In combating the theory of 'born indolence of the negroes' it has been necessary to show, as I have briefly done in the preceding paragraphs, how their apparent indifference to labour may in some ways be accounted for. At the same time, it must be admitted that they are not, generally speaking, energetic of disposition (neither are white men born in the tropics), because that quality has never yet been fairly roused owing to the circumstances of their life and to the fact that they have not felt the struggle for existence as it is felt in the civilised world, where the standard of living is higher and bread has to be won only by acute competition with others.

Nevertheless, their simple wants cannot be furnished nor their customs be followed without some degree of exertion commensurate to their physical ability, which has a limit. It is common knowledge that their stamina is easily exhausted, due in a measure to the poverty of their food, which is neither nutritious in quality nor enduring in its effects.

It is not practicable to obtain any statistics or even reliable information in respect of the actual demand and supply of native labour in the Congo and adjacent territories, and figures relating to the population appear to be mere guesses. I must therefore dispense with data which would be useful in the discussion and turn to the abstract question How to attract the greatest number of men available for foreign labour? '—that is, for labour at such a distance from home as to necessitate long journeys and dependence upon others for nourishment whilst travelling and working.

6

In the first place there is the abiding abhorrence of any departure from home on account of the dangers of the road from enemies and wild animals, and of the difficulties of obtaining food by the way sufficient for subsistence. It is not practicable for them to carry more than two or three days' provision, after which, if no hospitality is found, the wayfarer is liable to perish. Parts of the journey lie through alien if not unfriendly country where the inhabitants, though disposed to hospitality, are unable to extend it wholesale.

M. Goffin puts the truth in bald terms when he describes the route of the caravans between the Upper and the Lower Congo at one point as un sentier sinistre jalonné de cadavres.

In that expression we have the answer to many questions and the crux of it all. Is it possible to conceive that, with such forebodings, any natives not actually reduced to the last resorts or to desperate straits would ever again face such a contingency?—for that everlasting memory is fixed in them.

Proceeding, M. Goffin, speaking of the survivors, says:

Of course we treated our men with as much humanity as possible, and did all we could to make their condition sanitary. Little by little we succeeded, and gradually made a selection amongst the black labourers of those races best suited to the climate. But a panic had arisen all along the West Coast of Africa,

caused by the sick men whom we had repatriated. This rendered further recruitment in that direction impossible. Then we tried importing West Indian negroes and Chinese from Macao. They fared no better than the first lot of 2,000 men who had come from West Africa. Still we pegged away at the gradual improvement of the conditions of life for black men and white in this terrible Cataract region.

Gradually we were able to induce people to come once more from West Africa, from Senegal, Sierra Leone, and Accra. Under the most elaborately careful conditions of life and comfort these negro workmen suffered no longer in health or morale.

The first thought upon reading these words is to applaud the effort of those who brought about reform and obtained the results quoted, and then to ponder upon the ghastly responsibility of employers and the trials of those employed to recruit. Whether recruiters told the truth or disguised it they could expect little response.

Passing on now to the stage where the alarm, according to M. Goffin, had partly abated and labour was forthcoming, he continues his narrative :

But they produced little. We said to ourselves, 'It is the born indolence of the negro.' We sought for a method of conquering this natural disinclination to work. . . . We adopted piece-work, we sought to interest those negro workers directly in the amount of work they put forth. The immediate results were extraordinary.

Other expedients, which I will come to, are suggested in order to cultivate the best energies of the labourer. But they are subsidiary economic questions relating more to the prosperity of industrial companies than to the main point as to how to tempt and stimulate a flow of labour; no policy gives promise of endurance which is limited to economic considerations only.

If men are once attracted, are contented, and easy in their minds upon the prospect of a safe return home, I believe they will in the great majority of cases prove to be reasonable workers, provided they are under fair-minded overseers who are not themselves intemperate and lazy, and who, whilst preserving discipline, treat their labourers honestly, providing them at the same time with suitable food, housing, and medical treatment in the event of serious sickness or accident.

Finally, M. Goffin says in summing up the extraordinary results after establishing the system of piece-work: The work was at once doubled from one day to another, and the Congo natives now supply all the railway labour required, returning to their villages at intervals to be replaced by others.'

Piece

That is a happier picture, which speaks volumes. It ascribes, however, important results to single and insignificant causes. work is not the chief cause nor a solution of labour problems: it is only a feature which has come incidentally into operation.

We may take it that the railway referred to is but an instalment,

and that great industrial developments are following. If labour is to be found in sufficient quantity for these industries, in which apparently much European capital has been sunk, it must be looked for, putting all idea of pressure aside, upon the ground that the natives have an object in seeking it in every direction because they have acquired new wants, have learned the purchasing power of money, and are anxious to live up to a higher standard. It would be interesting to know whether anything has been done in Congoland to promote higher standards, for nothing in M. Goffin's remarks gives an indication that such is the case.

In my opinion the true solution of the question' How to stimulate industrious habits?' is to be found in education and the influences of the Christian religion as steps in the path towards civilisation.

Some of the most competent experts and men of different shades of opinion in another part of Africa have recently in authoritative documents affirmed, after solid investigation, their deliberate belief that education has proved highly beneficial to natives, and that its effect upon them has been to increase their capacity for usefulness and their earning power; that, as a concomitant of religious and moral instruction, it has been effective in raising the standard of material comfort and creating wants; and that these forces have tended to bring them into the field of industry and to effect their conversion into an industrious people.

