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diff --git a/15359.txt b/15359.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..2815c21 --- /dev/null +++ b/15359.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6536 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Negro, by W.E.B. Du Bois + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Negro + +Author: W.E.B. Du Bois + +Release Date: March 14, 2005 [EBook #15359] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE NEGRO *** + + + + +Produced by Suzanne Shell, Melissa Er-Raqabi and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net. + + + + + +THE NEGRO + +W.E.B. Du Bois + + + + +New York: Holt, 1915 + +[Transcriber's Notes for e-book versions: + +Hyphenation and accentuation are inconsistent, but are generally left as +found in the edition used for transcription. This edition may or may not +have completely replicated the 1915 edition of the book. Where changes +have been made, they are noted below. If you are using this book for +research, please verify any spelling or punctuation with another source. + +A missing quotation mark was inserted at the beginning of this +paragraph: "It is difficult to imagine that Egypt should have obtained it +from Europe where the oldest find (in Hallstadt) cannot be of an earlier +period than 800 B.C., or from Asia, where iron is not known before 1000 +B.C., and where, in the times of Ashur Nazir Pal, it was still used +concurrently with bronze, while iron beads have been only recently +discovered by Messrs. G.A. Wainwright and Bushe Fox in a predynastic +grave, and where a piece of this metal, possibly a tool, was found in the +masonry of the great pyramid."] + + + + +CONTENTS + + Preface + I Africa + II The Coming of Black Men + III Ethiopia and Egypt + IV The Niger and Islam + V Guinea and Congo + VI The Great Lakes and Zymbabwe + VII The War of Races at Land's End +VIII African Culture + IX The Trade in Men + X The West Indies and Latin America + XI The Negro in the United States + XII The Negro Problems + Suggestions for Further Reading + + +MAPS + +The Physical Geography of Africa +Ancient Kingdoms of Africa +Races in Africa +Distribution of Negro Blood, Ancient and Modern + + + + +THE NEGRO + + + + +TO +A FAITHFUL HELPER +M.G.A. + + + + +PREFACE + + +The time has not yet come for a complete history of the Negro +peoples. Archaeological research in Africa has just begun, and many +sources of information in Arabian, Portuguese, and other tongues are +not fully at our command; and, too, it must frankly be confessed, +racial prejudice against darker peoples is still too strong in so-called +civilized centers for judicial appraisement of the peoples of Africa. +Much intensive monographic work in history and science is needed +to clear mooted points and quiet the controversialist who mistakes +present personal desire for scientific proof. + +Nevertheless, I have not been able to withstand the temptation to +essay such short general statement of the main known facts and their +fair interpretation as shall enable the general reader to know as men +a sixth or more of the human race. Manifestly so short a story must +be mainly conclusions and generalizations with but meager indication +of authorities and underlying arguments. Possibly, if the Public +will, a later and larger book may be more satisfactory on these points. + +W.E. BURGHARDT DU BOIS. + +New York City, Feb. 1, 1915. + + + + +[Illustration: The Physical Geography of Africa] + + + + +I AFRICA + + "Behold! +The Sphinx is Africa. The bond +Of Silence is upon her. Old +And white with tombs, and rent and shorn; +With raiment wet with tears and torn, +And trampled on, yet all untamed." + +MILLER + + +Africa is at once the most romantic and the most tragic of continents. Its +very names reveal its mystery and wide-reaching influence. It is the +"Ethiopia" of the Greek, the "Kush" and "Punt" of the Egyptian, and the +Arabian "Land of the Blacks." To modern Europe it is the "Dark Continent" +and "Land of Contrasts"; in literature it is the seat of the Sphinx and +the lotus eaters, the home of the dwarfs, gnomes, and pixies, and the +refuge of the gods; in commerce it is the slave mart and the source of +ivory, ebony, rubber, gold, and diamonds. What other continent can rival +in interest this Ancient of Days? + +There are those, nevertheless, who would write universal history and leave +out Africa. But how, asks Ratzel, can one leave out the land of Egypt and +Carthage? and Frobenius declares that in future Africa must more and more +be regarded as an integral part of the great movement of world history. +Yet it is true that the history of Africa is unusual, and its strangeness +is due in no small degree to the physical peculiarities of the continent. +With three times the area of Europe it has a coast line a fifth shorter. +Like Europe it is a peninsula of Asia, curving southwestward around the +Indian Sea. It has few gulfs, bays, capes, or islands. Even the rivers, +though large and long, are not means of communication with the outer +world, because from the central high plateau they plunge in rapids and +cataracts to the narrow coastlands and the sea. + +The general physical contour of Africa has been likened to an inverted +plate with one or more rows of mountains at the edge and a low coastal +belt. In the south the central plateau is three thousand or more feet +above the sea, while in the north it is a little over one thousand feet. +Thus two main divisions of the continent are easily distinguished: the +broad northern rectangle, reaching down as far as the Gulf of Guinea and +Cape Guardafui, with seven million square miles; and the peninsula which +tapers toward the south, with five million square miles. + +Four great rivers and many lesser streams water the continent. The +greatest is the Congo in the center, with its vast curving and endless +estuaries; then the Nile, draining the cluster of the Great Lakes and +flowing northward "like some grave, mighty thought, threading a dream"; +the Niger in the northwest, watering the Sudan below the Sahara; and, +finally, the Zambesi, with its greater Niagara in the southeast. Even +these waters leave room for deserts both south and north, but the greater +ones are the three million square miles of sand wastes in the north. + +More than any other land, Africa lies in the tropics, with a warm, dry +climate, save in the central Congo region, where rain at all seasons +brings tropical luxuriance. The flora is rich but not wide in variety, +including the gum acacia, ebony, several dye woods, the kola nut, and +probably tobacco and millet. To these many plants have been added in +historic times. The fauna is rich in mammals, and here, too, many from +other continents have been widely introduced and used. + +Primarily Africa is the Land of the Blacks. The world has always been +familiar with black men, who represent one of the most ancient of human +stocks. Of the ancient world gathered about the Mediterranean, they formed +a part and were viewed with no surprise or dislike, because this world saw +them come and go and play their part with other men. Was Clitus the +brother-in-law of Alexander the Great less to be honored because he +happened to be black? Was Terence less famous? The medieval European +world, developing under the favorable physical conditions of the north +temperate zone, knew the black man chiefly as a legend or occasional +curiosity, but still as a fellow man--an Othello or a Prester John or an +Antar. + +The modern world, in contrast, knows the Negro chiefly as a bond slave in +the West Indies and America. Add to this the fact that the darker races in +other parts of the world have, in the last four centuries, lagged behind +the flying and even feverish footsteps of Europe, and we face to-day a +widespread assumption throughout the dominant world that color is a mark +of inferiority. + +The result is that in writing of this, one of the most ancient, +persistent, and widespread stocks of mankind, one faces astounding +prejudice. That which may be assumed as true of white men must be proven +beyond peradventure if it relates to Negroes. One who writes of the +development of the Negro race must continually insist that he is writing +of a normal human stock, and that whatever it is fair to predicate of the +mass of human beings may be predicated of the Negro. It is the silent +refusal to do this which has led to so much false writing on Africa and +of its inhabitants. Take, for instance, the answer to the apparently +simple question "What is a Negro?" We find the most extraordinary +confusion of thought and difference of opinion. There is a certain type in +the minds of most people which, as David Livingstone said, can be found +only in caricature and not in real life. When scientists have tried to +find an extreme type of black, ugly, and woolly-haired Negro, they have +been compelled more and more to limit his home even in Africa. At least +nine-tenths of the African people do not at all conform to this type, and +the typical Negro, after being denied a dwelling place in the Sudan, along +the Nile, in East Central Africa, and in South Africa, was finally given a +very small country between the Senegal and the Niger, and even there was +found to give trace of many stocks. As Winwood Reade says, "The typical +Negro is a rare variety even among Negroes." + +As a matter of fact we cannot take such extreme and largely fanciful stock +as typifying that which we may fairly call the Negro race. In the case of +no other race is so narrow a definition attempted. A "white" man may be of +any color, size, or facial conformation and have endless variety of +cranial measurement and physical characteristics. A "yellow" man is +perhaps an even vaguer conception. + +In fact it is generally recognized to-day that no scientific definition of +race is possible. Differences, and striking differences, there are between +men and groups of men, but they fade into each other so insensibly that we +can only indicate the main divisions of men in broad outlines. As Von +Luschan says, "The question of the number of human races has quite lost +its _raison d'etre_ and has become a subject rather of philosophic +speculation than of scientific research. It is of no more importance now +to know how many human races there are than to know how many angels can +dance on the point of a needle. Our aim now is to find out how ancient and +primitive races developed from others and how races changed or evolved +through migration and inter-breeding."