"Libya--Which Way Facing?"

The following address was given recently by Sir Alec Kirkbrids,lately Ambassador in Libya, to a meeting of the Royal EmpireSociety to which members of the Royal African Society were invited.The chair was taken by Lt-Col. Sir Stewart Symes.     

Medicine in Africa as I have seen It

This address by Dr. Smith was given before a joint meeting ofthe Royal African Society and the Royal Empire Society withLt.-Col. Sir Stewart Symes in the chair. Dr. Smith is May Readerin Medicine at Oxford University and Physician-in-Charge ofthe tuberculous Meningitis Unit at the United Oxford Hospitals.She formerly worked with Sir Hugh Cairns at the Radcliffe Infirmary,and was associated with him in starting certain research projectsin Africa concerned with various aspects of tuberculosis.     

From Cape to Kampala

The following address was given at a joint meeting of the RoyalAfrican Society and the Royal Empire Society on April 28, 1955Lt-Col. Sir Stewart Symes, G.B.E., K.C.M.G., D.S.O. took thechair.     

Some Aspects of the Sudan Economy

The address that follows was given by His Excellency Sayed AwadSatti, the Sudanese Ambassador in London, to a joint meetingof the Royal African Society and the Royal Empire Society onNovember 1, 1956. Lt.-Col. Sir Stewart Symes, G.B.E., K.C.M.G.,D.S.O., a former Governor-General of the Sudan, took the Chair.     

Judicial Interaction on the Latham Court: A Quantitative Study of Voting Patterns on the High Court 1935-1950

This article examines voting patterns in two sub-periods of the Latham Court (1935-1940 and 1940-1950), where voting is defined as a decision (and associated judgements) by the Justices participating in the disposition of a particular case. There are two main findings. First, from 1935 to 1940 there was a clear four-Justice core consisting of Justices Sir George Rich, Sir Owen Dixon, Herbert Vere Evatt and Sir Edward McTiernan. Over this period, both Chief Justice Sir John Latham and Justice Sir Hayden Starke were outside the core. Second, with the retirement of Justice Evatt, and appointment of Justice Sir Dudley Williams in 1940, the decision-making structure of the Court changed. From 1940 to 1950 there was a loose five-Justice core consisting of Chief Justice Latham, Justices Rich, Dixon, McTiernan and Williams with Justice Starke on the outside. The article argues that observed voting patterns can be explained in terms of personal relationships and ideological differences between the Justices.     

Post‐war Iraq: an assessment

Sir Terence Clark is a Council Member of the Society. He retired from the Diplomatic Service after a distinguished career spent mainly in the Middle East, where he was Ambassador to Iraq and Oman. He is the author of many articles in specialist journals and co‐author of Oman in Time (2001). On 18 June 2003, Sir Terence, together with Sir Harold Walker, Chairman of the Society, spoke to the Society about the situation in Iraq as it then appeared. The following is an edited and updated version of Sir Terence's talk.     

The First Year of Federation

This is the text of an address given by Sir Gilbert Rennie beforethe Royal African Society and the Royal Empire Society on October7, with Sir Miles Thomas, D.F.C., in the chair. Sir Gilbertis High Commissioner for the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasalandin London. He was Governor of Northern Rhodesia from 1947 tothe time of his appointment as Federal High Commissioner onApril 1, 1954. Sir Gilbert was Chief Secretary in Kenya from1939 to 1947. He held the post of Financial Secretary for theGold Coast before that. He served in the Ceylon Civil Servicesfrom 1920 to 1937, when he took up his appointment on the GoldCoast.     

The Future of the Rhodesias

Sir Alfred Beit has recently returned to this country aftera visit with a Parliamentary Delegation to Southern Africa.This article reproduces the more salient of the points he madein a lecture on the 29th November, under the Chairmanship ofSir John Chancellor, the first Governor of Southern Rhodesia.Sir Alfred is now Parliamentary Private Secretary to ColonelOliver Stanley.     

A Turk of the West: Sir Edgar Vincent's Career in Egypt and the Ottoman Empire

This article examines the concept of the ‘gentleman capitalist’, as embodied by the career of Sir Edgar Vincent (1857–1941), arguing that a career as a financier was not incompatible with the status of a gentleman in Victorian Britain. From the 1830s, both the City of London and the British government agreed on free trade as the bedrock of British commercial policy, and the use of financial power as a means of extending both formal and informal empire. The life of Sir Edgar Vincent is discussed in detail, particularly his period in Egypt as Financial Adviser to the Khedive and in Constantinople as Director-General of the Imperial Ottoman Bank. The article concludes that Sir Edgar believed absolutely in Britain's civilizing mission in the Middle East, promoting her interests whenever possible, but equally that he had no qualms about using his official position for financial gain.     

The Royal African Society: ANNUAL REPORT OF THE COUNCIL--1959

Sir Charles Arden Clarke, G.C.M.G., was elected Chairman ofCouncil at the Annual General Meeting, on April 29th, 1959,in succession to Lord Hailey. Sir Charles was the last Governorof the Gold Coast and the first Governor-General of Ghana.     

South-West Africa, the Union and the United Nations

The following address was given at a joint meeting of the RoyalAfrican Society and Royal Commonwealth Society on December 3,1959, by Sir Charles Arden-Clarke G.C.M.G., Chairman of theCouncil, former Governor-General of Ghana, and Chairman of theUnited Nations Good Offices Committee that visited South Africain 1958 to discuss the problem of South-West Africa with theUnion Government. Sir John Macpherson, G.C.M.G., former Governor-Generalof Nigeria, Permanent Under-Secretary at the Colonial Office,took the chair.     

