animals, is the explanation of many of the seemingly inexplicable traits
in his character, traits which are conspicuous in the bees and ants, and
in varying degrees remarkable in other animals that have attained to
some more or less complete communism. For instance, a native will share
as a matter of course the last bite with any one of the same clan (a
relationship that is expressed by the word "ndugu"), yet he will watch
starve with the most perfect equanimity another native who, even though
of the same tribe, does not come within that mystic denomination.
Should, however, even his "ndugu" become very sick or otherwise
incapable of taking his part in the battle of life, he is left to take
care of himself as best he can, and everything is devoted to the
sustenance of those who are still capable. In this respect the native
is inferior to the elephant, who will at considerable risk to themselves
endeavour to assist a wounded comrade from the field of battle. The
fundamental basis of native society is local communism and disregard for
all outside that commune; though at times the various communes that
constitute a tribe will combine for some object of equal benefit to all.
The rarity, however, of this combination for a purpose is what
constitutes the essential weakness of all African peoples. The old Zulu
_regime_, and the till recently remarkable cohesion of the Ruanda
people, are the conspicuous exceptions, and are proof of what
possibilities lie to the hand of dusky Napoleons in Africa. The Arabs
fully realized and availed themselves of this inherent lack of
combination amongst the tribes. The success of their policy of
disintegration should serve as a useful example for our African
statesmen. Many of our failures are to be attributed to our not having
grasped the dominant fact that every chief who is left in possession of
his power is a source of strength to ourselves, to be used as a
counterpoise to every other chief similarly placed. It stands to reason
that several definite units--to wit, clans consolidated under the aegis
of responsible men--can be more easily brought to focus than a
heterogeneous mass, incomplete in itself, and which will be bound to
gravitate to any adventurer who may acquire a temporary hearing. The
great mass, strangled as it is by innate superstition, hidebound by
tradition, and so situated as to be incapable of enlightenment other
than the most microscopically gradual, can never be brought thoroughly
under white rule. It must be ruled by its constituted and therefore
accepted chiefs, who alone can be made responsible to the
Administration. How to bring these chiefs under our influence without
lessening their local prestige, and how to infuse the necessary element
of competition _inter se_, are the problems the solution of which will
materially facilitate the thorny path of African administration. A
curious quality, and one in some degree referable to this low stage of
evolution, is their inability to grasp the idea of a natural death. If a
man's head is smashed, they can associate the obvious cause and effect,
but any death less easily explained is attributed to some such factor as
the "evil eye." This is invariable with the Soudanese tribes, and is a
source of unending trouble to the officers in command of Soudanese
troops. Again, the utter disregard for the future would argue a social
stage inferior to the bees. No native can be induced to look to the
morrow. Over and over again we served out rations to our men, for, say,
a week, and informed them that by no possible means could they obtain
food during that week; yet on every occasion they ate it all the first
day or threw away what they could not eat, trusting, in their
characteristic optimism, that something would turn up. Nor do they ever
learn from experience. Every year that the rains fail or their crops
are for some reason deficient, they are caught and philosophically
starve, yet two days more of work would place them beyond all
possibility of famine.
Another very essential factor has to be taken into consideration in an
endeavour to grasp the native character. That is the lack of the two
sentiments, gratitude and pity, which enter so largely into the workings
of the European mind. As far as I am aware, in all the Bantu dialects
there is no word that remotely suggested either of these virtues. In
the Swahili tongue the word asanti (thank you) has been borrowed from
another language for the benefit of the mixed Hindu-Persian and Arab
elements who constitute Swahili society. A few anecdotes will exemplify
this lack.
I was paddling across the Shire river to Chiromo, when a native asked me
to give him a lift across. I did so, and no sooner had he landed, than
he asked me for a present for having done so.
Another boy, who had been bitten by a deadly snake, came to me for
treatment. With considerable difficulty, and the expenditure of my last
bottle of whisky, I saved his life. Having completely recovered, he
helped himself to such of my movables as he could conveniently annex,
and absconded.
Their lack of the sense of pity is shown in their brutal treatment of
animals, of the sick, and of those who are too old to work. Even the
Portuguese or Spanish treatment of animals is Christian compared to a
native's method. They are impervious to the sufferings of others, and
rather regard them as a joke. On one occasion several boys were
standing under a tree, when a snake dropped from a branch, and bit one
of the boys on the cheek, causing the most intense pain which ended only
in death. The other boys thought it great fun, and were distorted with
laughter at the agonized convulsions of the unfortunate.