[1] + +The mulatto (using the term loosely to indicate either an intermediate +type between white and black or a mingling of the two) is as typically +African as the black man and cannot logically be included in the "white" +race, especially when American usage includes the mulatto in the Negro +race. + +It is reasonable, according to fact and historic usage, to include under +the word "Negro" the darker peoples of Africa characterized by a brown +skin, curled or "frizzled" hair, full and sometimes everted lips, a +tendency to a development of the maxillary parts of the face, and a +dolichocephalic head. This type is not fixed or definite. The color varies +widely; it is never black or bluish, as some say, and it becomes often +light brown or yellow. The hair varies from curly to a wool-like mass, and +the facial angle and cranial form show wide variation. + +It is as impossible in Africa as elsewhere to fix with any certainty the +limits of racial variation due to climate and the variation due to +intermingling. In the past, when scientists assumed one unvarying Negro +type, every variation from that type was interpreted as meaning mixture of +blood. To-day we recognize a broader normal African type which, as +Palgrave says, may best be studied "among the statues of the Egyptian +rooms of the British Museum; the larger gentle eye, the full but not +over-protruding lips, the rounded contour, and the good-natured, easy, +sensuous expression. This is the genuine African model." To this race +Africa in the main and parts of Asia have belonged since prehistoric +times. + +The color of this variety of man, as the color of other varieties, is due +to climate. Conditions of heat, cold, and moisture, working for thousands +of years through the skin and other organs, have given men their +differences of color. This color pigment is a protection against sunlight +and consequently varies with the intensity of the sunlight. Thus in Africa +we find the blackest men in the fierce sunlight of the desert, red pygmies +in the forest, and yellow Bushmen on the cooler southern plateau. + +Next to the color, the hair is the most distinguishing characteristic of +the Negro, but the two characteristics do not vary with each other. Some +of the blackest of the Negroes have curly rather than woolly hair, while +the crispest, most closely curled hair is found among the yellow +Hottentots and Bushmen. The difference between the hair of the lighter and +darker races is a difference of degree, not of kind, and can be easily +measured. If the hair follicles of a China-man, a European, and a Negro +are cut across transversely, it will be found that the diameter of the +first is 100 by 77 to 85, the second 100 by 62 to 72, while that of the +Negro is 100 by 40 to 60. This elliptical form of the Negro's hair causes +it to curl more or less tightly. + +There have been repeated efforts to discover, by measurements of various +kinds, further and more decisive differences which would serve as really +scientific determinants of race. Gradually these efforts have been given +up. To-day we realize that there are no hard and fast racial types among +men. Race is a dynamic and not a static conception, and the typical races +are continually changing and developing, amalgamating and differentiating. +In this little book, then, we are studying the history of the darker part +of the human family, which is separated from the rest of mankind by no +absolute physical line, but which nevertheless forms, as a mass, a social +group distinct in history, appearance, and to some extent in spiritual +gift. + +We cannot study Africa without, however, noting some of the other races +concerned in its history, particularly the Asiatic Semites. The +intercourse of Africa with Arabia and other parts of Asia has been so +close and long-continued that it is impossible to-day to disentangle the +blood relationships. Negro blood certainly appears in strong strain among +the Semites, and the obvious mulatto groups in Africa, arising from +ancient and modern mingling of Semite and Negro, has given rise to the +term "Hamite," under cover of which millions of Negroids have been +characteristically transferred to the "white" race by some eager +scientists. + +The earliest Semites came to Africa across the Red Sea. The Phoenicians +came along the northern coasts a thousand years before Christ and began +settlements which culminated in Carthage and extended down the Atlantic +shores of North Africa nearly to the Gulf of Guinea. + +From the earliest times the Greeks have been in contact with Africa as +visitors, traders, and colonists, and the Persian influence came with +Cambyses and others. Roman Africa was bounded by the desert, but at times +came into contact with the blacks across the Sahara and in the valley of +the Nile. After the breaking up of the Roman Empire the Greek and Latin +Christians filtered through Africa, followed finally by a Germanic +invasion in 429 A.D. + +In the seventh century the All-Mother, Asia, claimed Africa again for her +own and blew a cloud of Semitic Mohammedanism all across North Africa, +veiling the dark continent from Europe for a thousand years and converting +vast masses of the blacks to Islam. The Portuguese began to raise the veil +in the fifteenth century, sailing down the Atlantic coast and initiating +the modern slave trade. The Spanish, French, Dutch, and English followed +them, but as traders in men rather than explorers. + +The Portuguese explored the coasts of the Gulf of Guinea, visiting the +interior kingdoms, and then passing by the mouth of the Congo proceeded +southward. Eventually they rounded the Cape of Good Hope and pursued their +explorations as far as the mountains of Abyssinia. This began the modern +exploration of Africa, which is a curious fairy tale, and recalls to us +the great names of Livingstone, Burton, Speke, Stanley, Barth, +Schweinfurth, and many others. In this way Africa has been made known to +the modern world. + +The difficulty of this modern lifting of the veil of centuries emphasizes +two physical facts that underlie all African history: the peculiar +inaccessibility of the continent to peoples from without, which made it so +easily possible for the great human drama played here to hide itself from +the ears of other worlds; and, on the other hand, the absence of interior +barriers--the great stretch of that central plateau which placed +practically every budding center of culture at the mercy of barbarism, +sweeping a thousand miles, with no Alps or Himalayas or Appalachians to +hinder. + +With this peculiarly uninviting coast line and the difficulties in +interior segregation must be considered the climate of Africa. While there +is much diversity and many salubrious tracts along with vast barren +wastes, yet, as Sir Harry Johnston well remarks, "Africa is the chief +stronghold of the real Devil--the reactionary forces of Nature hostile to +the uprise of Humanity. Here Beelzebub, King of the Flies, marshals his +vermiform and arthropod hosts--insects, ticks, and nematode worms--which +more than in other continents (excepting Negroid Asia) convey to the skin, +veins, intestines, and spinal marrow of men and other vertebrates the +microorganisms which cause deadly, disfiguring, or debilitating diseases, +or themselves create the morbid condition of the persecuted human being, +beasts, bird, reptile, frog, or fish."[2] The inhabitants of this land +have had a sheer fight for physical survival comparable with that in no +other great continent, and this must not be forgotten when we consider +their history. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[1] Von Luschan: in _Inter-Racial Problems_, p. 16. + +[2] Johnston: _Negro in the New World_, pp. 14-15. + + + + +II THE COMING OF BLACK MEN + + +The movements of prehistoric man can be seen as yet but dimly in the +uncertain mists of time. This is the story that to-day seems most +probable: from some center in southern Asia primitive human beings began +to differentiate in two directions. Toward the south appeared the +primitive Negro, long-headed and with flattened hair follicle. He spread +along southern Asia and passed over into Africa, where he survives to-day +as the reddish dwarfs of the center and the Bushmen of South Africa. + +Northward and eastward primitive man became broader headed and +straight-haired and spread over eastern Asia, forming the Mongolian type. +Either through the intermingling of these two types or, as some prefer to +think, by the direct prolongation of the original primitive man, a third +intermediate type of human being appeared with hair and cranial +measurement intermediate between the primitive Negro and Mongolian. All +these three types of men intermingled their blood freely and developed +variations according to climate and environment. + +Other and older theories and legends of the origin and spread of mankind +are of interest now only because so many human beings have believed them +in the past. The biblical story of Shem, Ham, and Japheth retains the +interest of a primitive myth with its measure of allegorical truth,[3] but +has, of course, no historic basis. + +The older "Aryan" theory assumed the migration into Europe of one dominant +Asiatic race of civilized conquerors, to whose blood and influence all +modern culture was due. To this "white" race Semitic Asia, a large part of +black Africa, and all Europe was supposed to belong. This "Aryan" theory +has been practically abandoned in the light of recent research, and it +seems probable now that from the primitive Negroid stock evolved in Asia +the Semites either by local variation or intermingling with other stocks; +later there developed the Mediterranean race, with Negroid +characteristics, and the modern Negroes. The blue-eyed, light-haired +Germanic people may have arisen as a modern variation of the mixed peoples +produced by the mingling of Asiatic and African elements. The last word on +this development has not yet been said, and there is still much to learn +and explain; but it is certainly proved to-day beyond doubt that the +so-called Hamites of Africa, the brown and black curly and frizzly-haired +inhabitants of North and East Africa, are not "white" men if we draw the +line between white and black in any logical way. + +The primitive Negroid race of men developed in Asia wandered eastward as +well as westward. They entered on the one hand Burmah and the South Sea +Islands, and on the other hand they came through Mesopotamia and gave +curly hair and a Negroid type to Jew, Syrian, and Assyrian. Ancient +statues of Indian divinities show the Negro type with black face and +close-curled hair, and early Babylonian culture was Negroid. In Arabia the +Negroes may have divided, and one stream perhaps wandered into Europe by +way of Syria. Traces of these Negroes are manifest not only in skeletons, +but in the brunette type of all South Europe. The other branch proceeded +to Egypt and tropical Africa. Another, but perhaps less probable, theory +is that ancient Negroes may have entered Africa from Europe, since the +most ancient skulls of Algeria are Negroid. + +The primitive African was not an extreme type. One may judge from modern +pygmy and Bushmen that his color was reddish or yellow, and his skull was +sometimes round like the Mongolian. He entered Africa not less than fifty +thousand years ago and settled eventually in the broad region between Lake +Chad and the Great Lakes and remained there long stretches of years. + +After a lapse of perhaps thirty thousand years there entered Africa a +further migration of Asiatic people, Negroid in many characteristics, but +lighter and straighter haired than the primitive Negroes. From this +Mediterranean race was developed the modern inhabitants of the shores of +the Mediterranean in Europe, Asia, and Africa and, by mingling with the +primitive Negroes, the ancient Egyptians and modern Negroid races of +Africa. + +As we near historic times the migrations of men became more frequent from +Asia and from Europe, and in Africa came movements and minglings which +give to the whole of Africa a distinct mulatto character. The primitive +Negro stock was "mulatto" in the sense of being not widely differentiated +from the dark, original Australoid stock. As the earlier yellow Negro +developed in the African tropics to the bigger, blacker type, he was +continually mingling his blood with similar types developed in temperate +climes to sallower color and straighter hair. + +We find therefore, in Africa to-day, every degree of development in +Negroid stocks and every degree of intermingling of these developments, +both among African peoples and between Africans, Europeans, and Asiatics. +The mistake is continually