The Native Races of South Africa.
[Sidenote: The Bushmen]
The physical and mental differences between the three chief native
races of South Africa have been very great. The genuine aborigines, or
Bushmen, ranked amongst the lowest of human races, and maybe placed
upon much the same level as the Fuegians or the Black-fellows of
Australia. Though primarily natives of the coast they seem to have
become scattered in after times throughout the region from the Cape to
the Zambesi. Nomadic by nature, knowing nothing of agriculture, and
not even owning cattle, they wandered here and there, living upon such
wild animals as they could kill with poisoned arrows, or upon wild
fruits and the roots of plants. They were small in stature and
untamably savage, swift in passage from place to place, and capable of
enduring the severest fatigue. Almost inevitably, the pressure of a
civilization which had to often shoot them in self-defence, the
influence of progressive settlements which destroyed the game upon
which they lived, and the force of stronger types of savagery which
bore down on them from the north, have in the end blotted the Bushmen
out of existence.
[Sidenote: The Hottentots]
Superior in some respects were the Hottentots. Though small in stature
they were not by any means pygmies, and they lived in a better manner
than the Bushmen knew anything of. They possessed sheep and many lean
cattle, which they drove hither and thither over vast tracts of
country, doing a little intermittent hunting, fighting occasionally
with one another and living in a tribal system which the lower racial
type found it impossible to emulate. Like the Bushmen their muscular
power was slight, their hair grew in woolly tufts upon the skull, and
they were of a yellowish-black colour. They made fairly good servants
after a period of subjugation, but suffered in numbers very greatly
from the spread of small-pox and similar epidemics, which were at times
introduced into the country from the ships of the white man. In 1713
immense numbers perished from this cause. The Hottentot was for many
decades in the succeeding century a favourite subject of missionary
labour in Cape Colony, but it is to be feared that the degraded
elements which are to be found in every white community, with the
additional factor of an absolute contempt for all natives amongst the
Dutch of South Africa, had far greater influence for evil upon the
unfortunate tribes than English legislation and Christian efforts had
for good.
[Sidenote: The Bantu and its Sub-Divisions]
A far more important native race than either of these, and one which
has taken a place in history as distinct as that of the Indian in
America or the Maori in New Zealand, is the Bantu, with its many tribal
sub-divisions. Popularly known as Kaffirs from the earliest days of
Portuguese discovery and slave raids, there seems little reason to
doubt that they have gradually drifted southward from the Upper Nile
and the Nyanza Lake region; while the brown colour of many of them
would appear to indicate an admixture of Arab blood from settlers and
traders along the coast of the Indian Ocean, the majority are black and
they all possess the thick lips, woolly hair and scanty beard of the
typical negro. Usually they are strong and well-made, fierce in
battle, savage in their punishments, brutal in many of their customs.
Their bravery is of a high order, as a rule, but has varied somewhat in
quality, and the various tribes in later days have developed special
lines of intelligence. At the present time, for instance, the Zulus
and the Matabele are the most noted for courage and for fighting skill
of a savage sort, the Fingoes show some natural adaptiveness for trade
and barter, and the Basutos, under the influence, no doubt, of English
contiguity and friendliness have given distinct indications of steady
industry--a most unusual quality amongst natives.
[Sidenote: Civilization Helping the Natives]
There are various groups of this widely scattered race. They include
the Amakosa, with whom the Cape Colonists so early came into conflict
along the Fish River frontier, and who afterwards became known as
Tembus and Pondos; the Amazulu of Natal and Zululand; the Swazis, the
Matabele and the Amatongas; the Bechuanas, who are subdivided into
Bamangwato, the Basutos, the Barolongs, and the Barotze; the Makalakos
of Mashonaland. The speech and habits of these people are sufficiently
similar to denote a common racial origin and to stamp them as a
distinct type. As a race they are very prolific, and in this respect
present a marked contrast to the primeval natives of America or
Polynesia. The approach of civilization, instead of killing them off,
has surrounded them with safety, bound them to a more or less peaceful
life, and thus prevented the strife which at one time changed the
central part of South Africa from the home of a teeming population into
an almost lonely and empty wilderness. The result of this régime of
peaceful power is that their numbers all over South Africa are
increasing at a rate which, in itself, creates a serious problem for
the future and resembles the rapid advance of the population amongst
the myriad races of Hindostan under the gentle rule of Great Britain.
