"I think," said he, "every Colony in South Africa has been very remiss
in the matter of attracting immigrants. You have only to look at the
statistics of population--black and white--to see how disproportionate
are the two races. The Cape of Good Hope, with 221,000 square miles,
has nearly a million and a quarter of coloured people to 377,000 whites,
and the former are multiplying with extraordinary rapidity. Natal,
again, as I have said, has 45,000 whites and nearly a million coloured
people. British Bechuanaland, with only a little over 5000 whites, has
65,000 coloured people. Matabeleland, or rather what is now Rhodesia,
had some years ago only 2500 whites and 250,000 natives. Of course, the
whites are more numerous now, but still the disparity is sufficiently
striking."
"It has been asserted very freely that until the production of gold
assumes large proportions the white population cannot increase, because
they have nothing to subsist upon."
"There is always a place for intending farmers. If the land is to be
parcelled out among such, the present is as good a time for them as it
is for the miners."
"Men, of course, can support themselves on farms, even although there is
no town in the vicinity to furnish a market for their surplus produce?"
"Exactly so. It is necessary in the end to have markets, of course; but
the first necessary thing is to make a home. Considering the conditions
of this country and the rapid growth of population, with the closure of
the United States, with only Canada and Australia open to the surplus
population, where is there a better country for Englishmen than
Rhodesia?"