made of considering these types as transitions +between absolute Caucasians and absolute Negroes. No such absolute type +ever existed on either side. Both were slowly differentiated from a common +ancestry and continually remingled their blood while the differentiating +was progressing. From prehistoric times down to to-day Africa is, in this +sense, primarily the land of the mulatto. So, too, was earlier Europe and +Asia; only in these countries the mulatto was early bleached by the +climate, while in Africa he was darkened. + +It is not easy to summarize the history of these dark African peoples, +because so little is known and so much is still in dispute. Yet, by +avoiding the real controversies and being unafraid of mere questions of +definition, we may trace a great human movement with considerable +definiteness. + +Three main Negro types early made their appearance: the lighter and +smaller primitive stock; the larger forest Negro in the center and on the +west coast, and the tall, black Nilotic Negro in the eastern Sudan. In the +earliest times we find the Negroes in the valley of the Nile, pressing +downward from the interior. Here they mingled with Semitic types, and +after a lapse of millenniums there arose from this mingling the culture of +Ethiopia and Egypt, probably the first of higher human cultures. + +To the west of the Nile the Negroes expanded straight across the continent +to the Atlantic. Centers of higher culture appeared very early along the +Gulf of Guinea and curling backward met Egyptian, Ethiopian, and even +European and Asiatic influences about Lake Chad. To the southeast, nearer +the primitive seats of the earliest African immigrants and open to +Egyptian and East Indian influences, the Negro culture which culminated at +Zymbabwe arose, and one may trace throughout South Africa its wide +ramifications. + +All these movements gradually aroused the central tribes to unrest. They +beat against the barriers north, northeast, and west, but gradually +settled into a great southeastward migration. Calling themselves proudly +La Bantu (The People), they grew by agglomeration into a warlike nation, +speaking one language. They eventually conquered all Africa south of the +Gulf of Guinea and spread their influence to the northward. + +While these great movements were slowly transforming Africa, she was also +receiving influences from beyond her shores and sending influences out. +With mulatto Egypt black Africa was always in closest touch, so much so +that to some all evidence of Negro uplift seem Egyptian in origin. The +truth is, rather, that Egypt was herself always palpably Negroid, and from +her vantage ground as almost the only African gateway received and +transmitted Negro ideals. + +Phoenician, Greek, and Roman came into touch more or less with black +Africa. Carthage, that North African city of a million men, had a large +caravan trade with Negroland in ivory, metals, cloth, precious stones, and +slaves. Black men served in the Carthaginian armies and marched with +Hannibal on Rome. In some of the North African kingdoms the infiltration +of Negro blood was very large and kings like Massinissa and Jugurtha were +Negroid. By way of the Atlantic the Carthaginians reached the African west +coast. Greek and Roman influences came through the desert, and the +Byzantine Empire and Persia came into communication with Negroland by way +of the valley of the Nile. The influence of these trade routes, added to +those of Egypt, Ethiopia, Benin, and Yoruba, stimulated centers of culture +in the central and western Sudan, and European and African trade early +reached large volume. + +Negro soldiers were used largely in the armies that enabled the +Mohammedans to conquer North Africa and Spain. Beginning in the tenth +century and slowly creeping across the desert into Negroland, the new +religion found an already existent culture and came, not a conqueror, but +as an adapter and inspirer. Civilization received new impetus and a wave +of Mohammedanism swept eastward, erecting the great kingdoms of Melle, the +Songhay, Bornu, and the Hausa states. The older Negro culture was not +overthrown, but, like a great wedge, pushed upward and inward from Yoruba, +and gave stubborn battle to the newer culture for seven or eight +centuries. + +Then it was, in the fifteenth century, that the heart disease of Africa +developed in its most virulent form. There is a modern theory that black +men are and always have been naturally slaves. Nothing is further from the +truth. In the ancient world Africa was no more a slave hunting ground than +Europe or Asia, and both Greece and Rome had much larger numbers of white +slaves than of black. It was natural that a stream of black slaves should +have poured into Egypt, because the chief line of Egyptian conquest and +defense lay toward the heart of Africa. Moreover, the Egyptians, +themselves of Negro descent, had not only Negro slaves but Negroes among +their highest nobility and even among their Pharaohs. Mohammedan +conquerors enslaved peoples of all colors in Europe, Asia, and Africa, but +eventually their empire centered in Asia and Africa and their slaves came +principally from these countries. Asia submitted to Islam except in the +Far East, which was self-protecting. Negro Africa submitted only +partially, and the remaining heathen were in small states which could not +effectively protect themselves against the Mohammedan slave trade. In this +wise the slave trade gradually began to center in Africa, for religious +and political rather than for racial reasons. + +The typical African culture was the culture of family, town, and small +tribe. Hence domestic slavery easily developed a slave trade through war +and commerce. Only the integrating force of state building could have +stopped this slave trade. Was this failure to develop the great state a +racial characteristic? This does not seem a fair conclusion. In four great +centers state building began in Africa. In Ethiopia several large states +were built up, but they tottered before the onslaughts of Egypt, Persia, +Rome, and Byzantium, on the one hand, and finally fell before the +turbulent Bantu warriors from the interior. The second attempt at empire +building began in the southeast, but the same Bantu hordes, pressing now +slowly, now fiercely, from the congested center of the continent, +gradually overthrew this state and erected on its ruins a series of +smaller and more transient kingdoms. + +The third attempt at state building arose on the Guinea coast in Benin and +Yoruba. It never got much beyond a federation of large industrial cities. +Its expansion toward the Congo valley was probably a prime cause of the +original Bantu movements to the southeast. Toward the north and northeast, +on the other hand, these city-states met the Sudanese armed with the new +imperial Mohammedan idea. Just as Latin Rome gave the imperial idea to the +Nordic races, so Islam brought this idea to the Sudan. + +In the consequent attempts at imperialism in the western Sudan there +arose the largest of the African empires. Two circumstances, however, +militated against this empire building: first, the fierce resistance of +the heathen south made war continuous and slaves one of the articles of +systematic commerce. Secondly, the highways of legitimate African commerce +had for millenniums lain to the north. These were suddenly closed by the +Moors in the sixteenth century, and the Negro empires were thrown into the +turmoil of internal war. + +It was then that the European slave traders came from the southwest. They +found partially disrupted Negro states on the west coast and falling +empires in the Sudan, together with the old unrest of over-population and +migration in the valley of the Congo. They not only offered a demand for +the usual slave trade, but they increased it to an enormous degree, until +their demand, added to the demand of the Mohammedan in Africa and Asia, +made human beings the highest priced article of commerce in Africa. Under +such circumstances there could be but one end: the virtual uprooting of +ancient African culture, leaving only misty reminders of the ruin in the +customs and work of the people. To complete this disaster came the +partition of the continent among European nations and the modern attempt +to exploit the country and the natives for the economic benefit of the +white world, together with the transplanting of black nations to the new +western world and their rise and self-assertion there. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[3] Ham is probably the Egyptian word "Khem" (black), the native name of +Egypt. In the original myth Canaan and not Ham was Noah's third son. + +The biblical story of the "curse of Canaan" (Genesis IX, 24-25) has been +the basis of an astonishing literature which has to-day only a +psychological interest. It is sufficient to remember that for several +centuries leaders of the Christian Church gravely defended Negro slavery +and oppression as the rightful curse of God upon the descendants of a son +who had been disrespectful to his drunken father! Cf. Bishop Hopkins: +_Bible Views of Slavery_, p. 7. + + + + +III ETHIOPIA AND EGYPT + + +Having viewed now the land and movements of African people in main +outline, let us scan more narrowly the history of five main centers of +activity and culture, namely: the valleys of the Nile and of the Congo, +the borders of the great Gulf of Guinea, the Sudan, and South Africa. +These divisions do not cover all of Negro Africa, but they take in the +main areas and the main lines in development. + +First, we turn to the valley of the Nile, perhaps the most ancient of +known seats of civilization in the world, and certainly the oldest in +Africa, with a culture reaching back six or eight thousand years. Like all +civilizations it drew largely from without and undoubtedly arose in the +valley of the Nile, because that valley was so easily made a center for +the meeting of men of all types and from all parts of the world. At the +same time Egyptian civilization seems to have been African in its +beginnings and in its main line of development, despite strong influences +from all parts of Asia. Of what race, then, were the Egyptians? They +certainly were not white in any sense of the modern use of that +word--neither in color nor physical measurement, in hair nor countenance, +in language nor social customs. They stood in relationship nearest the +Negro race in earliest times, and then gradually through the infiltration +of Mediterranean and Semitic elements became what would be described in +America as a light mulatto stock of Octoroons or Quadroons. This stock was +varied continually; now by new infiltration of Negro blood from the south, +now by Negroid and Semitic blood from the east, now by Berber types from +the north and west. + +Egyptian monuments show distinctly Negro and mulatto faces. Herodotus, in +an incontrovertible passage, alludes to the Egyptians as "black and +curly-haired"[4]--a peculiarly significant statement from one used to the +brunette Mediterranean type; in another passage, concerning the fable of +the Dodonian Oracle, he again alludes to the swarthy color of the +Egyptians as exceedingly dark and even black. AEschylus, mentioning a boat +seen from the shore, declares that its crew are Egyptians, because of +their black complexions. + +Modern measurements, with all their admitted limitations, show that in the +Thebaid from one-seventh to one-third of the Egyptian population were +Negroes, and that of the predynastic Egyptians less than half could be +classed as non-Negroid. Judging from measurements in the tombs of nobles +as late as the eighteenth dynasty, Negroes form at least one-sixth of the +higher class.