A further proof of the lack of these senses is their utter inability to
understand them in others.
An amusing case that came to my notice is a proof in point. An official
had engaged a cook at 10s. a month, who for three months gave complete
satisfaction. At the end of that time he called the native before him,
and explained that as he had done his work so well, his wages would be
raised to 15s. a month. The cook appeared to be rather puzzled, and
went away. The following morning he returned and demanded 15s., arguing
that he was the same now as he had been before and that therefore he
ought to have 5s. more for each of the three months which he had spent
in his service. From that day he became useless, and eventually left,
firm in the conviction that he had been swindled out of 15s.
Another man of my acquaintance saved a small child from a crocodile.
The child's hand was badly torn, but after careful tending, with the
help of a doctor brought at considerable expense from the nearest
station, he was sent home completely cured. Thereupon the child's
father and mother arrived on the scene, and demanded a large present
because the child had been kept so long.
Gratitude or pity in others they attribute to fear, or the desire to get
the better of them. They look upon kindness as a thing suspicious, a
move to cloak some ulterior design. Nor can they understand leniency,
but consider it weakness. They themselves are either abject grovellers
or blustering bullies. The Arab understands this, and rules with a rod
of iron; the natural result of which is that natives prefer Arab service
to British, the philanthropy of which they do not understand, and either
mistrust or despise. Strict justice they do understand; but it must be
based on the "eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth" school. The
unreasoning philanthropy which is the latest phase of our "unctuous
rectitude" is as pearls before swine, and, as with other nations, so
with natives, merely renders us objects of pity.
I trust that these few points are sufficient to indicate the
difficulties that lie before the student of native character. Yet in
spite of this, there exists a certain section of the community at home
who presume to dictate the methods to be adopted in dealing with
natives. Strong in their magnificent ignorance of the local
requirements, racial characteristics, and the factors that make society,
men are found who will condemn such acts as the desecration of the
Mahdi's tomb. These individuals, unless specialists, would never dream
of discoursing on the treatment of horses, spectral analysis, or any
other subject requiring special study, yet, with a confidence sublime in
its assurance, they will launch forth into the still more abstruse
subject of native administration. Nothing is more to be deprecated than
this meddling on the part of the stay-at-homes, in the methods adopted
by the men specially selected to undertake the difficult task of ruling
these peoples. We select the men whom we think most capable of
promoting the prosperity of the countries in question, and instead of
allowing them to find out by experience the methods most productive of
good, we cramp their efforts by well-intentioned but fatal limitations
on points of which we are necessarily profoundly ignorant. If, as a
section of the press would lead us to believe, we are compelled to
assume that every man who leaves this country _ipso facto_ becomes an
abandoned ruffian, the sooner we shut up our branch shops, and retain
our servants under the watchful eye of the man in blue, the better for
all concerned. But if, on the other hand, we are confident that we are
promoting the welfare of the community at large by assuming these
responsibilities, and believe that we can find reliable men to carry on
the work, the least that we can do is to allow those men to profit by
and regulate their methods on the experience that they must necessarily
acquire, and which is necessarily denied to us. The fact that the
method most productive of good in Africa is not the same as the method
most productive of good at home is no evidence of the inadvisability of
its adoption. A thousand and one factors known only to the man on the
spot must be assumed. In the halcyon days that are no doubt coming, no
one will be allowed to hold an important position in the Government who
has not gone through the mill of travel. "What do they know of England
who only England know?" What indeed! In an empire like ours, of which
the British isles are already but the viscera, it is inconceivable that
men who are largely responsible for the administration of that empire
should display the gaping ignorance of the elements of which it is
composed, which daily passes without comment. This external
interference is of paramount importance. It is crushing all our African
ventures, and with the rapidly-increasing facility of communication
attendant on telegraphic construction, its effect is becoming daily more
conspicuous. In the old days men were bound to act on their own
initiative; now the tendency is to shirk responsibility by appealing to
headquarters. This paralyzes decisive action, which alone is effective
in dealing with natives. A general outline of policy should be adopted
on the recommendation of the best available experts, but every possible
detail should be left to the discretion of the local official. Many of
the ridiculous restrictions that are made are nothing short of insults
to the men affected by them. Imagine placing one man in charge of a
district such as Toro--Toro is larger than Ireland, and consequently the
position is one of enormous responsibility--and telling that man that he
must not give more than twenty-five lashes to a native. It is grotesque.