Dr. Theal states[1] that "the Bantu population in South Africa from the
Limpopo to the sea has trebled itself by natural increase alone within
fifty years," and he goes on to add that even this is asserting "what
must be far below the real rate of growth." In 1879, for instance,
there were 319,000 Kaffirs in Natal as against 455,000 in 1891; while
in Cape Colony between 1875 and 1891 the natives increased from 483,000
to 1,150,000. Roughly speaking, the native population of all South
Africa south of the Zambesi was, in 1893, about five millions.
[1] Theal, _History of the Republics_.
[Sidenote: Vain to Avoid Interference]
Of this population Great Britain controls more than one-half. About a
million and a half are in the Portuguese possessions, a hundred
thousand in the German Protectorate, seven hundred thousand in the
Transvaal, and something over a hundred thousand in the Free State.
Since the time, in the early fifties, when Earl Grey was at the
Colonial Office, and the proposed abandonment of the Orange River
region was announced, he added in his despatch to the Governor: "That
done, no war in future, 'however sanguinary,' between the different
tribes and communities which will be left in a state of independence
beyond the Colonial boundary are to be considered as affording ground
for your interference." In this vain effort to avoid further
responsibility beyond the outer marches of the Cape Lord Grey was
certainly logical. But, like the Manchester School in this
respect--although he did not adhere very closely to its general
views--he bore a striking resemblance to Mrs. Partington, in the
familiar pages of _Punch_, sweeping back the ocean tide with a broom.
He believed that, with utterly inadequate military resources at the
Cape and with absolute indifference at home, it was useless to try to
control a vast region where the majority of the white settlers were
opposed to Great Britain and the masses of the natives strongly
hostile. But he overlooked the impossibility of maintaining a stable
frontier amid the shifting sands of a savage population, and he forgot
that justice had to be done, as between native and native and often as
between white man and native, if Great Britain was to fulfill her
mission and do her duty. Neither of these ends could be accomplished
without strife or expansion. As time passed, and amid all the
countless mutations of South African policy, this inevitable advance of
the British border and gradual incorporation of native tribes went on.
In 1865 British Kaffraria, with its 78,000 natives, was annexed to the
Cape, and then Basutoland, with (in 1893) some 218,000 natives, was
brought under British control. Following this came Griqualand West,
with its 30,000 natives; British Bechuanaland, with some 50,000;
Khama's Country, or the Bechuanaland Protectorate, with over 100,000;
Zululand, with its 140,000; Pondoland, with 200,000, and Tongaland,
with 80,000; and finally Rhodesia, or British Mashonaland, with a
quarter of a million Matabele and Mashonas.
[Sidenote: Expansion Inevitable]
Earl Grey's despatch was, in fact, only a passing phase of the
many-sided British policy toward the native territories. Every now and
then, however, this principle of non-extension and non-responsibility,
so far as the Kaffirs were concerned, continued to come into
practice--as in the previous case of Lord Glenelg and the Kosas.
Instances in point may be mentioned such as the giving up of part of
Zululand and much of Swaziland to the Transvaal, the earlier and
prolonged refusal to annex the Kosa country, afterwards known as
Kaffraria, the hesitating and lingering policy over Bechuanaland and
the refusal to annex Damaraland and Namaqaland at a period when no
objection would have been raised by anyone, and a region covering
300,000 square miles and, with the Providential exception of Walfisch
Bay, guarding the entire western coast, might have become British
instead of German territory. There were three causes--all connected,
directly or indirectly, with the natives and the native question--for
the ultimate and inevitable expansion. The first was the determination
of the British people to suppress and prevent slavery. This produced
emancipation in Cape Colony, and partially caused the Great Trek of the
Boers. The second was the intensity of Dutch arrogance, the frequency
of Dutch oppression and a continuous Dutch policy of aggression, in
connection with native tribes. The third was the impossibility of
holding frontiers intact against uncivilized races, and the natural
wish of missionaries to extend British influence and through it the
power of Christianity. The second and third causes worked together in
some measure and may be seen controlling or modifying many complicated
conditions.