The Sudan: Past, Present and Future

Sir Angus Gillan Served in the Sudan Administration between1909-1939. He is now Director of the Empire Section of the BritishCouncil. This article is an abridgment of a lecture he gave,under the chairmanship of Mr. A.R.I. Mellor, at a combined meetingof the Royal African Society and the Royal Empire Society onthe 26th April. Sir Angus first gave reasons for the world'scomparative ignorance of the Sudan, broken only by events leadingup to the three dates: Khartoum 1885, Omdurman 1898, and Abyssinia1940.     

Opobo To-day

These notes on a recent visit by member of the Nigerian EducationDepartment vividly illustrate life in the small delta portsby-passed by railway development elsewhere. The descendantsof King Jaja, it will be remembered, have just been voted $11,420by Parliament in settlement of a 50-year old claim against thekidnapping of the King by Consul (Sir) Harry Johnston in 1887.In this they were assisted by Sir William Geary, Mr. Sorensen,M.P., and Colonel Ponsonby, M.P. A report says that the moneyis to be used to provide a secondary school.     

The U. N. Disposal of Eritrea

This forms the greater part of a lecture given on the 29th January,with Major-General Sir Richard Lewis in the Chair. In introducingthe speaker General Lewis said that Sir Duncan Cumming had beenone of the first to enter Eritrea when it was captured duringthe war and had been the last to leave in 1952. During, andafter, the war, Sir Duncan had been responsible for the civiladministration of all of the occupied Italian Colonies in theMiddle East, of which Eritrea was one. In 1949, he returnedto his own service in the Sudan and in February, 1951, whenhis predecessor retired from Eritrea owing to ill health, heconsented to undertake the difficult task of implementing theUnited Nations resolution on Eritrea. In eighteen months hehad to hold democratic general elections, in an area where suchthings were not well understood, to create a Government in accordancewith the provisions of the constitution and the resolution,to create a civil service, which entailed as a starting pointthe elementary education of selected literates, and to leavethe country with a balanced budget. Sir Duncan had not had aclean start at the job because at the time of his arrival inEritrea it was not possible to move about freely. The localbrigands had made unescorted movement unsafe: incidents occurreddaily and murders and atrocities were frequent. By the latesummer of 1951 he had made brigandage unprofitable and was ableto turn to his constructive task. In doing so, he won the confidenceand respect and, indeed, the affection, not of merely some ofthe conflicting interests but of them all.     

Sir Syed Ahmad Khan and the Turks

Sir Syed Ahmad Khan was a pioneer of higher education for the Muslims of India after political power passed to the British in the nineteenth century. He was a leader who foresaw with clarity that Hindus and Muslims were bound to seek separate national destinies after the British left India. After the collapse of their own empire, the Indian Muslims aligned themselves with the Ottoman Turks and Sir Syed therefore deliberately chose Turkish models for educational, cultural and even sartorial reform. He was loyal to British rule in India mainly because, though it subdued all Indians, it simultaneously prevented the Hindu domination of Muslims.     

Some Aspects of Economic Development in Uganda

This lecture was given at a joint meeting on the 29th November,with Lord Hailey in the chair. Sir John Hall is the retiringGovernor.     

Uganda's Progress and Problems

The following address was given by the former Governor of Ugandaat a joint meeting of the Royal African Society and the RoyalEmpire Society on February 7, 1957. Sir John Macpherson tookthe chair.     

The Cultural Revolution in Inner Mongolia 1967–1969: The Purge of the “Heirs of Genghis Khan”

This is the edited text of the Lecture which he delivered to the Society on 8 January 2008, immediately after he had been presented with the Sir Percy Sykes Medal. 1 1. The Sir Percy Sykes Memorial Medal, established in 1947, in memory of Sir Percy Sykes (1869–1945), a British soldier and diplomat who spent 25 years associated with Iran, and was author of one of the first histories of that country, A History of Persia, as well as of the travel book Ten Thousand Miles in Persia. The medal is ‘to be awarded by the Council of The Royal Society for Asian Affairs at such time or times as the council may in its discretion think fit, to any distinguished traveller, writer or other distinguished person whatsoever approved by the Society, who is deemed to have increased man's knowledge of and stimulated man's interest in Asian countries, or done work furthering cultural relations between the Commonwealth and Asian countries?…’. Sit Percy Sykes is not to be confused with his contemporary, Sir Mark Sykes, co-author of the 1916 Anglo-French ‘Sykes-Picot’ Agreement. Previous recipients of the award have included Freya Stark, Albert Hourani, Ella Maillart, Hugh Richardson, Giuseppe Tucci, Gunnar Jarring, Denis Wright, Peter Hopkirk, Mark Tully and William Dalrymple. (See Activities of the Society, page 332 of this issue.)     

Presentation of Wellcome Gold Medals

On the 28th April, after the lecture by Lord Hailey, our Presidentwelcomed Comte Sir Maurice Lippens, G.C.V.O., to whom a WellcomeGold Medal was awarded in 1939.     

Kenya's Agricultural Planning

The following address was given by the Director of Agriculture,Kenya, at a joint meeting of the Royal African Society and theRoyal Empire Society on May 2, 1957. Major Sir Thomas Dugdaletook the chair.