I PROPOSE in this chapter to deal with the forms
of government in force in the British tropical col-
onies, the French tropical colonies, and in the
Dutch colony of Java, a range of inquiry which
embraces all the more efficient types of adminis-
tration to be found to-day in the tropical depend-
encies of European powers.

The British tropical colonies are Labuan, Ceylon,
the Straits Settlements, and Hong Kong, forming
an eastern group; Fiji, and British New Guinea
in the Pacific; Gambia, the Gold Coast, Lagos,
Sierra Leone, and Mauritius, forming an African
group; and the West Indian colonies of Bar-
bados, Jamaica, the Windward Islands ( St. Lucia,
St. Vincent, Grenada), the Leeward Islands (An-
tigua, St. Kitts-Nevis, Montserrat, Anguilla, the
Virgin Islands, and Dominica), Trinidad, Tobago,
and Turks Islands; with British Guiana and Brit-
ish Honduras on the mainland of the American
continent.

In addition to these there are a number of small

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