Federal service in tropical lands might well be recruited from the
negroes. It has indeed been proposed that these soldiers should be
permitted to take their families with them so that they might become
permanently and contentedly established in Luzon and elsewhere in
the colonies. There is no doubt but that the abler negroes, when
properly officered, make excellent soldiers--at least as infantry
men. The experience had with them during the Spanish War makes this
point perfectly clear. It may also be reckoned that they would endure
tropical climates better than the whites. It may further be said that
the existence of a large and well respected force of blacks in the
Federal army would unquestionably add to the social position of the
negroes in the estimation of both races. Again, the return of these men
to their homes, after their period of service, would be advantageous.
Their training and experience would make them of much value to their
people.
There are, however, certain signal disadvantages which would arise
from the employment of negroes as soldiers. In the first place, it
would tend to remove from the body of the folk the abler men--those
to whom we should mainly look for the uplifting of their race. This
evil, great in the case of all levies, would be most serious in this
case; for the reason that, while with white troops the rank and file
are not commonly by nature leaders of their society, they would be so
with black recruits. If the choice could be made of the Guinea type,
this loss would not be serious; but it certainly would fall to the more
militant stocks--those to which we have to look for advancement. In
the next place, we must see that the negro does not need the training
in passive obedience and mere order of life that the common soldier
receives. He has had that already in quite sufficient measure. He now
should have the lessons of individual responsibility--of control of his
life from within--lessons that civil life alone can give. Therefore,
the well-wisher of the race will be inclined to oppose this project of
recruiting our armies from the negroes of the Southern States. If it
is determined to enlist them it would be best to limit the age of the
recruits to about twenty years, and the period of active service to
five years, so that the men may be returned to civil life young enough
to enter on ordinary employments.
At present it is most desirable that the negroes of the South should
be induced to save money, for until that habit is formed, there is
little chance of lifting them in the economic scale or of developing
in them the business sense, which is one of the corner-stones of
civilization. It is probable that more could be done in the way of
correcting the faults and stimulating the latent capacities of the race
by developing this motive than by any other means. It is difficult to
suggest any effective system by which this end can be attained. The
general conditions of the South make rural savings-banks impossible.
The receipts, at least for many years, would be too small to render the
business remunerative. The only practicable method appears to be that
of a Federal system operated through the post-offices. The institution
of such a system appears to be justified by the two conditions: the
exceeding need of such a provision and the impossibility of doing
the work except through the postal machinery of which the Federal
Government holds a monopoly. It may be said that this method has proved
successful under other governments, and that it has been for some time
established in Canada. In our own country it is clearly demanded,
in all rural communities, though nowhere else so gravely as in the
Southern States.
In looking over the latent possibilities of the negro people, the
observer can not fail to remark their keen delight in music. Statistics
on this, as on other facts, are lacking; but from what I have been
able to learn, it appears probable that a far greater proportion of
the blacks are sensitive to musical effects than is the case with the
white people. I have indeed never been able to find a black man who
was so far lacking in this sensibility that he did not enjoy the songs
of his people. It is not unlikely that close inquiry would show this
to be a remarkable feature in this unexplored race. As yet little
effort has been made to determine the true measure of this capacity of
the negro for music. It may be that they can not attain to the higher
levels of the art; yet it is perfectly evident that their voices are
exceptionally good, and that they have a keen native sense of time and
tune. The most effective dance music I have ever heard has been made by
negroes who could not read a note. When we consider how large a place
music has in our life, it is a fair suggestion that this quality of the
black nature might well be made the subject of experiment.
Those who look closely at the conditions of the negroes of the South
are led to the belief that the existing separation in sympathy of the
races is not likely long to continue. The greater number of the negroes
instinctively crave a protective relation with the whites. It is the
ancient disposition of the weak man to lean upon the strong which has
in all ages and lands determined the relations of folk. At present the
two peoples are held apart by the memories of slavery, rather than
by any real personal dislike--the race prejudice which so commonly
separates the Northern white from the negro. As this temporary barrier
wears down, we may hope to find a new form of association arising--one
in which the negroes will seek and find their friends among the trusted
men of the superior race. I have seen marks of this new relation here
and there, not many nor very clear, but fairly indicative of what may
come about, provided the political excitement is allowed to subside
and the people of the South, black and white, make their adjustments
according to their motives and capacities, with no reference to the
Federal power.