[5] + +Such measurements are by no means conclusive, but they are apt to be +under rather than over statements of the prevalence of Negro blood. Head +measurements of Negro Americans would probably place most of them in the +category of whites. The evidence of language also connects Egypt with +Africa and the Negro race rather than with Asia, while religious +ceremonies and social customs all go to strengthen this evidence. + +The ethnic history of Northeast Africa would seem, therefore, to have been +this: predynastic Egypt was settled by Negroes from Ethiopia. They were of +varied type: the broad-nosed, woolly-haired type to which the word "Negro" +is sometimes confined; the black, curly-haired, sharper featured type, +which must be considered an equally Negroid variation. These Negroes met +and mingled with the invading Mediterranean race from North Africa and +Asia. Thus the blood of the sallower race spread south and that of the +darker race north. Black priests appear in Crete three thousand years +before Christ, and Arabia is to this day thoroughly permeated with Negro +blood. Perhaps, as Chamberlain says, "one of the prime reasons why no +civilization of the type of that of the Nile arose in other parts of the +continent, if such a thing were at all possible, was that Egypt acted as a +sort of channel by which the genius of Negro-land was drafted off into the +service of Mediterranean and Asiatic culture."[6] + +To one familiar with the striking and beautiful types arising from the +mingling of Negro with Latin and Germanic types in America, the puzzle of +the Egyptian type is easily solved. It was unlike any of its neighbors and +a unique type until one views the modern mulatto; then the faces of +Rahotep and Nefert, of Khafra and Amenemhat I, of Aahmes and Nefertari, +and even of the great Ramessu II, become curiously familiar. + +The history of Egypt is a science in itself. Before the reign of the first +recorded king, five thousand years or more before Christ, there had +already existed in Egypt a culture and art arising by long evolution from +the days of paleolithic man, among a distinctly Negroid people. About 4777 +B.C. Aha-Mena began the first of three successive Egyptian empires. This +lasted two thousand years, with many Pharaohs, like Khafra of the Fourth +Dynasty, of a strongly Negroid cast of countenance. + +At the end of the period the empire fell apart into Egyptian and Ethiopian +halves, and a silence of three centuries ensued. It is quite possible that +an incursion of conquering black men from the south poured over the land +in these years and dotted Egypt in the next centuries with monuments on +which the full-blooded Negro type is strongly and triumphantly impressed. +The great Sphinx at Gizeh, so familiar to all the world, the Sphinxes of +Tanis, the statue from the Fayum, the statue of the Esquiline at Rome, +and the Colossi of Bubastis all represent black, full-blooded Negroes and +are described by Petrie as "having high cheek bones, flat cheeks, both in +one plane, a massive nose, firm projecting lips, and thick hair, with an +austere and almost savage expression of power."[7] + +Blyden, the great modern black leader of West Africa, said of the Sphinx +at Gizeh: "Her features are decidedly of the African or Negro type, with +'expanded nostrils.' If, then, the Sphinx was placed here--looking out in +majestic and mysterious silence over the empty plain where once stood the +great city of Memphis in all its pride and glory, as an 'emblematic +representation of the king'--is not the inference clear as to the peculiar +type or race to which that king belonged?"[8] + +The middle empire arose 3064 B.C. and lasted nearly twenty-four centuries. +Under Pharaohs whose Negro descent is plainly evident, like Amenemhat I +and III and Usertesen I, the ancient glories of Egypt were restored and +surpassed. At the same time there is strong continuous pressure from the +wild and unruly Negro tribes of the upper Nile valley, and we get some +idea of the fear which they inspired throughout Egypt when we read of the +great national rejoicing which followed the triumph of Usertesen III (c. +2660-22) over these hordes. He drove them back and attempted to confine +them to the edge of the Nubian Desert above the Second Cataract. Hemmed in +here, they set up a state about this time and founded Nepata. + +Notwithstanding this repulse of black men, less than one hundred years +later a full-blooded Negro from the south, Ra Nehesi, was seated on the +throne of the Pharaohs and was called "The king's eldest son." This may +mean that an incursion from the far south had placed a black conqueror on +the throne. At any rate, the whole empire was in some way shaken, and two +hundred years later the invasion of the Hyksos began. The domination of +Hyksos kings who may have been Negroids from Asia[9] lasted for five +hundred years. + +The redemption of Egypt from these barbarians came from Upper Egypt, led +by the mulatto Aahmes. He founded in 1703 B.C. the new empire, which +lasted fifteen hundred years. His queen, Nefertari, "the most venerated +figure of Egyptian history,"[10] was a Negress of great beauty, strong +personality, and of unusual administrative force. She was for many years +joint ruler with her son, Amenhotep I, who succeeded his father.[11] + +The new empire was a period of foreign conquest and internal splendor and +finally of religious dispute and overthrow. Syria was conquered in these +reigns and Asiatic civilization and influences poured in upon Egypt. The +great Tahutmes III, whose reign was "one of the grandest and most eventful +in Egyptian history,"[12] had a strong Negroid countenance, as had also +Queen Hatshepsut, who sent the celebrated expedition to reopen ancient +trade with the Hottentots of Punt. A new strain of Negro blood came to the +royal line through Queen Mutemua about 1420 B.C., whose son, Amenhotep +III, built a great temple at Luqsor and the Colossi at Memnon. + +The whole of the period in a sense culminated in the great Ramessu II, the +oppressor of the Hebrews, who with his Egyptian, Libyan, and Negro armies +fought half the world. His reign, however, was the beginning of decline, +and foes began to press Egypt from the white north and the black south. +The priests transferred their power at Thebes, while the Assyrians under +Nimrod overran Lower Egypt. The center of interest is now transferred to +Ethiopia, and we pass to the more shadowy history of that land. + +The most perfect example of Egyptian poetry left to us is a celebration of +the prowess of Usertesen III in confining the turbulent Negro tribes to +the territory below the Second Cataract of the Nile. The Egyptians called +this territory Kush, and in the farthest confines of Kush lay Punt, the +cradle of their race. To the ancient Mediterranean world Ethiopia (i.e., +the Land of the Black-faced) was a region of gods and fairies. Zeus and +Poseidon feasted each year among the "blameless Ethiopians," and Black +Memnon, King of Ethiopia, was one of the greatest of heroes. + +"The Ethiopians conceive themselves," says Diodorus Siculus (Lib. III), +"to be of greater antiquity than any other nation; and it is probable +that, born under the sun's path, its warmth may have ripened them earlier +than other men. They suppose themselves also to be the inventors of divine +worship, of festivals, of solemn assemblies, of sacrifices, and every +religious practice. They affirm that the Egyptians are one of their +colonies." + +The Egyptians themselves, in later days, affirmed that they and their +civilization came from the south and from the black tribes of Punt, and +certainly "at the earliest period in which human remains have been +recovered Egypt and Lower Nubia appear to have formed culturally and +racially one land."[13] + +The forging ahead of Egypt in culture was mainly from economic causes. +Ethiopia, living in a much poorer land with limited agricultural +facilities, held to the old arts and customs, and at the same time lost +the best elements of its population to Egypt, absorbing meantime the +oncoming and wilder Negro tribes from the south and west. Under the old +empire, therefore, Ethiopia remained in comparative poverty, except as +some of its tribes invaded Egypt with their handicrafts. + +As soon as the civilization below the Second Cataract reached a height +noticeably above that of Ethiopia, there was continued effort to protect +that civilization against the incursion of barbarians. Hundreds of +campaigns through thousands of years repeatedly subdued or checked the +blacks and brought them in as captives to mingle their blood with the +Egyptian nation; but the Egyptian frontier was not advanced. + +A separate and independent Ethiopian culture finally began to arise during +the middle empire of Egypt and centered at Nepata and Meroe. Widespread +trade in gold, ivory, precious stones, skins, wood, and works of +handicraft arose.[14] The Negro began to figure as the great trader of +Egypt. + +This new wealth of Ethiopia excited the cupidity of the Pharaohs and led +to aggression and larger intercourse, until at last, when the dread Hyksos +appeared, Ethiopia became both a physical and cultural refuge for +conquered Egypt. The legitimate Pharaohs moved to Thebes, nearer the +boundaries of Ethiopia, and from here, under Negroid rulers, Lower Egypt +was redeemed. + +The ensuing new empire witnessed the gradual incorporation of Ethiopia +into Egypt, although the darker kingdom continued to resist. Both mulatto +Pharaohs, Aahmes and Amenhotep I, sent expeditions into Ethiopia, and in +the latter's day sons of the reigning Pharaoh began to assume the title of +"Royal Son of Kush" in some such way as the son of the King of England +becomes the Prince of Wales. + +Trade relations were renewed with Punt under circumstances which lead us +to place that land in the region of the African lakes. The Sudanese tribes +were aroused by these and other incursions, until the revolts became +formidable in the fourteenth century before Christ. + +Egyptian culture, however, gradually conquered Ethiopia where her armies +could not, and Egyptian religion and civil rule began to center in the +darker kingdom. When, therefore, Shesheng I, the Libyan, usurped the +throne of the Pharaohs in the tenth century B.C., the Egyptian legitimate +dynasty went to Nepata as king priests and established a theocratic +monarchy. Gathering strength, the Ethiopian kingdom under this dynasty +expanded north about 750 B.C. and for a century ruled all Egypt. + +The first king, Pankhy, was Egyptian bred and not noticeably Negroid, but +his successors showed more and more evidence of Negro blood--Kashta the +Kushite, Shabaka, Tarharqa, and Tanutamen. During the century of Ethiopian +rule a royal son was appointed to rule Egypt, just as formerly a royal +Egyptian had ruled Kush. In many ways this Ethiopian kingdom showed its +Negro peculiarities: first, in its worship of distinctly Sudanese gods; +secondly, in the rigid custom of female succession in the kingdom, and +thirdly, by the election of kings from the various royal claimants to the +throne. "It was the heyday of the Negro. For the greater part of the +century ... Egypt itself was subject to the blacks, just as in the new +empire the Sudan had been subject to Egypt."