Those views of men who had much at stake in penning them are the best evidence we can have, relating as they do to territories which have been under active and sympathetic control for many generations.

It means that Christianity and education serve to elevate character, and automatically to compel the abandonment of wild habits which kept the natives down to the low level of mere animal existence.

Were further evidence wanted, a striking illustration of modern racial changes is furnished by the present Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies, Mr. Winston Churchill, whose considered utterance carries weight, and who, after a recent visit to Uganda, gave expression to the information he had publicly gained in the following terms:

No greater contrast can be experienced than the spectacle of Uganda after one travelled through the East African Protectorate for hundreds of miles, meeting native savages whose method of showing you honour was to paint their skins in every colour under the sun, and deck their heads with feathers and their bodies with shells, and dance to a monotonous hopping dirge around the chair in which the visitor took his seat.

Once in Uganda you went into another world. You found there a completely established polity-a State with every one in his place and a place for every one. You found clothed, cultivated, educated natives. You found 200,000 who could read and write, a very great number who ha i embraced the Christian faith sincerely and had abandoned polygamy in consequence of their

conversion.

You found, in short, in Uganda almost everything which went to vindicate the ideal which the negrophile had so often held up before the British public and

before the House of Commons, and in regard to which he had so often in other places been disappointed by the hard logic of facts and the disappointing trend of concrete and material events. We owed a great deal in Uganda to the development on, he thought, an unequalled scale of missionary enterprise. . . .

It is not necessary to be a negrophilist, in the accepted sense of the word, to appropriate such testimony, offered apparently from conviction, in support of my argument for enlightenment of the native races as a means to an end.

The missionary enterprise to which the speaker alluded had, as an underlying principle, associated with the propagation of Christianity that elementary education which was material for creating self-respect and elevating the individual.

Thoughts of this character raise the subject to a higher level of discussion, leaving far behind such questions as the economic value of piece-work because it is more lucrative to all parties. We are led to consider how the formation of industrious habits can be more universally encouraged as a creed amongst the growing coloured natives who have not hitherto felt the impulse.

Apart, however, from the sound economic reasons which suggest a liberal and encouraging attitude, it cannot be overlooked that the European nations, in taking upon themselves the burden of government, have incurred at the same time moral obligations to provide for the care and development of subject races.

Admitting, then, that raising the standard of wants and ideals are chief elements in the fostering of diligence, it is important to consider, after these aims have been partially achieved, how natives who have come under improving influence should be treated when introduced into congregated fields of labour. Manifestly the method of living, food, housing, and treatment should be, though simple, appropriate and such as not to remind them of the bitter experience of the past as set forth in the quotations I have given. These memories can only be wiped out by the establishment and maintenance of sound and healthy conditions which, if rigorously adhered to, will attract the men who formerly were frightened away.

The future purpose of those who require labour and of those who are responsible for its administration must be to ensure reasonable control of it by Government from recruitment to repatriation. I do not mean that any Government should undertake recruiting, believing that public officials should be absolutely freed from making pledges, which as recruiters they would have to do-pledges which they cannot fulfil-in respect of the amount and description of wages, food, and good treatment to be accorded by employers.

The proper function of public officers is to be unhampered by any such duties or pledges, but to be ready to hear and redress legitimate grievances and to be watchful of the strangers whose guardians they ought to be. If they are employed as recruiters, they are handi

capped at once in the performance of higher duties; and, moreover, should the demand for labour be excessive, they are liable to be made the instruments of pressure in the name of Government.

It is considered unpractical, I know, to suggest that in countries where there are no railways, or none but trunk lines, and few other main lines of traffic, provision should be made for the accommodation of strings of natives proceeding to and from labour markets. But I believe such accommodation at intervals to be good business, effective in results and humane. The cost of maintenance of buildings is small, and they will always prove the best sedative against that alarm which so many of these tropical natives have felt at the prospect of travelling.

By the establishment of such places, which may be humble of construction and equipped with the common food of the country, the natives may be landed at their destinations in a contented mind and fit for work. The unfitness and disinclination alluded to by M. Goffin may in all probability be attributed to the fact that the men he referred to were starved, and unequal until after a long rest to regain the necessary strength.

If the labourers are contented, it is notorious throughout the continent of Africa that they become interested and good workers. They are eager to learn new devices, adapt themselves readily to the use of machinery and appliances, and are easily managed. But to remain contented they require to be assured of protection in their rights and of absolute justice when they throw themselves upon the mercy of their magistrates or rulers. It is not sufficient to give them good pay and good food if justice is withheld. They will submit to the cruellest punishment for misdeeds, but will never forget injustice.

I do not lay much store by piece-work. It is capable of being used by unscrupulous overseers as a means of fraud, and, in any case, is only an item in the larger question. It produces perhaps a higher output and gives hard workers a better wage; but it cannot be fairly extended to new hands, who take a long time to learn its methods and advantages. M. Goffin, who builds up a case upon it, says 'men volunteered for overtime. work in order to ensure the completion of their tasks within the fixed period; they themselves did justice on any sluggard and dragged him if necessary to his task.'

It is by no means safe to subject them to overtime, for their hours are always long; and if some had to be dragged to their tasks they were either ill or enslaved, and the idea of free-contract work vanishes.

Sir Harry Johnston voices a sound aphorism when he lays stress upon the iniquity of paying labourers in trade goods. Wherever that has been done it has led to grave abuses, besides which it is entirely destructive of the whole idea of wages. It results in the lading up of the weary workman after his period of toil with many