[Sidenote: Slavery]
Little doubt exists as to the continued practice of slavery amongst the
Boers--in Natal before 1846, in the Orange Free State up to recent
years, and in the Transvaal at the present time. There was, in the
earlier period, a state of absolute lawlessness amongst the Boers
themselves, combined with constant war, or raids, upon surrounding
tribes. Kaffirs were shot down in cold blood, beaten at pleasure,
their families burned out of their little huts and their children, or
the most promising of them, taken away as "apprentices" for a given
period--the euphemistic expression for a condition of permanent
enslavery. Of course the natives retaliated when they could, and
during the first thirty years of the Boer migration and history--1836
to 1866--the state of affairs was lamentable. It was estimated in 1869
that six thousand child-slaves were in the Transvaal as the much-prized
booty of casual raids upon different tribes. And this despite the
clause in the Sand River Convention forbidding, and promising to
prevent, anything of the kind. During these years agitation in England
against these practices of the Boers was incessant, and local protests
from missionaries and others at the Cape and in Natal equally so.
Papers in 1868 were laid before the Natal Legislature describing many
accredited instances even at that late date, and three years before,
Mr. W. Martin had laid before the Government of that Colony a detailed
statement of his own experiences across the Vaal in this connection.
The Lieutenant-Governor (Mr. John Maclean, C.B.) transmitted the
documents to Cape Town, and the High Commissioner intimated that while
he believed there was much of truth in the charges, yet it would be
practically impossible to intervene successfully without being prepared
to use force. A Resolution of protest against this view was at once
passed by the Legislature, of which the following is an extract:
"That the traffic is a direct breach of the Treaty entered into with
Her Majesty's Commissioners, is an outrage upon humanity and
civilization, and is an aggravation of the traffic which Her Majesty's
Government has so long sought to suppress upon the east coast. That so
long as this traffic in children is suffered to exist there can be
little hope for the progress of civilization amongst the native tribes
in the Transvaal Republic, while the prevalence of such practices in
the immediate neighborhood of independent and colonial tribes has a
most pernicious and injurious effect, and tends to lower the position
and influence of the white race. That it is impossible for the High
Commissioner, living as he does so far from the scene of those
atrocities, to judge clearly and fully their character and tendencies."
[Sidenote: Livingstone Reports on Slave Trade]
This statement regarding the Boer slave policy represented the feeling
and knowledge of Englishmen generally along the borders, or when they
came into contact with the Dutch and the natives together. Of the
missionary sentiment in this connection the works of Livingstone and
Moffat and the more recent statements of the Rev. Dr. Stewart afford
abundant evidence. And this aside from the aggressive and sometimes
mistaken or exaggerated views of Dr. Philip and Cape Town missionary
leaders and semi-political preceptors in the earlier days of Kosa or
Kaffir warfare. All around the frontier of the two Republics commandos
would from time to time attack isolated tribes, with slight excuse and
sometimes none at all, burn their kraals, take their cattle and kidnap
their women and children. Dr. Livingstone has put it on record,[2]
after prolonged experience of both Boers and Blacks and with a personal
character for honesty and honor which no one will impeach, that "the
great objection many of the Boers had, and still have, to English law
is that it makes no distinction between black men and white."
Elsewhere in the same volume he declares that "it is difficult for a
person in a civilized country to conceive that any body of men
possessing the common attributes of humanity should with one accord set
out ... and proceed to shoot down in cold blood men and women, of a
different color it is true, but possessed of domestic feelings and
affections equal to their own.... It was long before I could give
credit to the tales of bloodshed told by native witnesses; but when I
found the Boers themselves, some bewailing and denouncing, others
glorying in the bloody scenes in which they had been themselves the
actors, I was compelled to admit the validity of the testimony."