[15] + +Egypt now began to fall into the hands of Asia and was conquered first by +the Assyrians and then by the Persians, but the Ethiopian kings kept their +independence. Aspeluta, whose mother and sister are represented as +full-blooded Negroes, ruled from 630 to 600 B.C. Horsiatef (560-525 B.C.) +made nine expeditions against the warlike tribes south of Meroe, and his +successor, Nastosenen (525-500 B.C.) was the one who repelled Cambyses. He +also removed the capital from Nepata to Meroe, although Nepata continued +to be the religious capital and the Ethiopian kings were still crowned on +its golden throne. + +From the fifth to the second century B.C. we find the wild Sudanese tribes +pressing in from the west and Greek culture penetrating from the east. +King Arg-Amen (Ergamenes) showed strong Greek influences and at the same +time began to employ the Ethiopian speech in writing and used a new +Ethiopian alphabet. + +While the Ethiopian kings were still crowned at Nepata, Meroe gradually +became the real capital and supported at one time four thousand artisans +and two hundred thousand soldiers. It was here that the famous Candaces +reigned as queens. Pliny tells us that one Candace of the time of Nero had +had forty-four predecessors on the throne, while another Candace figures +in the New Testament.[16] + +It was probably this latter Candace who warred against Rome at the time of +Augustus and received unusual consideration from her formidable foe. The +prestige of Ethiopia at this time was considerable throughout the world. +Pseudo-Callisthenes tells an evidently fabulous story of the visit of +Alexander the Great to Candace, Queen of Meroe, which nevertheless +illustrates her fame: Candace will not let him enter Ethiopia and says he +is not to scorn her people because they are black, for they are whiter in +soul than his white folk. She sent him gold, maidens, parrots, sphinxes, +and a crown of emeralds and pearls. She ruled eighty tribes, who were +ready to punish those who attacked her. + +The Romans continued to have so much trouble with their Ethiopian frontier +that finally, when Semitic mulattoes appeared in the east, the Emperor +Diocletian invited the wild Sudanese tribe of Nubians (Nobadae) from the +west to repel them. These Nubians eventually embraced Christianity, and +northern Ethiopia came to be known in time as Nubia. + +The Semitic mulattoes from the east came from the highlands bordering the +Red Sea and Asia. On both sides of this sea Negro blood is strongly in +evidence, predominant in Africa and influential in Asia. Ludolphus, +writing in the seventeenth century, says that the Abyssinians "are +generally black, which [color] they most admire." Trade and war united the +two shores, and merchants have passed to and fro for thirty centuries. + +In this way Arabian, Jewish, Egyptian, Greek, and Roman influences spread +slowly upon the Negro foundation. Early legendary history declares that a +queen, Maqueda, or Nikaula of Sheba, a state of Central Abyssinia, visited +Solomon in 1050 B.C. and had her son Menelik educated in Jerusalem. This +was the supposed beginning of the Axumite kingdom, the capital of which, +Axume, was a flourishing center of trade. Ptolemy Evergetes and his +successors did much to open Abyssinia to the world, but most of the +population of that day was nomadic. In the fourth century Byzantine +influences began to be felt, and in 330 St. Athanasius of Alexandria +consecrated Fromentius as Bishop of Ethiopia. He tutored the heir to the +Abyssinian kingdom and began its gradual christianization. By the early +part of the sixth century Abyssinia was trading with India and Byzantium +and was so far recognized as a Christian country that the Emperor +Justinian appealed to King Kaleb to protect the Christians in southwestern +Arabia. Kaleb conquered Yemen in 525 and held it fifty years. + +Eventually a Jewish princess, Judith, usurped the Axumite throne; the +Abyssinians were expelled from Arabia, and a long period begins when as +Gibbon says, "encompassed by the enemies of their religion, the Ethiopians +slept for nearly a thousand years, forgetful of the world by whom they +were forgotten." Throughout the middle ages, however, the legend of a +great Christian kingdom hidden away in Africa persisted, and the search +for Prester John became one of the world quests. + +It was the expanding power of Abyssinia that led Rome to call in the +Nubians from the western desert. The Nubians had formed a strong league of +tribes, and as the ancient kingdom of Ethiopia declined they drove back +the Abyssinians, who had already established themselves at Meroe. + +In the sixth century the Nubians were converted to Christianity by a +Byzantine priest, and they immediately began to develop. A new capital, +Dongola, replaced Nepata and Meroe, and by the twelfth century churches +and brick dwellings had appeared. As the Mohammedan flood pressed up the +Nile valley it was the Nubians that held it back for two centuries. + +Farther south other wild tribes pushed out of the Sudan and began a +similar development. Chief among these were the Fung, who fixed their +capital at Senaar, at the junction of the White and Blue Nile. When the +Mohammedan flood finally passed over Nubia, the Fung diverted it by +declaring themselves Moslems. This left the Fung as the dominant power in +the fifteenth century from the Three Cataracts to Fazogli and from the Red +Sea at Suakin to the White Nile. Islam then swept on south in a great +circle, skirted the Great Lakes, and then curled back to Somaliland, +completely isolating Abyssinia. + +Between the thirteenth and sixteenth centuries the Egyptian Sudan became a +congeries of Mohammedan kingdoms with Arab, mulatto, and Negro kings. Far +to the west, near Lake Chad, arose in 1520 the sultanate of Baghirmi, +which reached its highest power in the seventh century. This dynasty was +overthrown by the Negroid Mabas, who established Wadai to the eastward +about 1640. South of Wadai lay the heathen and cannibals of the Congo +valley, against which Islam never prevailed. East of Wadai and nearer the +Nile lay the kindred state of Darfur, a Nubian nation whose sultans +reigned over two hundred years and which reached great prosperity in the +early seventeenth century under Soliman Solon. + +Before the Mohammedan power reached Abyssinia the Portuguese pioneers had +entered the country from the east and begun to open the country again to +European knowledge. Without doubt, in the centuries of silence, a +civilization of some height had flourished in Abyssinia, but all authentic +records were destroyed by fire in the tenth century. When the Portuguese +came, the older Axumite kingdom had fallen and had been succeeded by a +number of petty states. + +The Sudanese kingdoms of the Sudan resisted the power of the Mameluke beys +in Egypt, and later the power of the Turks until the nineteenth century, +when the Sudan was made nominally a part of Egypt. Continuous upheaval, +war, and conquest had by this time done their work, and little of ancient +Ethiopian culture survived except the slave trade. + +The entrance of England into Egypt, after the building of the Suez Canal, +stirred up eventually revolt in the Sudan, for political, economic, and +religious reasons. Led by a Sudanese Negro, Mohammed Ahmad, who claimed to +be the Messiah (Mahdi), the Sudan arose in revolt in 1881, determined to +resist a hated religion, foreign rule, and interference with their chief +commerce, the trade in slaves. The Sudan was soon aflame, and the able +mulatto general, Osman Digna, aided by revolt among the heathen Dinka, +drove Egypt and England out of the Sudan for sixteen years. It was not +until 1898 that England reentered the Sudan and in petty revenge +desecrated the bones of the brave, even if misguided, prophet. + +Meantime this Mahdist revolt had delayed England's designs on Abyssinia, +and the Italians, replacing her, attempted a protectorate. Menelik of +Shoa, one of the smaller kingdoms of Abyssinia, was a shrewd man of +predominantly Negro blood, and had been induced to make a treaty with the +Italians after King John had been killed by the Mahdists. The exact terms +of the treaty were disputed, but undoubtedly the Italians tried by this +means to reduce Menelik to vassalage. Menelik stoutly resisted, and at the +great battle of Adua, one of the decisive battles of the modern world, the +Abyssinians on March 1, 1896, inflicted a crushing defeat on the Italians, +killing four thousand of them and capturing two thousand prisoners. The +empress, Taitou, a full-blooded Negress, led some of the charges. By this +battle Abyssinia became independent. + +Such in vague and general outline is the strange story of the valley of +the Nile--of Egypt, the motherland of human culture and + +"That starr'd Ethiop Queen that strove To set her beauty's praise above +The sea nymphs." + +FOOTNOTES: + +[4] [Greek: "autos de eikasa tede kai hote melanchroes eisi kai +oulotriches."] Liber II, Cap. 104. + +[5] Cf. Maciver and Thompson: _Ancient Races of the Thebaid_. + +[6] _Journal of Race Development_, I, 484. + +[7] Petrie: _History of Egypt_, I, 51, 237. + +[8] _From West Africa to Palestine_, p. 114. + +[9] Depending partly on whether the so-called Hyksos sphinxes belong to +the period of the Hyksos kings or to an earlier period (cf. Petrie, I, +52-53, 237). That Negroids largely dominated in the early history of +western Asia is proven by the monuments. + +[10] Petrie: _History of Egypt_, II, 337. + +[11] Chamberlain: _Journal of Race Development_, April, 1911. + +[12] Petrie: _History of Egypt_, II, 337. + +[13] Reisner: _Archeological Survey of Nubia_, I, 319. + +[14] Hoskins declares that the arch had its origin in Ethiopia. + +[15] Maciver and Wooley: _Areika_, p. 2. + +[16] Acts VIII, 27. + + + + +IV THE NIGER AND ISLAM + + +The Arabian expression "Bilad es Sudan" (Land of the Blacks) was applied +to the whole region south of the Sahara, from the Atlantic to the Nile. It +is a territory some thirty-five hundred miles by six hundred miles, +containing two million square miles, and has to-day a population of +perhaps eighty million. It is thus two-thirds the size of the United +States and quite as thickly settled. In the western Sudan the Niger plays +the same role as the Nile in the east. In this chapter we follow the +history of the Niger. + +The history of this part of Africa was probably something as follows: +primitive man, entering Africa from Arabia, found the Great Lakes, spread +in the Nile valley, and wandered westward to the Niger. Herodotus tells of +certain youths who penetrated the desert to the Niger and found there a +city of black dwarfs. Succeeding migrations of Negroes and Negroids pushed +the dwarfs gradually into the inhospitable forests and occupied the Sudan, +pushing on to the Atlantic. Here the newcomers, curling northward, met the +Mediterranean race coming down across the western desert, while to the +southward the Negro came to the Gulf of Guinea and the thick forests of +the Congo valley. Indigenous civilizations arose on the west coast in +Yoruba and Benin, and contact of these with the Mediterranean race in the +desert, and with Egyptian and Arab from the east, gave rise to centers of +Negro culture in the Sudan at Ghana and Melle and in Songhay, Nupe, the +Hausa states, and Bornu. + +The history of the Sudan thus leads us back again to Ethiopia, that +strange and ancient center of world civilization whose inhabitants in the +ancient world were considered to be the most pious and the oldest of men. +From this center the black originators of African culture, and to a large +degree of world culture, wandered not simply down the Nile, but also +westward. These Negroes developed the original substratum of culture which +later influences modified but never displaced. + +We know that Egyptian Pharaohs in several cases