At first sight it will appear to most of the Northern people over-much
to ask that the powers at Washington give up all efforts to deal with
the needs of the negro folk--the so-called wards of the nation. Yet
experience has shown the impracticability of the project of helping
these negroes with the long arm of the Federal law. All that has been
undertaken in this way has been fruitless or worse. The only chance for
lifting the black man to the full status of the citizen is by leaving
his future essentially in the hands of the masterful folk who alone
can help him. We see that the ruling class in the South have a measure
of interest in the status of the negro and an opportunity to benefit
his state that can never belong to the people of the North. Although
the country, as a whole, will, of course, suffer from the failure to
elevate the blacks, the burden will lie most heavily on those with whom
they dwell.
The Southern whites have given evidence of political capacity of a high
order. Even their blunder in the rebellion is in good part compensated
for by the sagacity with which they accepted the results of the war
and turned them to the best account they could. They are not likely to
cower before the vast undertakings which the uplifting of the blacks
will entail; as yet, they have not accepted the task as their own. They
have indeed been brought to believe that their business was to defend
their own class interests, as well as they might be able to, against
the attacks of the negroes, aided by the Federal power. If they are
forced to see that within the limits the Federal Constitution sets
to action, the responsibility for the future of their several States
is in the hands of those who control their politics, we may hope to
find the political and economic skill which went to the development of
the system of slavery given to the advancement of the Africans. While
the work must needs be done by the men who are near to it, it should
receive every possible aid and sympathy from those who, because they
are far away, can not effectively control the matter. The cause is so
large that it needs the help of all who wish it well.
It appears to me that the time has come for an effective union of
endeavor on the part of those of North and South, ex-slaveholder and
ex-abolitionist alike, who wish to see the negro have, not his rights
in the common sense of the word (for mere rights are a pitiful share
for a man), but rather a good human chance to climb the ladder of
civilization, upon which our ancestors set him. The aims of these two
ancient parties surely have for a common end the best that can be done
for the negro people. It is just as much a mistake to suppose that the
majority of the slaveholders in a malign spirit sought to oppress and
torture the blacks, as to fancy that the abolitionists desired to set
the negroes over their sometime masters; for history will probably
write it down that the better men of these two parties were both
dealing with the same very difficult problem: that their contentions
grew from a failure on both sides to see the whole of the matter.
It is possible that something might be done to help towards effective
work, looking to the end we have in view, through a society for the
study of the African problem. Such an association, provided it included
men who were guided by a true spirit of inquiry and had no political
ends to win, especially if it was in part made up of Southerners who
had a large-minded view of the matter, could do much to guide action in
profitable ways. In general, I am opposed to the increase in the number
of societies; so that, if there be any in existence that could fairly
undertake this task, I should prefer to see it set about the work. I
am not aware, however, that there is any existing association which
includes such questions in its field of inquiry.
It will be observed that the suggestions I have made concerning the
immediate needs of the negro do not include any mention of the higher
scholastic education. This is not because I disbelieve in such training
for those blacks who, by their evident capacity, show that it fits
them; but because it seems futile at the present time to waste efforts
in giving these people an education for which they are in general by
no means ready--which, if attained, does not afford them a way to a
suitable station. The few youths of the race who really desire what is
commonly called a college education, are reasonably certain to receive
it in some one of the many schools where they are sure of a welcome and
of all due help. Even in the case of those blacks who, by some rare
chance, have inherited the proper foundations of the higher mental
training, and are made ready for the so-called professions, I see but a
very poor chance of advancement to any fit positions in this country.
Even in the part of the North where one would expect these well-trained
negroes would have a fair chance in life, it does not avail them. As
physicians, lawyers, clergymen or engineers they can look forward to
no future having a definite relation to their capacities. They can not
expect to have any range of social opportunities, and their employment
will have to be essentially with their own people.
The youth of negro blood might naturally expect to find in a community
devoted to the maintenance of his rights at least a welcome to the
external business society. He will, however, find that the people who
would willingly sacrifice much to ensure him an equal place in matters
political, allow their race prejudices or those of their associates to
deny him fair play. It is a lamentable fact that this dislike to these
men of the other aspect is far stronger in the North than in the South.
In the parts of the North where negroes are rare, there is, it is true,
a sense of duty by them that ensures their place before the law; but
not enough personal contact with them to wear away the first offence of
their diverse aspect. In most parts of the Southern States the black
man is so constantly in view that the instinctive prejudice is worn
away--he is perhaps, in a somewhat contemptuous way, personally liked.
The race prejudice takes the form of certain rules of intercourse,
expressing about the feeling that separates the commissioned officers
and the enlisted men of an army. There is an element of truth in the
statement, attributed to Thomas Carlyle, that the Northern man said,
“God d--d you, Sambo, be free;” and the Southerner, “God bless you,
Sambo, be slave.” The result to Sambo is the same--a deprivation of
opportunities in all the higher walks of life.