Twenty-five lashes would kill an average Toro native, but a hundred
lashes barely make the dust fly off a Manyema porter. Surely details of
this description should be left to the judgment of the man who can weigh
the facts of the case.
But few people at home realize what an alarming and ever-growing
difficulty has to be faced in the African native problem. It is a
difficulty that is unique in the progress of the world. In Australia,
Tasmania, New Zealand (in a minor degree), and America the aborigine has
faded out of existence before the irresistible and to him insufferable
advance of the white man. But not so the African, who in this sense
differs entirely from other savages. Under the beneficent rule of the
white man he thrives like weeds in a hot-house. Originally, the two
great checks on population were smallpox and internecine strife. These
have been minimized by the advent of white rule, and the resulting rate
of increase is one to stagger the statistician. The stately Maori, the
wild Australian, the chivalrous Tasmanian, and the grim Redskin have
given up the struggle, and are fast going the way of the mammoth and the
dodo, but in white-teethed content the negro smiles and breeds apace,
mildly contemptuous of the mad Englishman who does so much for him and
expects so little in return. What is to be done with this
ever-increasing mass of inertia? We have undertaken his education and
advancement. When we undertake the education of a child or beast we
make them work, realizing that work is the sole road to advancement. But
when we undertake the education of a negro, who, as I have endeavoured
to show, is a blend of the two, we say, "Dear coloured man, thou elect
of Exeter Hall, chosen of the negrophil, darling of the unthinking
philanthropist, wilt thou deign to put thy hand to the plough, or dost
prefer to smoke and tipple in undisturbed content? We, the white men,
whom thy conscience wrongly judges to be thy superiors, will arrange thy
affairs of state. Sleep on, thou ebony idol of a jaded civilization,
maybe anon thou wilt sing 'Onward, Christian Soldiers!'"
A good sound system of compulsory labour would do more to raise the
native in five years than all the millions that have been sunk in
missionary efforts for the last fifty; but at the very sound of
"compulsory labour," the whole of stay-at-home England stops its ears,
and yells, "Slavery!" and not knowing what "slavery" is, yells
"Slavery!" again, nor ever looks at home nor realizes that we are all
slaves. Have we not compulsory education, taxes, poor-rates, compulsory
this and compulsory that, with "jail" as the alternative? Nor are we
paid by the State for being educated. Then let the native be compelled
to work so many months in the year at a fixed and reasonable rate, and
call it compulsory education. Under such a title, surely the most
delicate British conscience may be at rest. Thereby the native will be
morally and physically improved; he will acquire tastes and wants which
will increase the trade of the country; he will learn to know the white
man and his ways, and will, by providing a plentiful supply of labour,
counterbalance the physical disadvantages under which the greater part
of Africa labours, and thus ensure the future prosperity of the land,
whereby, with the attendant security of tenure and of the rights of the
individual, he will have that chance of progressive evolution which
centuries of strife and bloodshed have denied him. Inducements might be
offered to chiefs to make plantations of wheat, rice, coffee, and other
suitable products, by exempting a number of their men, proportionate to
the area cultivated, from the annual educational course.
This perpetual wail of "slavery," which is always raised to combat
legitimate and reasonable discussion, is due to ignorance, to the
inability to discriminate between the status of slavery and
slave-raiding. Slave-raiding was a curse beyond belief, and is now,
happily, to all intents a nightmare of the past, but the status of
slavery is still widespread, and with many peoples is necessary and
beneficent. The line between slavery and freedom is a very nice
distinction. We can all be called upon to fight or to give up our goods
for the common weal, or, as we phrase it, for the cause of progress.
Then why should not other peoples be called upon to work for the cause
of progress? There is a sound maxim in the progress of the world: "What
cannot be utilized must be eliminated." And drivel as we will for a
while, the time will come when the negro must bow to this as to the
inevitable. Why, because he is black and is supposed to possess a soul,
we should consider him, on account of that combination, exempt, is
difficult to understand, when a little firmness would transform him from
a useless and dangerous brute into a source of benefit to the country
and of satisfaction to himself.
I invariably had trouble with my natives when they were not occupied.