ventured into the western +Sudan and that Egyptian influences are distinctly traceable. Greek and +Byzantine culture and Phoenician and Carthaginian trade also penetrated, +while Islam finally made this whole land her own. Behind all these +influences, however, stood from the first an indigenous Negro culture. The +stone figures of Sherbro, the megaliths of Gambia, the art and industry of +the west coast are all too deep and original evidences of civilization to +be merely importations from abroad. + +Nor was the Sudan the inert recipient of foreign influence when it came. +According to credible legend, the "Great King" at Byzantium imported +glass, tin, silver, bronze, cut stones, and other treasure from the Sudan. +Embassies were sent and states like Nupe recognized the suzerainty of the +Byzantine emperor. The people of Nupe especially were filled with pride +when the Byzantine people learned certain kinds of work in bronze and +glass from them, and this intercourse was only interrupted by the +Mohammedan conquest. + +To this ancient culture, modified somewhat by Byzantine and Christian +influences, came Islam. It approached from the northwest, coming +stealthily and slowly and being handed on particularly by the Mandingo +Negroes. About 1000-1200 A.D. the situation was this: Ghana was on the +edge of the desert in the north, Mandingoland between the Niger and the +Senegal in the south and the western Sahara, Djolof was in the west on the +Senegal, and the Songhay on the Niger in the center. The Mohammedans came +chiefly as traders and found a trade already established. Here and there +in the great cities were districts set aside for these new merchants, and +the Mohammedans gave frequent evidence of their respect for these black +nations. + +Islam did not found new states, but modified and united Negro states +already ancient; it did not initiate new commerce, but developed a +widespread trade already established. It is, as Frobenius says, "easily +proved from chronicles written in Arabic that Islam was only effective in +fact as a fertilizer and stimulant. The essential point is the +resuscitative and invigorative concentration of Negro power in the service +of a new era and a Moslem propaganda, as well as the reaction thereby +produced."[17] + +Early in the eighth century Islam had conquered North Africa and converted +the Berbers. Aided by black soldiers, the Moslems crossed into Spain; in +the following century Berber and Arab armies crossed the west end of the +Sahara and came to Negroland. Later in the eleventh century Arabs +penetrated the Sudan and Central Africa from the east, filtering through +the Negro tribes of Darfur, Kanem, and neighboring regions. The Arabs were +too nearly akin to Negroes to draw an absolute color line. Antar, one of +the great pre-Islamic poets of Arabia, was the son of a black woman, and +one of the great poets at the court of Haroun al Raschid was black. In the +twelfth century a learned Negro poet resided at Seville, and Sidjilmessa, +the last town in Lower Morocco toward the desert, was founded in 757 by a +Negro who ruled over the Berber inhabitants. Indeed, many towns in the +Sudan and the desert were thus ruled, and felt no incongruity in this +arrangement. They say, to be sure, that the Moors destroyed Audhoghast +because it paid tribute to the black town of Ghana, but this was because +the town was heathen and not because it was black. On the other hand, +there is a story that a Berber king overthrew one of the cities of the +Sudan and all the black women committed suicide, being too proud to allow +themselves to fall into the hands of white men. + +In the west the Moslems first came into touch with the Negro kingdom of +Ghana. Here large quantities of gold were gathered in early days, and we +have names of seventy-four rulers before 300 A.D. running through +twenty-one generations. This would take us back approximately a thousand +years to 700 B.C., or about the time that Pharaoh Necho of Egypt sent out +the Phoenician expedition which circumnavigated Africa, and possibly +before the time when Hanno, the Carthaginian, explored the west coast of +Africa. + +By the middle of the eleventh century Ghana was the principal kingdom in +the western Sudan. Already the town had a native and a Mussulman quarter, +and was built of wood and stone with surrounding gardens. The king had an +army of two hundred thousand and the wealth of the country was great. A +century later the king had become Mohammedan in faith and had a palace +with sculptures and glass windows. The great reason for this development +was the desert trade. Gold, skins, ivory, kola nuts, gums, honey, wheat, +and cotton were exported, and the whole Mediterranean coast traded in the +Sudan. Other and lesser black kingdoms like Tekrou, Silla, and Masina +surrounded Ghana. + +In the early part of the thirteenth century the prestige of Ghana began to +fall before the rising Mandingan kingdom to the west. Melle, as it was +called, was founded in 1235 and formed an open door for Moslem and Moorish +traders. The new kingdom, helped by its expanding trade, began to grow, +and Islam slowly surrounded the older Negro culture west, north, and east. +However, a great mass of the older heathen culture, pushing itself upward +from the Guinea coast, stood firmly against Islam down to the nineteenth +century. + +Steadily Mohammedanism triumphed in the growing states which almost +encircled the protagonists of ancient Atlantic culture. Mandingan Melle +eventually supplanted Ghana in prestige and power, after Ghana had been +overthrown by the heathen Su Su from the south. + +The territory of Melle lay southeast of Ghana and some five hundred miles +north of the Gulf of Guinea. Its kings were known by the title of Mansa, +and from the middle of the thirteenth century to the middle of the +fourteenth the Mellestine, as its dominion was called, was the leading +power in the land of the blacks. Its greatest king, Mari Jalak (Mansa +Musa), made his pilgrimage to Mecca in 1324, with a caravan of sixty +thousand persons, including twelve thousand young slaves gowned in figured +cotton and Persian silk. He took eighty camel loads of gold dust (worth +about five million dollars) to defray his expenses, and greatly impressed +the people of the East with his magnificence. + +On his return he found that Timbuktu had been sacked by the Mossi, but he +rebuilt the town and filled the new mosque with learned blacks from the +University of Fez. Mansa Musa reigned twenty-five years and "was +distinguished by his ability and by the holiness of his life. The justice +of his administration was such that the memory of it still lives."[18] The +Mellestine preserved its preeminence until the beginning of the sixteenth +century, when the rod of Sudanese empire passed to Songhay, the largest +and most famous of the black empires. + +The known history of Songhay covers a thousand years and three dynasties +and centers in the great bend of the Niger. There were thirty kings of the +First Dynasty, reigning from 700 to 1335. During the reign of one of these +the Songhay kingdom became the vassal kingdom of Melle, then at the height +of its glory. In addition to this the Mossi crossed the valley, plundered +Timbuktu in 1339, and separated Jenne, the original seat of the Songhay, +from the main empire. The sixteenth king was converted to Mohammedanism in +1009, and after that all the Songhay princes were Mohammedans. Mansa Musa +took two young Songhay princes to the court of Melle to be educated in +1326. These boys when grown ran away and founded a new dynasty in Songhay, +that of the Sonnis, in 1355. Seventeen of these kings reigned, the last +and greatest being Sonni Ali, who ascended the throne in 1464. Melle was +at this time declining, other cities like Jenne, with its seven thousand +villages, were rising, and the Tuaregs (Berbers with Negro blood) had +captured Timbuktu. + +Sonni Ali was a soldier and began his career with the conquest of Timbuktu +in 1469. He also succeeded in capturing Jenne and attacked the Mossi and +other enemies on all sides. Finally he concentrated his forces for the +destruction of Melle and subdued nearly the whole empire on the west bend +of the Niger. In summing up Sonni Ali's military career the chronicle says +of him, "He surpassed all his predecessors in the numbers and valor of his +soldiery. His conquests were many and his renown extended from the rising +to the setting of the sun. If it is the will of God, he will be long +spoken of."[19] + +Sonni Ali was a Songhay Negro whose father was a Berber. He was succeeded +by a full-blooded black, Mohammed Abou Bekr, who had been his prime +minister. Mohammed was hailed as "Askia" (usurper) and is best known as +Mohammed Askia. He was strictly orthodox where Ali was rather a scoffer, +and an organizer where Ali was a warrior. On his pilgrimage to Mecca in +1495 there was nothing of the barbaric splendor of Mansa Musa, but a +brilliant group of scholars and holy men with a small escort of fifteen +hundred soldiers and nine hundred thousand dollars in gold. He stopped and +consulted with scholars and politicians and studied matters of taxation, +weights and measures, trade, religious tolerance, and manners. In Cairo, +where he was invested by the reigning caliph of Egypt, he may have heard +of the struggle of Europe for the trade of the Indies, and perhaps of the +parceling of the new world between Portugal and Spain. He returned to the +Sudan in 1497, instituted a standing army of slaves, undertook a holy war +against the indomitable Mossi, and finally marched against the Hausa. He +subdued these cities and even imposed the rule of black men on the Berber +town of Agades, a rich city of merchants and artificers with stately +mansions. In fine Askia, during his reign, conquered and consolidated an +empire two thousand miles long by one thousand wide at its greatest +diameters; a territory as large as all Europe. The territory was divided +into four vice royalties, and the system of Melle, with its +semi-independent native dynasties, was carried out. His empire extended +from the Atlantic to Lake Chad and from the salt mines of Tegazza and the +town of Augila in the north to the 10th degree of north latitude toward +the south. + +It was a six months' journey across the empire and, it is said, "he was +obeyed with as much docility on the farthest limits of the empire as he +was in his own palace, and there reigned everywhere great plenty and +absolute peace."