventing civil strife among the natives by 
the promise of British protection, began to subsidize it. In 
1881, the capital was increased to £1,000,000; and in 1882, 
the firm was reorganized as the “National African Com- 
pany,” for the purpose of securing greater efficiency and of 
extending its operations into the vast region north of Lokoja. 
The interests of two French corporations which, attracted 
by the success of the British organization, had established 
stations on the Niger were bought out in 1884. Treaties 
were concluded with the chieftains of Nupé, Sokoto (1885), 
and Boussa; and British trade and authority were carried 
energetically into the northern districts. Meantime, the 
British consul, Hewett, was engaged in making treaties 
with the chiefs of the Oil Rivers district and competing 
with the Germans along the Cameroon border. And the 
French explorers from Senegal reached Bamaku on the 
Upper Niger about the same time, and began a work 
of expansion northward toward Timbuctu. Great Britain, 
at length, under the pressure of these French and German 
activities, realized the necessity of formulating a definite 
policy of expansion in West Africa, and of marking out 
promptly the future field of her operations. She had been 
in no haste to enter upon a race for territory in West Africa. 
Many of her statesmen were strongly opposed to any further 
acquisitions in that region; but the march of events and the 
rise of unforeseen circumstances were slowly but surely 
forcing the British Government into the path of expansion.