[Sidenote: Early Scenes of Bloodshed] The great missionary proceeds, in
detail, to describe one of the Boer methods of fighting natives. "When
they reach the tribe to be attacked, friendly natives (previously
captured) are ranged in front to form as they say 'a shield;' the Boers
then coolly fire over their heads till the devoted people flee and
leave cattle, wives and children to the captors." He knew of this
being done nine times within his own personal experience, and upon no
occasion was any Boer blood shed. He also declares that the Boers
never intended to abide by the promise regarding slavery made in
1852-4, and describes how a slave raid amongst the Bechuanas was
organized and carried out by 400 Boers under Piet Scholz immediately
after that engagement was entered into. It was the same all along the
line until, in the latter sixties, England began to advance into the
interior and to definitely plant her feet upon regions which the Boer
deemed himself heir to and, almost, actual owner of. During these
years the Natal _Mercury_, the Cape _Argus_ and the Transvaal
_Argus_--a small but energetic sheet--drew continuous attention to this
slave system and policy, and a bulky pamphlet was published in 1868 at
Cape Town containing a mass of printed proof as to the real condition
of affairs. As Dr. Livingstone says, no attention was ever paid, or
intended to be paid, to the pledges in the Conventions. The only
effect was to change the name of "slave" to "apprentice." The
following paragraph from an authoritative source[3] summarizes the
situation in this respect:
"Children were kidnapped, trained to work in the fields, had their
price and were as little protected by the law as any other live stock
on the farm. The 'apprenticeship' never came to an end. Wagon-loads
of slaves, 'black-ivory' as they were called, passed through the
country and were put up to auction or were exchanged, sometimes for
money, and sometimes for a horse, or for a cow and a big pot."
[2] _Missionary Travels_. By David Livingstone. London, 1857.
[2] Martineau's _Life of Sir Bartle Frere_. Vol. II., p. 174.
[Sidenote: English Abhorrence of Slavery]
Such were some of the causes of British dislike for Boer methods and
for naturally unfriendly contact with them through strong sympathy for
oppressed races and utter abhorrence of slavery in every shape and
form. The relation of the Boer and the native was indeed at the root
of much to of British expansion during the last thirty years of the
century. The threatened subjugation of Moshesh caused the annexation
of Basutoland. The Transvaal attack upon the Bapedi under Sekukuni and
its failure precipitated the annexation of 1877. The danger of a Zulu
invasion of the same country and of Natal, as a consequence of this
attack, caused the war with Cetywayo and the establishment of a feeble
and tentative protectorate over Zululand. The raids of the Boers into
the latter region and the formation of what they called the "New
Republic" caused the ultimate annexation of a greater portion of the
whole country and of Pondoland. Their attempt to crush the Batlapins
and Barolongs in Bechuanaland and to establish the so-called Republics
of Stellaland and Goshen caused the expedition of General Warren and
the annexation of the territory. Their effort in 1891 to trek north of
the Limpopo and to take possession of a portion of Rhodesia had to be
repressed by Dr. Jameson under threats of force. Their previously
well-known ambition in this connection had much to do with Mr. Rhodes'
determination to extend British power northwards by means of his
Chartered Company. Similar efforts in Tongaland had, meanwhile,
compelled its ruler to appeal to the Queen's Government for protection
in 1887. The complications of British policy with the natives of South
Africa north and east of Cape Colony, in the latter half of the
century, were, therefore, as much the fault of Boer ambition and
arrogance and ill-treatment of the Blacks as were the difficulties in
the earlier part of the century with the Hottentots and Bushmen and
Kosas.
[Sidenote: The Napoleon of South Africa]
Of these natives--Bantu, or Kaffirs, or whatever their local names
might be--much has been written and much might be said here. The race
has produced some great men. Merciless in war they generally were, but
it is a question whether the cruelties perpetrated by Matabele or Zulu
chiefs have not been excelled by leaders of Christian nations without
the aggravation of continuous warfare or the excuse of natural
savagery. The religious strife of mediæval Europe, or the fire and
sword and tortures of Spain in Mexico and Peru, will occur to every
mind. Bravery was an almost universal quality amongst the Bantu,
though it varied in degree. Tshaka, the founder of the Zulu nation,
possessed boundless ambition, a powerful and ruthless will, a genuine
genius for military organization and rule. He was emphatically the
native Napoleon of South Africa. Dingaan, his successor, had a few of
his qualities; Cetywayo enough of them to constitute him an interesting
figure and to give him a permanent place in history. Had he not been
obliged to contest his supremacy with the firearms and cannon of the
white man, he might have extended his sway up to the Zambesi and been a
greater warrior than Tshaka. Moselkatze, until he came into conflict
with the emigrant farmers, was a savage potentate of considerable
ability. Like Tshaka with his Zulus, he organized the Matabele into a
strong military power and ruled the west and north with a rod of iron
for many years. His successor, Lobengula, resembled the Zulu Cetywayo
in many respects, and in none more than in his final overthrow by the
white man. Had conditions been otherwise the two chiefs might have
disputed the primacy of South Africa; and it is hard to say which would
have won. These men were all warriors by nature and environment and
generals by instinct. Moshesh the Basuto was, however, a statesman as
well, and his rise and progress and career afford most striking
evidence of the natural ability which a savage may possess. Of a
somewhat similar character is Khama, the present Chief of the
Bechuanas. So much for the greater names among the Bantu.