The native has no means of amusing himself, nor idea of making
occupation, and consequently, like women similarly situated, has
recourse to chatter and the hatching of mischief. Work, I am convinced,
is the keynote to the betterment of the African; and he will not work
for the asking. No amount of example will assist him. What are the
results of several hundred years' communication with the Portuguese? A
few natives wear hats, and the women's morals have deteriorated. Africa
labours under many disadvantages--remoteness from markets,
inaccessibility, dearth of waterways, and in parts a pestilential
climate; but it has one great advantage in an inexhaustible supply of
potential labour, which, if properly handled, should place it on terms
of equality with countries more favourably endowed by Nature.
The first essential in opening up new country in Africa is for the
Administration to fix a rate of pay, and to make that rate a low one.
If it is left to competition the rate is bound to be forced up by
contending trading companies. The first profits from new country are
usually large, and the difficulty of obtaining labour very great before
the native has gained confidence. Hence the rate dependent on
competition is a fictitious one, and cannot be sustained under the
conditions that will prevail subsequent to the harvesting of the
first-fruits of the land. But it will be well-nigh impossible ever to
lower the rate to meet diminishing profits. At first sight this seems
severe on the native, but in reality it is not so. As he is, he has
every necessary of life, and everything that we give him is a luxury.
The taste for pay is a cultivated taste, and three shillings really
gives him as much satisfaction as three pounds. The native on the
Tanganyika plateau works more cheerfully for his three shillings a month
than the Rhodesian native does for his two pounds, and yet beads and
cloth are much more costly on the plateau than in Rhodesia. There is a
short-sighted inclination amongst British officials to give the native
more than he requires or even asks for, presumably simply because he is
a native.
At one station I required a certain amount of labour, and as there was
no precedent to go upon, we called up some of the local natives, and
asked them for what sum they would be willing to do the work in
question. They mentioned a figure which they evidently considered
preposterous, but which, as a matter of fact, was very small. The
official thereupon told them that they would get more. This naturally
aroused their suspicions, and some of those who had at first been
willing failed to turn up. It must always be remembered that the
untutored native will work as readily for three shillings as he will for
three pounds; and if he does not want to work, he will not do so for
thirty pounds. The actual rate of pay carries no weight with him. It
is merely a matter of whether he is in the mood. But, of course, if he
has once received a certain figure he will never work for less, even if
he is in the mood to do so. Were he to do so he would imagine that he
had been swindled.
The Portuguese, for the simple reason that they themselves practically
never pay their natives at all, failed to grasp the necessity of
controlling the labour market in the Beira district, with the result
that the wages of an ordinary carrier or labourer are one pound a month,
and of an untrained house-boy from two pounds to three pounds a month.
These sums were gladly paid in the original days of boom and prosperity,
but in these days of comparative gloom they are feeling the pinch. Large
supplies of labour are brought down from the Zambesi to minimize the
difficulty, but with the sole result that this fictitious rate is spread
to the regions that are being tapped when the labourers return to their
homes. By this means the evil is gradually working up the Shire river
to British Central Africa. Rhodesia has, to a considerable extent,
blighted her prospects by not grappling with the subject, in spite of
the hysteria of those whose knowledge of natives, their ways, and of the
best methods of dealing with them appears to be derived from week-end
studies of the becollared fraternity who affect Margate and Brighton
sands.
The name of Englishman is held high throughout Africa, and the Union
Jack is the surest passport in the land. Let this be the answer to
those who casually assume that because a man goes to Africa he
necessarily becomes a brute, no matter what his social status,
education, or previous mental condition. It is obviously to the
interest of men who live as an infinitesimal minority amongst hordes of
savages, to find out what means are most conducive to the proper control
of those hordes, and to inspire them with that respect and assurance of
justice, without which they will be in continual revolt, as has been the
case with the natives of the Upper Congo since the substitution of
Belgian and polyglot officials for the original staff of British and
Americans. However, the damage is done, and I think the proposed remedy
of importing "the teeming millions" of Lake Tanganyika (who, by the way,
do not exist) a false and dangerous one. The imported natives, finding
that they obtain less pay than the natives of the country, although they
have come far from their own homes, break out in discontent, and, maybe,
open revolt (as did the Angoni police, recruited and sent to Salisbury
by Major Harding, C.M.G.), and when they return home spread the feeling
of dissatisfaction far and wide. The Yaos who were sent to Mauritius
were even a greater failure, and cannot but have the most pernicious
influence on their return. Uganda has been similarly doomed as an
agricultural country by the chaotic incompetence that supervened after
the Lugard _regime_. British Central Africa alone of the young African
States has steered a straight course through the stormy seas of labour
questions. But British Central Africa has profited by its hitherto
comparative insignificance, and, under the able guidance of Sir Harry
Johnston, has found the right channel unruffled by the whirlwinds of
adverse criticism, which have played with such unceasing ferocity upon
Rhodesia. It seems hardly reasonable that one district should be called
upon to pay for the mistakes made in another.