[20] The University of Sankore became a center of learning +in correspondence with Egypt and North Africa and had a swarm of black +Sudanese students. Law, literature, grammar, geography and surgery were +studied. Askia the Great reigned thirty-six years, and his dynasty +continued on the throne until after the Moorish conquest in 1591. + +Meanwhile, to the eastward, two powerful states appeared. They never +disputed the military supremacy of Songhay, but their industrial +development was marvelous. The Hausa states were formed by seven original +cities, of which Kano was the oldest and Katsena the most famous. Their +greatest leaders, Mohammed Rimpa and Ahmadu Kesoke, arose in the fifteenth +and early sixteenth centuries. The land was subject to the Songhay, but +the cities became industrious centers of smelting, weaving, and dyeing. +Katsena especially, in the middle of the sixteenth century, is described +as a place thirteen or fourteen miles in circumference, divided into +quarters for strangers, for visitors from various other states, and for +the different trades and industries, as saddlers, shoemakers, dyers, etc. + +Beyond the Hausa states and bordering on Lake Chad was Bornu. The people +of Bornu had a large infiltration of Berber blood, but were predominantly +Negro. Berber mulattoes had been kings in early days, but they were soon +replaced by black men. Under the early kings, who can be traced back to +the third century, these people had ruled nearly all the territory between +the Nile and Lake Chad. The country was known as Kanem, and the pagan +dynasty of Dugu reigned there from the middle of the ninth to the end of +the eleventh century. Mohammedanism was introduced from Egypt at the end +of the eleventh century, and under the Mohammedan kings Kanem became one +of the first powers of the Sudan. By the end of the twelfth century the +armies of Kanem were very powerful and its rulers were known as "Kings of +Kanem and Lords of Bornu." In the thirteenth century the kings even dared +to invade the southern country down toward the valley of the Congo. + +Meantime great things were happening in the world beyond the desert, the +ocean, and the Nile. Arabian Mohammedanism had succumbed to the wild +fanaticism of the Seljukian Turks. These new conquerors were not only +firmly planted at the gates of Vienna, but had swept the shores of the +Mediterranean and sent all Europe scouring the seas for their lost trade +connections with the riches of India. Religious zeal, fear of conquest, +and commercial greed inflamed Europe against the Mohammedan and led to the +discovery of a new world, the riches of which poured first on Spain. +Oppression of the Moors followed, and in 1502 they were driven back into +Africa, despoiled and humbled. Here the Spaniards followed and harassed +them and here the Turks, fighting the Christians, captured the +Mediterranean ports and cut the Moors off permanently from Europe. In the +slow years that followed, huddled in Northwest Africa, they became a +decadent people and finally cast their eyes toward Negroland. + +The Moors in Morocco had come to look upon the Sudan as a gold mine, and +knew that the Sudan was especially dependent upon salt. In 1545 Morocco +claimed the principal salt mines at Tegazza, but the reigning Askia +refused to recognize the claim. + +When the Sultan Elmansour came to the throne of Morocco, he increased the +efficiency of his army by supplying it with fire arms and cannon. +Elmansour determined to attack the Sudan and sent four hundred men under +Pasha Djouder, who left Morocco in 1590. The Songhay, with their bows and +arrows, were helpless against powder and shot, and they were defeated at +Tenkadibou April 12, 1591. Askia Ishak, the king, offered terms, and +Djouder Pasha referred them to Morocco. The sultan, angry with his +general's delay, deposed him and sent another, who crushed and +treacherously murdered the king and set up a puppet. Thereafter there were +two Askias, one under the Moors at Timbuktu and one who maintained himself +in the Hausa states, which the Moors could not subdue. Anarchy reigned in +Songhay. The Moors tried to put down disorder with a high hand, drove out +and murdered the distinguished men of Timbuktu, and as a result let loose +a riot of robbery and decadence throughout the Sudan. Pasha now succeeded +pasha with revolt and misrule until in 1612 the soldiers elected their own +pasha and deliberately shut themselves up in the Sudan by cutting off +approach from the north. + +Hausaland and Bornu were still open to Turkish and Mohammedan influence +from the east, and the Gulf of Guinea to the slave trade from the south, +but the face of the finest Negro civilization the modern world had ever +produced was veiled from Europe and given to the defilement of wild +Moorish soldiers. In 1623 it is written "excesses of every kind are now +committed unchecked by the soldiery," and "the country is profoundly +convulsed and oppressed."[21] The Tuaregs marched down from the desert and +deprived the Moors of many of the principal towns. The rest of the empire +of the Songhay was by the end of the eighteenth century divided among +separate Moorish chiefs, who bought supplies from the Negro peasantry and +were "at once the vainest, proudest, and perhaps the most bigoted, +ferocious, and intolerant of all the nations of the south."[22] They lived +a nomadic life, plundering the Negroes. To such depths did the mighty +Songhay fall. + +As the Songhay declined a new power arose in the nineteenth century, the +Fula. The Fula, who vary in race from Berber mulattoes to full-blooded +Negroes, may be the result of a westward migration of some people like the +"Leukoaethiopi" of Pliny, or they may have arisen from the migration of +Berber mulattoes in the western oases, driven south by Romans and Arabs. + +These wandering herdsmen lived on the Senegal River and the ocean in very +early times and were not heard of until the nineteenth century. By this +time they had changed to a Negro or dark mulatto people and lived +scattered in small communities between the Atlantic and Darfur. They were +without political union or national sentiment, but were all Mohammedans. +Then came a sudden change, and led by a religious fanatic, these despised +and persecuted people became masters of the central Sudan. They were the +ones who at last broke down that great wedge of resisting Atlantic +culture, after it had been undermined and disintegrated by the American +slave trade. + +Thus Islam finally triumphed in the Sudan and the ancient culture combined +with the new. In the Sudan to-day one may find evidences of the union of +two classes of people. The representatives of the older civilization dwell +as peasants in small communities, carrying on industries and speaking a +large number of different languages. With them or above them is the ruling +Mohammedan caste, speaking four main languages: Mandingo, Hausa, Fula, and +Arabic. These latter form the state builders. Negro blood predominates +among both classes, but naturally there is more Berber blood among the +Mohammedan invaders. + +Europe during the middle ages had some knowledge of these movements in the +Sudan and Africa. Melle and Songhay appear on medieval maps. In literature +we have many allusions: the mulatto king, Feirifis, was one of Wolfram von +Eschenbach's heroes; Prester John furnished endless lore; Othello, the +warrior, and the black king represented by medieval art as among the three +wise men, and the various black Virgin Marys' all show legendary knowledge +of what African civilization was at that time doing. + +It is a curious commentary on modern prejudice that most of this splendid +history of civilization and uplift is unknown to-day, and men confidently +assert that Negroes have no history. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[17] Frobenius: _Voice of Africa_, II, 359-360. + +[18] Ibn Khaldun, quoted in Lugard, p. 128. + +[19] Quoted in Lugard, p. 180. + +[20] Es-Sa 'di, quoted by Lugard, p. 199. + +[21] Lugard, p. 373. + +[22] Mungo Park, quoted in Lugard, p. 374. + + + + +V GUINEA AND CONGO + + +One of the great cities of the Sudan was Jenne. The chronicle says "that +its markets are held every day of the week and its populations are very +enormous. Its seven thousand villages are so near to one another that the +chief of Jenne has no need of messengers. If he wishes to send a note to +Lake Dibo, for instance, it is cried from the gate of the town and +repeated from village to village, by which means it reaches its +destination almost instantly."[23] + + + +From the name of this city we get the modern name Guinea, which is used +to-day to designate the country contiguous to the great gulf of that +name--a territory often referred to in general as West Africa. Here, +reaching from the mouth of the Gambia to the mouth of the Niger, is a +coast of six hundred miles, where a marvelous drama of world history has +been enacted. The coast and its hinterland comprehends many well-known +names. First comes ancient Guinea, then, modern Sierra Leone and Liberia; +then follow the various "coasts" of ancient traffic--the grain, ivory, +gold, and slave coasts--with the adjoining territories of Ashanti, +Dahomey, Lagos, and Benin, and farther back such tribal and territorial +names as those of the Mandingoes, Yorubas, the Mossi, Nupe, Borgu, and +others. + +Recent investigation makes it certain that an ancient civilization existed +on this coast which may have gone back as far as three thousand years +before Christ. Frobenius, perhaps fancifully, identified this African +coast with the Atlantis of the Greeks and as part of that great western +movement in human culture, "beyond the pillars of Hercules," which +thirteen centuries before Christ strove with Egypt and the East. It is, at +any rate, clear that ancient commerce reached down the west coast. The +Phoenicians, 600 B.C., and the Carthaginians, a century or more later, +record voyages, and these may have been attempted revivals of still more +ancient intercourse. + +These coasts at some unknown prehistoric period were peopled from the +Niger plateau toward the north and west by the black West African type of +Negro, while along the west end of the desert these Negroes mingled with +the Berbers, forming various Negroid races. + +Movement and migration is evident along this coast in ancient and modern +times. The Yoruba-Benin-Dahomey peoples were among the earliest arrivals, +with their remarkable art and industry, which places them in some lines of +technique abreast with the modern world. Behind them came the Mossi from +the north, and many other peoples in recent days have filtered through, +like the Limba and Temni of Sierra Leone and the Agni-Ashanti, who moved +from Borgu some two thousand years ago to the Gold and Ivory coasts. + +We have already noted in the main the history of black men along the +wonderful Niger and seen how, pushing up from the Gulf of Guinea, a +powerful wedge of ancient culture held back Islam for a thousand years, +now victorious, now stubbornly disputing every inch of retreat. The center +of this culture lay probably, in oldest times, above the Bight of Benin, +along the Slave Coast, and reached east, west, and north. We trace it +to-day not only in the remarkable tradition of the natives, but in stone +monuments, architecture, industrial and social organization, and works of +art in bronze, glass, and terra cotta. + +Benin art has been practiced without interruption for centuries, and Von +Luschan says that it is "of extraordinary significance that by the +sixteenth and seventeenth centuries a local and monumental art had been +learned in Benin which in many respects equaled European art and developed +a technique of the very highest accomplishment."[24] + +Summing up Yoruban civilization, Frobenius concluded that "the technical +summit of that civilization was reached in the terra-cotta industry, and +that the most important achievements in art were not expressed in stone, +but in fine clay baked in the furnace; that hollow casting was thoroughly +known, too, and practiced by these people; that iron was mainly used for +decoration; that, whatever their purpose, they kept their glass beads in +stoneware urns within their own locality, and that they manufactured both +earthen and glass ware; that the art of weaving was highly developed among +them; that the stone monuments, it is true, show some dexterity in +handling and are so far instructive, but in other respects evidence a +cultural condition insufficiently matured to grasp the utility of stone +monumental material; and, above all, that the then great and significant +idea of the universe as imaged in the Templum was current in those +days."