[Sidenote: Native Bravery]
Their customs and characteristics are, and have always been, somewhat
varied in detail amongst the different tribes, though the main points
are the same. In a military sense they all possess bravery, skill in
ambush, and resourcefulness in attack or defence. The assegai is
certainly a manly weapon in many respects, as well as a deadly one. It
required physical strength, skill and courage in assault, and marked
powers of endurance in the long marches which they have so often
undertaken to surprise a foe or raid a kraal, to attack a British force
or a Dutch commando. The southern tribes--Zulus, Pondos, Tembus and
Kosas--have been perhaps the fiercest and strongest warriors, but the
Matabele of the north ran them pretty close. On the west coast,
however, owing to intermixture with the Bushmen and Hottentots, the
Bantu have deteriorated in both physique and intellect. As a whole,
they knew something in earlier days of agriculture and tilling the
soil, though their women performed the labor; could work in metals to
some extent; had a common language, fairly developed, and a sort of
general law of custom. In government they were, with certain
exceptions, autocratic, and the chiefs possessed great personal power.
Cattle constituted and still comprise the principal source of wealth
and measure of value. Slavery amongst the tribes of the interior was
common up to the days of British rule, and was a natural result of wars
of conquest or predatory excursions. With the Zulu and the Matabele,
as with the Boer, it was a matter of course to keep prisoners of
strength or usefulness as slaves, and to the Kaffir, being
constitutionally lazy, it was a great advantage to have some in his
possession. If he had none, his wife, or wives, occupied a position of
practical serfdom.
[Sidenote: Religion and Superstitions]
Religion has always been a strong factor in Kaffir life. It is not,
however, a principle of Deity worship, nor has it ever been potent in
morals, or government, or military enthusiasm. It is more like the
Chinese deification of ancestors, and consists chiefly in a worship of
the spirits of the dead. The greater the dead chiefs or warriors, the
more pronounced the worship, and the system has, therefore, some
influence in maintaining loyalty to the living chiefs. Spirits are
supposed to pass into animals, and at different times and places,
snakes and lions and antelopes and crocodiles are revered, and have
been propitiated by the sacrifice of other animals--but never of human
beings. It is a moot question as to whether a Supreme Being has ever
been so much as thought of in their original conception of religion,
and the probabilities seem to be against it. Of proof there is
practically none. With a simple superstition which peoples the world
with spirits of no higher character than their own gross or wild
imaginations it has, therefore, been a matter of course that the Kaffir
religion should not influence for good the morals and habits of the
tribes or inspire them even with the religious and military enthusiasm
of the Mahommedan dervish or the Hindoo devotee. Such power as it had,
up to recent years, lay with the wizards, or witch-doctors, who took
the place of the priests in other creeds, and, like the medicine men of
the Red Indians, revelled in cruelties and ruled by playing upon
superstitious fears. The practice of "smelling-out" persons suspected
of witchcraft or of causing sickness, or drought, or cattle-disease,
gave a tremendous power into the hands of chiefs and their unscrupulous
allies. Once a victim was "smelled-out" little chance was left him,
and, no matter how wealthy in person, or strong in influence, his end
had usually come. His property then went to the chief. The murders
and terrorism this system gave rise to constituted perhaps the darkest
side of native life, and its suppression has caused at least one war
between the British and the Kaffirs; while it was for long the greatest
obstacle in the way of the missionary. Of morals the Kaffirs never
knew much, and could not, therefore, lose by association with the white
man in as important a degree as other savage races have done. They
were distinctly inferior in their conception of woman's position to
even the Indian of North America, and females appear to have always
held a very degraded place amongst them. Hence the easy immorality of
the Boers and the practical impossibility of abolishing the polygamous
system amongst semi-independent tribes despite all the efforts of
generations of missionaries.
