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EUROPE AND AFRICA 
Mawambi on the Aruwimi — only eighty miles from Uganda 
— in November, 1902 and the Hinde Cataracts on the Lua- 
laba-Congo in 1903. Although the Congo officials refused 
to permit the establishment of missions on the Aruwimi 
and in some other districts, or to allow him to carry on his 
work and his investigations freely in all sections of the Congo 
Basin, his labors among the natives (with whom he was very 
popular because of his gentle manners, cheerful patience, 
and friendly spirit) were remarkably successful, and as an ex- 
plorer he earned a reputation in Central Africa second only 
to that of Stanley. 
For twenty-three years King Leopold administered the 
State through two ministers resident at Brussels and one 
Administrator-General living at Boma on the Lower Congo, 
the latter controlling the fourteen districts, each under a 
commissioner, into which the territory was divided. The 
Government appropriated all the land not then actually in 
use by the natives to itself as the public domain, which it 
divided into the “Domaine de la Couronne” and the 
“Domaine Privé,” The “Domaine de la Couronne,” 
located in the center of the Congo region, embraced a district 
six times the size of Belgium, and was set aside as the special 
property of the ruler. The “Domaine Privé” was the ex- 
clusive property of the State and included nearly one half 
the area of the Congo Basin. It was situated north of the 
“Domaine de la Couronne” and of lat. 8° S.; and, beginning 
about 1890, the Government began to sublet large districts 
to trading companies and to confer extensive monopolies of 
various sorts on private corporations in order to insure the 
development of the country. The remaining territory to 
the south and west of the crown property and the state 
domain was left open at first; but after 1898 the greater part 
of this was let out in large districts to concessionnaire com- 
panies with both commercial rights and political powers.