_MUTINY AMONG THE CREW_
Our fifth night was Saturday. We did not intend to travel or work on
Sunday. We selected a splendid camp site. Heretofore the blacks had
waited and given us the best camping place. But we had been treating
them so well that they thought our kindness to them was not kindness
at all, but fear of them. And so they started to make _their_ shelter
on the best spot.
"You can't have that place," I said.
"We got it," grinned one of the men. Most of the others stuck by him.
One or two slunk off.
"Go down there," I commanded.
"We stay here," he declared and stood his ground.
I was in an uncomfortable position. If I let them have their way this
time there would be no living with them. If I got in a fight--they
were, after all, twenty-two blacks to three whites--they could
overpower us.
Suddenly I had a vision of how they would abuse us if I gave in. I
could see them grinning at each other, believing that we were afraid
of them. That situation would be unbearable. I turned on the black man
and pointed with my left hand down the slope.
"Get down there and stay down!" I commanded.
"I won't--"
He didn't say any more. My fist shot out and took him under the ear
and he went over like a stick of wood. Then I wheeled to face the
others.
I really expected a fight, but the blacks stared at their fallen
companion who rolled down the slope, their eyes bulging, and before I
had time to bark out a short command for them to get out, they hastily
snatched up their belongings and ran down the hill.
I stood there a moment, waiting to let my anger cool off a little to
make sure that I would not say things or do things unnecessarily
severe or that I would regret. Then I strode down to where they were
grouped and where the first black was dazedly rubbing his chin. When
they saw me approach they again dropped their things and started to
run away.
"Don't run. You are all right there," I shouted. They paused and
looked at me suspiciously.
"We are running this little outfit," I said to them, pointing to
Lewis, "and we are hiring you to work for us. You know your places.
Keep them and you will get good treatment, otherwise you will be the
sorriest niggers in British Guiana. For every wrong that you do, you
shall be punished. For every good thing that you do you shall be
rewarded. We are treating you kindly because it is the right thing to
do, not because we are afraid of you. Your punishment for attempting
to dispute our authority shall be to sleep to-night without your
shelter cloth!"
Then I picked up their shelter cloth, turned my back on them and
walked away. To be quite truthful, I was not a little frightened when
I turned my back, fearing treachery, yet it was the only thing to do.
I knew that I had to make them believe that I was without fear of
them or of anything else, otherwise I would not win their respect or
co-operation.
Meekly they arranged to hang their hammocks without the shelter cloth,
seeming to take it for granted that they had this penalty coming to
them for the way they had acted.
"You acted like a veteran explorer," said old Captain Peter to me.
"You did just right, boy. If you had given in they would not have
worked, they would have stolen everything and they would have abused
you during all the trip."
Most of the white men that these native darkies knew had been of a
rough sort, adventurous Dutchmen and others, who kicked them about and
treated them without the least regard until the poor black boys--we
call all blacks "boys"--thought that it was the white man's natural
way. When we showed kindness to them and full regard for their comfort
they mistook it for fear. And, thinking that we were afraid of them,
they decided to run things themselves. It did not take them long to
learn that American white men are not brutes and that when they worked
hard and acted on the square they would be treated with kindness. And
I am sure no group of native blacks, as a whole, ever worked more
faithfully than this bunch after they had learned their lesson. There
are always a few exceptions. One or two became lazy, one or two tried
to steal diamonds, later, but we had our own methods of handling them.
For the first time in my life I learned by direct experience the value
of superiority of intelligence. We white men, being mentally far
superior to the blacks, could rule them. Had they known their own
strength they could have overpowered us at any time. And I recalled
that in all of my histories the same has held good. The mentally
superior people have ruled the less intelligent.