[Sidenote: Tribal Divisions]
These general characteristics were, of course, modified by surroundings
and external influences. Roughly speaking, the Kaffirs are divided
into the military and industrial Bantu. The former live largely in the
fertile regions between the Drakensberg mountains and the Indian Ocean,
in the Zoutpansberg district of the Transvaal and in Kaffraria. The
latter prefer the mountainous country, and are to be found in
Basutoland, in the greater part of the two Boer republics and in the
regions south of the Orange River or on the confines of the Kalahari
Desert. The differences between these classes of the same race are
pronounced. The military Bantu is stronger, fleeter of foot and
sterner in battle. His assegai has a short handle and a long blade,
and is used for fighting at close quarters; while the other tribes have
a weapon with a long shaft and light blade intended primarily for
hunting. Among the former the chief is a despot; amongst the Mashonas
and Bechuanas and Basutos his power is limited by a council and
sometimes by a general assemblage of the people. The town, or kraal,
of the former is designed chiefly for defence; that of the latter for
purposes of open intercourse and barter. The sole business of the one
has, up to recent years, been warfare and the raising of corn and
cattle as a subsidiary pursuit. The latter cultivated gardens, sowed
fields of grain and could smelt ore and work in iron. Their seats of
power and influence were, and are, in Basutoland and Bechuanaland.
Outside of the steadily improved civilization and character of the
Basutos themselves their country is noteworthy for the career of
Moshesh; his almost final words in 1868, after twenty years of
intermittent conflict with the Boers: "Let me and my people rest and
live under the large folds of the flag of England before I am no more;"
and for the general and sincere loyalty of its people in these later
days. Bechuanaland is famous as the scene of the labors of Robert
Moffat, David Livingstone and John Mackenzie; as being the trade route
from Cape Colony to Central Africa; and as the scene of a prolonged
struggle voiced in the words of Livingstone: "The Boers resolved to
shut up the interior and I determined to open it." Eventually it was
opened, and the work of the great missionary became triumphant.
[Sidenote: British Efforts at Civilizing the Natives]
Meanwhile, much was being done by the British in the various parts of
South Africa which they controlled, from time to time, to elevate the
life and pursuits and character of the natives. In regions governed by
the Dutch no such idea was ever tolerated. Dr. Moffat tells a story in
this connection which describes much in a few words. He was visiting a
Dutchman's house, and suggested that the servants be brought in to the
Sunday service. His host roared with laughter. "Preach to
Hottentots!" he exclaimed. "Call in my dogs and the preach to them!
Go to the mountains and preach to the baboons! Preach to the
Hottentots! A good joke." Aside from the missionaries, Sir George
Grey was probably the first prominent Englishman to even partially
understand the natives, and he was certainly the first to put his views
into effect as Governor. He was greatly respected by all the tribes
with whom he came into contact personally or by policy. Yet he had his
limitations. Mr. Rees in his biography of the Governor tells an
amusing story of his having upon some public occasion remonstrated
against the extravagant folly of a number of the native women in
wearing brass ornaments. One of the chiefs promptly rose and pointed
out that there were bounds to human power. "Rest content, O great
chief," said he, "with what you have accomplished. You have made us
pay taxes. You have made our people work. These things we thought
could never be. But think not you can stop women wearing ornaments.
If you try to do this, O Governor, you will most surely fail."
[Sidenote: Education of Natives]
The first and most important point in the improvement of the native
races is the matter of education. To be really effective it must take
the form of an organized system with plenty of pliability and
machinery; and there should be a fair number of Europeans in the
general community to prevent the native children, after they have once
been trained and taught, from relapsing by degrees into the barbarism
of their natural associates and older relatives. For this reason
little has been done in Natal to educate the Kaffirs; although there
are some seventy-three native schools and the natives appear to be
improving in general character and even in willingness to perform mild
sorts of intermittent labor. Nothing of importance has been achieved
in the purely native territories except such isolated teaching as the
missionaries can manage. Nothing has been even attempted in the two
Republics. But in Cape Colony very successful results have followed
the labors of many men during a number of years--assisted by special
provision made through the Government for purposes of native education.