The only safe way up for the negro appears to lie in the industrial
field, in mechanical employments, where his race may not weigh against
him, and where head and hands may help one another to profit of mind
and pocket--in business of varied kinds where he may get money, and
with it the station that, in the common view, nothing else will afford
him; in good work done for his race such as will give him the dignity
in the eyes of all men that the master of Tuskegee has won. It is very
much better for a negro youth, and for his race, that he should be a
successful blacksmith, farmer or engineer, than a lawyer or physician,
hindered and shunned, sorely burthened as he is sure to be by the
cross that his fellowmen force him to bear. Therefore, unless they are
willing to betake themselves to countries where the government is in
the control of mixed peoples, thereby escaping the worst evils of race
prejudice, it seems best for negroes not to seek the so-called learned
professions, but to win their way on the lines where they will find
less resistance--on ways quite fit for a man, even if not the highest.
It has been suggested that our colonies may afford a field for
professionally educated negroes; but there, if they are to be ruled by
the home government, it is likely that they will find a white caste in
control. We may thus expect that the same essential disfranchisement
will be found there as at home. Moreover, as before remarked, this
project of sending to far lands the individual of ability who is needed
at home, can not commend itself to those who feel the need which
is with us, a need that calls for all the capacity we can hope to
develop among the black people. It is clearly not a time to consider a
proposition to export these abler youths of the black population.
Back of all our projects to bring the negroes of the South to the full
station of citizens, to get rid of the contempt and the consequences
of the contempt in which they are, as a race, so generally held,
is the grave question as to the practicability of framing a social
and political system in which men of such diverse origin may have
a substantially equal chance. It must be granted that in no modern
state of high grade has this problem been fairly solved. The instances
from the tropical colonies of Great Britain are not really apposite;
but there seems no fundamental difficulty to contend with in order
to attain this end. With cultivated people of their own race about
them the better negro youth would not be deprived of that element of
education. We have taken into our political family races scarcely less
different in motives from our own than are the negroes, making no kind
of objection to their sharing the commonwealth with us. In certain ways
it is true that a nation loses strength where it fails to have its
elements closely knit together. But it may be doubted whether these
losses are not more than compensated for by the gains that arise from
diversities such as would come from the introduction into our system of
a body of folk with the capacities which our Africans are likely with
thorough training to develop.
In this matter there are but two courses open to us--one of folly,
the other of wisdom. We may leave the black people to work out their
own salvation as best they may, to lie as a mass at the bottom of our
society, except so far as the abler men who may arise among them help
their struggling fellows. The result of this will be the perpetuation
of all the existing evils. Or we may set to work, after the true manner
of our folk, with the full knowledge that the task is very great, but
that we have the strength to see it done. With this spirit we may
accomplish the noblest work that men have ever undertaken in any nation.
To the people of the South we may fairly say: “These negroes were
brought here by your forefathers, and thus tied to the land. In their
training as slaves, they were given an opportunity to rise far above
their primitive savagery. You have seen in serious trials how, as a
race, they are trustworthy. They are now your fellow-citizens in name,
but are in a condition to be a permanent menace to your commonwealth.
Properly aided on their way upward, they may be of great value to your
descendants.” To the people of the North we may plead for all the help
they can give; for hardly less than the Southerners, their ancestors
shared in the actions which brought the negroes to this country.
They gave the blacks the semblance of citizenship by the process of
emancipation. If the work stops there, it may be questioned whether it
was a boon to the masses of the folk it made nominally free. To be what
it was meant to be, then, it needs more than enactments. There must be
long continued and devoted labor, wisely directed.
A necessary part of the work of a true emancipation of the negro is a
careful inquiry into the history and former status of the people. Such
an inquiry, placed and kept in good hands, is a necessary preliminary
to sagacious action. It may serve to unite the men of all parts of the
country in a work that so nearly concerns us all. There is not, nor
is there likely to arise, a situation that so calls for intelligent
patriotism as this we are sorely neglecting. We may go far away and
rear an empire with our armies; but if we leave these, our neighbors,
without a fair chance to develop the good that is in them, we shall
have lost our real opportunity for great deeds--mayhap we shall fix
among us evils that in the end will drag us down.
THE PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY OF THE LANDS.
BY PROFESSOR W. M. DAVIS.
HARVARD UNIVERSITY.