The establishment of native locations on a large scale in the districts
that require labour will tend to ameliorate the labour scarcity and
maintain wages at a reasonable level. On farms and plantations there is
comparatively little difficulty in obtaining labour. The native is
useless without his women-folk, but is easily induced to settle down in
any spot required, if allotted so much land and allowed to bring his
family, while at the same time a fillip is given to production when he
finds that his women can add to his income by cultivating the various
requirements of the white man.
To summarize; the questions of paramount importance are:--
1. _To make the Administration the sole labour agents_.
By this means the supply of labour can be evenly distributed through the
year, or according to the country's requirements. The rate of pay can
be fixed and maintained at a rational level. Undesirable people can be
prevented from obtaining labour, and thereby adversely influencing the
native. The native is protected against the employer, and guaranteed
proper treatment by knowing that he has a court of appeal where he can
obtain information and air his grievances.
2. _To rule through the chiefs, and refrain from injuring their
prestige_.
Centuries cannot give the white man the power over the individual native
that the recognized chief holds without question. The substitution of
one chief for another is of no use unless the original chief is killed
and his rightful heir instated. These matters are religion with
natives. "Once a chief always a chief, even when dead," is their
belief. To get a grip on an important chief and yet leave him his power
is a difficult matter; and as these preliminary questions will affect
the whole future of the country, the first step in administration should
be entrusted to really able men, and not, as is too often the case, to
any trader, hunter, or out-of-a-job who happens to be in the
neighbourhood and to know a little of the language. By leaving the
chiefs their power, administration is greatly facilitated by the
resulting concentration of responsibility. All the petty questions and
difficulties (which are often such dangerous ground, until the local
customs are fully understood) devolve on the chief, and if there is any
serious trouble the responsibility can be instantly located.
The prestige of the chiefs should be maintained in every possible way,
such as exempting them from the hut-tax, allowing them a small armed
escort, etc.
I realized the immense importance of this ruling through the chiefs when
in the Chambesi district of Northern Rhodesia. Two chiefs of
considerable influence, namely, Makasa and Changala, really administer
the country under the direction of the collector. A criminal was
wanted, and Changala handed him over in thirty-six hours; had he not
done so, all the police in the district might have hunted for a year
without success.
3. _More attention must be paid to maintaining the prestige of the white
man_.
This is of paramount importance. There is rather a tendency amongst the
officials to lower the non-official in the eyes of the native. This is
fatal. The prestige must be maintained at all costs, as it is the sole
hold that we have over the native. The rabble that is inseparable from
a mining community is a great difficulty. But still much harm is caused
by the ignorance of the youthful officials who are in positions for
which they are in no wise fitted.
4. _Officials should be forced to acquire a knowledge of the language_.
The Germans set us a good example in their East Coast Protectorate,
where a man must go through a preliminary course at the coast before
being admitted to any position in the interior. I have seen much harm
done by the employment of interpreters, who are invariably bribed, and
only say what they wish to be said. This destroys the confidence of the
native. I have always remarked the eagerness with which the native
appeals to the white man who can converse direct with him.
5. _The constant moving of officials from place to place should be
avoided_.
The native requires a long time to learn to know a white man and to feel
confidence in him. In many places a game of general post with the
officials seems to be the chief occupation of the Administration.
6. _The official should be enabled and encouraged to travel round his
district_.
This is the surest means of inspiring confidence. At present most of
the officials whom I met were tied to their stations by such
statesmanlike duties as weighing out beads, measuring cloth, and copying
out orders; all of which might be cheaply and effectually done by an
Indian clerk. Travelling round and learning the natives is usually
severely repressed at headquarters.
[Illustration: MAP TO ILLUSTRATE "FROM THE CAPE TO CAIRO" (northern half
of map)]
[Illustration: MAP TO ILLUSTRATE "FROM THE CAPE TO CAIRO" (southern half
of map)]
[Transcriber's note: larger versions of these maps (img-380.jpg and
img-382.jpg) have been provided, but they are not linked into this
etext.]
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