Sir Langham Dale, Superintendent-General of Education, reported in 1883
that there were 396 mission schools in the Colony, with an attendance
of 44,307 pupils; 226 aborigines' schools, with 13,817 pupils; and 21
boarding and trade schools, with 2,519 pupils. About one-third of the
annual Education Grant, which amounted in 1866 to $110,000, and in 1889
to $425,000, and in 1897 to nearly a million dollars, was appropriated
to these purposes. In the latter year, it may be added, the number of
mission schools had risen to 551, and the aborigines' schools to 420.
Of the various native schools, or institutions, that at Lovedale is the
most important. In 1883 there were 300 pupils in attendance, and it
had a yearly revenue of $125,000. Native clergy and teachers are
trained in its College department; young men are taught book-binding,
printing and other trades in its workshops; young women are instructed
in sewing and laundress work, and there is also an elementary school
for children.
[Illustration: A MATABELE CHIEF. A KAFFIR CHIEF. PRESIDENT STEYN,
ORANGE FREE STATE. SIR W. HALY-HUTCHINSON. GOVERNOR OF NATAL.
ENGLISH, DUTCH AND NATIVE TYPES, SOUTH AFRICA]
[Illustration: A DERVISH CHARGE, SOUDAN WAR. A battle of the Soudan in
which Sir Herbert Kitchener avenged the massacre of Hicks Pasha and his
12,000 men; also the death of the heroic Gordon which occurred a year
later.]
[Sidenote: Progress of the Natives]
The Superintendent-General of Education, already quoted, in a
supplementary Report published in 1884, speaks of the general
opposition he has had to meet as coming from two classes of people--one
which describes the schools as worthless and decries educated natives
as useless, and another which describes the aborigines as getting a
better education than white people and denounces the system as
consequently increasing the competition in industrial employments. And
then he appeals to such evidences of progress and success as: "The
large interchange among natives of letters passing through the
Post-Office; of the utilization of educated natives as carriers of
letters, telegrams and parcels; of the hundreds who fill responsible
posts as clerks, interpreters, school-masters, sewing-mistresses; and
of the still larger number engaged in industrial pursuits, as
carpenters, blacksmiths, tin-smiths, wagon-makers, shoe-makers,
printers, sail-makers, saddlers, etc., earning good wages and helping
to spread civilization amongst their own people." This is a good
record, and there is no doubt that amongst the million natives of Cape
Colony the influence of the system is steadily spreading. There is the
natural defect, however, of the refusal of the white population to mix
with the black either in school or elsewhere, outside of politics. The
native schools and the native system are things apart and isolated,
although, throughout the Colony, there are wealthy and influential
Kaffirs, many of whom are substantial owners of property. And, as a
matter of fact, there are more negro children now attending Government
schools than there are pupils of white extraction.
Everywhere in British territory an effort has been made to utilize
Kaffir free labor and to make the native appreciate the money value of
his work and his time. But although some progress may be seen, it has
not been very great. In Natal, for instance, the sugar industry, with
an invested capital of nearly five million dollars, finds colored labor
absolutely essential. But the Kaffirs cannot be got to work with any
degree of permanence, or effectiveness, and the planters have had to
import coolies in thousands, while all around them are multitudes of
natives admirably suited to the work. At the Diamond Mines of
Kimberley, Mr. Rhodes has employed thousands of black laborers, but it
has only been for short periods and in successive relays. They make a
little money and then go back to their huts, or kraals, as miniature
millionaires--able to obtain cattle enough to buy a wife and to settle
down in Kaffir comfort. Of the important matter of liquor drinking and
liquor selling to natives a word must be said here. In Natal, where
there are at least half a million Zulus, scattered around the villages
and settlements of the fifty thousand white men, it is naturally a
vital question--as in a lesser degree it is all through South Africa.
