The French Government has made the purchase negotiations now pending
between King Leopold and the Belgian Parlia- ment in regard to the Congo Free State, an excuse for the publication of a Yellow Book including documents intended to assert that the Republic has a right of pre-emption. That France has this right in preference to all other nations except Belgium, is admitted. The question is, whether, since the King of the Belgians is also the head of the Congo State, this limitation is good as against his own Kingdom. The point is one which would have delighted the transcendental lawyers of the sixteenth century, who, for example, loved to discuss such problems as whether the King was seised of his Duchy of Lancaster in respect of his " body natural," or whether he possessed it, as he did the rest of the possessions of the Crown, in his capacity of a corporation sole.