The most important principles established in physical geography
during the nineteenth century are that the description of the earth’s
surface features must be accompanied by explanation, and that the
surface features must be correlated with their inhabitants. During the
establishment of these evolutionary principles, exploration at home
and abroad has greatly increased the store of recorded facts; the more
civilized countries have been in large part measured and mapped; the
coasts of the world have been charted; the less civilized continents
have been penetrated to their centers. This harvest of fact has been an
indispensable stimulus to the study of physical geography; yet it can
not be doubted that the spirit which has given life to the letter of
the subject is the principle of evolution--inorganic and organic. This
is especially true of the geography of the lands.
The century has seen the measurement of higher peaks in the Himalayas
than had been previously measured in the Andes. The Nile has been
traced to its source in the lakes of equatorial Africa, verifying the
traditions of the ancients; and the Kongo has been found to cross the
equator twice on its way to the sea. Facts without number have been
added to the previous sum of knowledge. But at the same time, it has
been discovered that the valleys of mountain ranges are the work of
erosion; that the product of valley erosion is often seen in extensive
piedmont fluviatile plains; that waterfalls are retrogressively
worn away until they are reduced to the smooth grade of a maturely
established river; and that interior basins are slowly filling with the
waste that is washed in from their rims upon their floors. Here are
explanatory generalizations, involving, yet going far beyond matter of
direct observation. Such generalizations in geography correspond to the
recognition in astronomy that planetary movements exemplify the law of
gravitation; they are the Newton as against the Kepler of the subject.
The sufficient justification of the demand that has now arisen for
explanation and correlation in the study of land forms is found in the
repeated experience that until an explanatory description of a region
can be given, one may be sure that some of its significant elements
pass unnoticed; and until the controls that it exerts on living forms
are studied, one may be confident that its geographical value is but
half measured. A sentence from Guyot’s Earth and Man may here be taken
as a guide: “To describe, without rising to the causes, or descending
to the consequences, is no more science than merely and simply to
relate a fact of which one has been a witness.” There could hardly
be devised a more concise and searching test of good work than this
quotation suggests. The causes, in so far as the physical geography of
the lands is concerned, have been learned chiefly through the study of
geology; yet it does not by any means follow that all geologists are
possessed of such knowledge of these causes as will constitute them
geographers. The consequences have been learned through the study of
evolutionary biology; yet a distinct addition to the usual discipline
of biology is required in order to apprehend its geographical
correlations. The limited space allowed to this article will require
that further consideration of the consequences be excluded, in order to
give due consideration to the causes.
One of the preparatory steps in the century’s advance was taken
by the German geographer, Ritter, who, near the beginning of the
century, advocated a new principle that may be illustrated by the
change in the definition of geography from “the description of the
earth and its inhabitants” to “the study of the earth in relation
to its inhabitants;” but advance beyond this beginning was for
a long time obstructed by certain ancient beliefs. Theological
preconceptions as to the age of the earth and the associated geological
doctrine of catastrophism, although attacked by the rising school of
uniformitarianism, were then dominant. They gave to the geographer
a ready-made earth, on which the existing processes of change were
unimportant. Furthermore, the belief in the separate creation of every
organic species led to the doctrine of teleology, which maintained the
predetermined fitness of the earth for its inhabitants, and of its
inhabitants for their lifework. All this had to be outgrown before
geographers could understand the slow development of land forms and the
progressive adaptation of all living beings to their environments. Yet
the beginning that Ritter made was of great importance, and it would
have led further had it not happened that for many decades professors
of geography in Europe brought chiefly a historical training to their
chairs, to the almost entire neglect of physical geography. In the
last thirty years there has been a reaction from this condition in
Germany and France, but Italy, with many professors of geography in her
universities, still for the most part follows historical methods.
In the victory of the uniformitarians over the catastrophists began
the fortunate alliance of geography with geology, which was long
afterwards happily phrased by Mackinder: “Geology considers the past
in the light of the present; geography considers the present in the
light of the past.” Instead of believing in cataclysmic upheavals and
in overwhelming floods, Playfair and other exponents of the Huttonian
school taught that mountains were slowly upheaved and slowly worn down.
The simplicity of Playfair’s argument finds excellent illustration in
the often quoted passage regarding the origin of valleys: “Every river
appears to consist of a main trunk, fed from a variety of branches,
each running in a valley proportioned to its size, and all of them
together forming a system of vallies, communicating with one another,
and having such a nice adjustment of their declivities that none of
them join the principal valley either on too high or too low a level;
a circumstance which would be infinitely improbable if each of these
vallies were not the work of the stream that flows in it.” Descriptions
of valleys should always recognize the share that rivers have had in
eroding them, or else the “nice adjustment of their declivities” may
pass unnoticed.