The law is therefore very strictly administered, and the penalty for a
European selling liquor to a native is severe. It is practical
prohibition, and a similar law has been enforced in the vast
territories of the Chartered Company. Incidentally, it may be said
that in the Colony of Natal the general native management approximates
somewhat to the model of India. The tribal organization has been
largely preserved, instead of being broken up, as it was in Cape Colony
by Sir George Grey. The native mass was too great to be merged in the
small white population. European Courts, mixed Courts of native and
European Judges, and Courts composed of Kaffir chiefs alone, administer
the law in a peculiar form which admits the validity of Kaffir custom
and precedents and law--modified, of course, by Colonial statutes.
Order is maintained, and splendidly so, by a system of passes and by a
code of special police regulations applicable to natives alone.
Written permission from a magistrate must be obtained before a Kaffir
can change his abode, and in the towns all natives must retire to their
huts when curfew rings at nine o'clock. Registration of firearms is
imperative, and the sale to natives is guarded by very strict
enactments. Every native who is responsible for a hut has to pay a
yearly tax of 14s., and this is very cheerfully done.
[Sidenote: The Liquor Laws]
Drunkenness amongst the Kaffirs of Natal is limited, as may be inferred
from this sketch of their management. But in Cape Colony the natives
are not nearly so well guarded from its evils--partly because of the
aversion of the Dutch electorate to legislate in their behalf or to
enforce laws of this kind when they are made; partly from the influence
of the wine-growers and distillers, who naturally have something to
say; partly, in general result, from the intermixture of lower races
such as the Hottentot and Bushmen, and the creation of a type of negro
and half-breed much inferior in parts of the Colony to the Kosa of the
east or the Zulu of Natal. [Sidenote: Civil Rights and Qualifications]
In the important matter of civil rights there is a common feeling among
all settlers of British origin in South Africa, as elsewhere in the
Empire, that no color line should exist in the franchise--other things
being reasonably equal. The qualification is, of course, vital,
although the Dutch part of the community make no qualification or
admission of equality in any way, shape or form, and were, for
instance, greatly disgusted when, in 1895, Khama, the educated,
Christianized and civilized Chief of the Bechuanas, was received in
England with respect and consideration, and entertained by prominent
personages. The principle of political equality is, however, firmly
established in British South Africa. But, so far as the natives are
concerned, the tribal system must be given up, and this debars the
greater part of the population of Natal. In that Colony, also, a
native must have lived for seven years exempt from tribal laws before
he can share in the franchise under qualifications of the same kind as
affect the white population. In Cape Colony there are similar
conditions, with an added proviso that the would-be native voter must
be able to sign his name and write his occupation and address.
[Sidenote: Native Suffrage]
Practically it is only at the Cape that the experiment of native
suffrage has been fairly tried. In Jamaica it failed for various
reasons, and in Natal it did not work when first tried, and at present
has little more than a theoretical existence. In the eastern part of
Cape Colony, which contains the chief native population--including the
Kaffraria of earlier days and the Transkei region--a member of the
Legislative Council is apportioned to mixed constituencies containing
an average respectively of 227,000 colored people and 18,000 whites;
and a member of the House of Assembly is similarly given to every
56,000 natives and 4,500 whites.[4] There are, as yet, not very many
constituencies where this colored vote is an important consideration.
The chief exceptions are to be found amongst the Malays in and around
Cape Town, the Hottentots of the Kat River Settlement, and the Kaffirs
at King Williamstown, Beaufort and Alice. But the number of voters is
growing, and in the eastern part of the Colony their influence appears
to be very good. The educated Kaffir is very unlike the educated
Hindoo, who is apt to become a sort of skeptic in patriotism as well as
in creed. He is intensely conservative in a natural fondness for land
and aversion to change. He is also loyal in the extreme to the British
institutions from which his opportunities and position are derived; and
in this respect has set an example of gratitude worthy the appreciation
of some more civilized peoples. Practically, he is an Imperialist, and
one student of the subject has recently expressed a belief that the
wiping out of the native vote in Cape Colony would mean the loss of
eight or ten seats to the Progressive party in the Assembly. Most
instructive of all, and even more striking than the fact of their being
adherents of Mr. Rhodes' advanced British policy, has been the support
given by educated natives to measures presented to the Legislature for
the prohibition of the sale of liquor to colored people--proposals
defeated from time to time largely by the Afrikander vote. This is,
indeed, a fitting statement to conclude a brief sketch of native
history and development.
[4] Tables of Director of Census. Cape Town. 1891.