[25] + +Effort has naturally been made to ascribe this civilization to white +people. First it was ascribed to Portuguese influence, but much of it is +evidently older than the Portuguese discovery. Egypt and India have been +evoked and Greece and Carthage. But all these explanations are +far-fetched. If ever a people exhibited unanswerable evidence of +indigenous civilization, it is the west-coast Africans. Undoubtedly they +adapted much that came to them, utilized new ideas, and grew from contact. +But their art and culture is Negro through and through. + +Yoruba forms one of the three city groups of West Africa; another is +around Timbuktu, and a third in the Hausa states. The Timbuktu cities have +from five to fifteen hundred towns, while the Yoruba cities have one +hundred and fifty thousand inhabitants and more. The Hausa cities are many +of them important, but few are as large as the Yoruba cities and they lie +farther apart. AH three centers, however, are connected with the Niger, +and the group nearest the coast--that is, the Yoruba cities--has the +greatest numbers of towns, the most developed architectural styles, and +the oldest institutions. + +The Yoruba cities are not only different from the Sudanese in population, +but in their social relations. The Sudanese cities were influenced from +the desert and the Mediterranean, and form nuclei of larger surrounding +monarchial states. The Yoruba cities, on the other hand, remained +comparatively autonomous organizations down to modern times, and their +relative importance changed from time to time without developing an +imperialistic idea or subordinating the group to one overpowering city. + +This social and industrial state of the Yorubas formerly spread and +wielded great influence. We find Yoruba reaching out and subduing states +like Nupe toward the northward. But the industrial democracy and city +autonomy of Yoruba lent itself indifferently to conquest, and the state +fell eventually a victim to the fanatical Fula Mohammedans and was made a +part of the modern sultanate of Gando. + +West of Yoruba on the lower courses of the Niger is Benin, an ancient +state which in 1897 traced its twenty-three kings back one thousand years; +some legends even named a line of sixty kings. It seems probable that +Benin developed the imperial idea and once extended its rule into the +Congo valley. Later and also to the west of the Yoruba come two states +showing a fiercer and ruder culture, Dahomey and Ashanti. The state of +Dahomey was founded by Tacondomi early in the seventeenth century, and +developed into a fierce and bloody tyranny with wholesale murder. The king +had a body of two thousand to five thousand Amazons renowned for their +bravery and armed with rifles. The kingdom was overthrown by the French in +1892-93. Under Sai Tutu, Ashanti arose to power in the seventeenth +century. A military aristocracy with cruel blood sacrifices was formed. By +1816 the king had at his disposal two hundred thousand soldiers. The +Ashanti power was crushed by the English in the war of 1873-74. + +In these states and in later years in Benin the whole character of +west-coast culture seems to change. In place of the Yoruban culture, with +its city democracy, its elevated religious ideas, its finely organized +industry, and its noble art, came Ashanti and Dahomey. What was it that +changed the character of the west coast from this to the orgies of war and +blood sacrifice which we read of later in these lands? + +There can be but one answer: the slave trade. Not simply the sale of men, +but an organized traffic of such proportions and widely organized +ramifications as to turn the attention and energies of men from nearly all +other industries, encourage war and all the cruelest passions of war, and +concentrate this traffic in precisely that part of Africa farthest from +the ancient Mediterranean lines of trade. + +We need not assume that the cultural change was sudden or absolute. +Ancient Yoruba had the cruelty of a semi-civilized land, but it was not +dominant or tyrannical. Modern Benin and Dahomey showed traces of skill, +culture, and industry along with inexplicable cruelty and +bloodthirstiness. But it was the slave trade that turned the balance and +set these lands backward. Dahomey was the last word in a series of human +disasters which began with the defeat of the Askias at Tenkadibou.[26] + +From the middle of the fifteenth to the last half of the nineteenth +centuries the American slave trade centered in Guinea and devastated the +coast morally, socially, and physically. European rum and fire arms were +traded for human beings, and it was not until 1787 that any measures were +taken to counteract this terrible scourge. In that year the idea arose of +repatriating stolen Negroes on that coast and establishing civilized +centers to supplant the slave trade. About four hundred Negroes from +England were sent to Sierra Leone, to whom the promoters considerately +added sixty white prostitutes as wives. The climate on the low coast, +however, was so deadly that new recruits were soon needed. An American +Negro, Thomas Peters, who had served as sergeant under Sir Henry Clinton +in the British army in America, went to England seeking an allotment of +land for his fellows. The Sierra Leone Company welcomed him and offered +free passage and land in Sierra Leone to the Negroes of Nova Scotia. As a +result fifteen vessels sailed with eleven hundred and ninety Negroes in +1792. Arriving in Africa, they found the chief white man in control there +so drunk that he soon died of delirium tremens. John Clarkson, however, +brother of Thomas Clarkson, the abolitionist, eventually took the lead, +founded Freetown, and the colony began its checkered career. In 1896 the +colony was saved from insurrection by the exiled Maroon Negroes from +Jamaica. After 1833, when emancipation in English colonies took place, +severer measures against the slave trade was possible and the colony began +to grow. To-day its imports and exports amount to fifteen million dollars +a year. + +Liberia was a similar American experiment. In 1816 American +philanthropists decided that slavery was bound to die out, but that the +problem lay in getting rid of the freed Negroes, of which there were then +two hundred thousand in the United States. Accordingly the American +Colonization Society was proposed this year and founded January 1, 1817, +with Bushrod Washington as President. It was first thought to encourage +migration to Sierra Leone, and eighty-eight Negroes were sent, but they +were not welcomed. As a result territory was bought in the present +confines of Liberia, December 15, 1821, and colonists began to arrive. A +little later an African depot for recaptured slaves taken in the +contraband slave trade, provided for in the Act of 1819, was established +and an agent was sent to Africa to form a settlement. Gradually this +settlement was merged with the settlement of the Colonization Society, and +from this union Liberia was finally evolved. + +The last white governor of Liberia died in 1841 and was succeeded by the +first colored governor, Joseph J. Roberts, a Virginian. The total +population in 1843 was about twenty-seven hundred and ninety, and with +this as a beginning in 1847 Governor Roberts declared the independence of +the state. The recognition of Liberian independence by all countries +except the United States followed in 1849. The United States, not wishing +to receive a Negro minister, did not recognize Liberia until 1862. + +No sooner was the independence of Liberia announced than England and +France began a long series of aggressions to limit her territory and +sovereignty. Considerable territory was lost by treaty, and in the effort +to get capital to develop the rest, Liberia was saddled with a debt of +four hundred thousand dollars, of which she received less than one hundred +thousand dollars in actual cash. Finally the Liberians turned to the +United States for capital and protection. As a result the Liberian customs +have been put under international control and Major Charles Young, the +ranking Negro officer in the United States army, with several colored +assistants, has been put in charge of the making of roads and drilling a +constabulary to keep order in the interior. + +To-day Liberia has an area of forty thousand square miles, about three +hundred and fifty miles of coast line, and an estimated total population +of two million of which fifty thousand are civilized. The revenue amounted +in 1913 to $531,500. The imports in 1912 were $1,667,857 and the exports +$1,199,152. The latter consisted chiefly of rubber, palm oil and kernels, +coffee, piassava fiber, ivory, ginger, camwood, and arnotto. + +Perhaps Liberia's greatest citizen was the late Edward Wilmot Blyden, who +migrated in early life from the Danish West Indies and became a prophet of +the renaissance of the Negro race. + +Turning now from Guinea we pass down the west coast. In 1482 Diego Cam of +Portugal, sailing this coast, set a stone at the mouth of a great river +which he called "The Mighty," but which eventually came to be known by the +name of the powerful Negro kingdom through which it flowed--the Congo. + +We must think of the valley of the Congo with its intricate interlacing of +water routes and jungle of forests as a vast caldron shut away at first +from the African world by known and unknown physical hindrances. Then it +was penetrated by the tiny red dwarfs and afterward horde after horde of +tall black men swirled into the valley like a maelstrom, moving usually +from north to east and from south to west. + +The Congo valley became, therefore, the center of the making of what we +know to-day as the Bantu nations. They are not a unified people, but a +congeries of tribes of considerable physical diversity, united by the +compelling bond of language and other customs imposed on the conquered by +invading conquerors. + +The history or these invasions we must to-day largely imagine. Between two +and three thousand years ago the wilder tribes of Negroes began to move +out of the region south or southeast of Lake Chad. This was always a land +of shadows and legends, where fearful cannibals dwelt and where no +Egyptian or Ethiopian or Sudanese armies dared to go. It is possible, +however, that pressure from civilization in the Nile valley and rising +culture around Lake Chad was at this time reenforced by expansion of the +Yoruba-Benin culture on the west coast. Perhaps, too, developing culture +around the Great Lakes in the east beckoned or the riotous fertility of +the Congo valleys became known. At any rate the movement commenced, now by +slow stages, now in wild forays. There may have been a preliminary +movement from east to west to the Gulf of Guinea. The main movement, +however, was eastward, skirting the Congo forests and passing down by the +Victoria Nyanza and Lake Tanganyika. Here two paths beckoned: the lakes +and the sea to the east, the Congo to the west. A great stream of men +swept toward the ocean and, dividing, turned northward and fought its way +down the Nile valley and into the Abyssinian highlands; another branch +turned south and approached the Zambesi, where we shall meet it again. + +Another horde of invaders turned westward and entered the valley of the +Congo in three columns. The northern column moved along the Lualaba and +Congo rivers to the Cameroons; the second column became the industrial and +state-building Luba and Lunda peoples in the southern Congo valley and +Angola; while the third column moved into Damaraland and mingled with +Bushman and Hottentot. + +In the Congo valley the invaders settled in village and plain, absorbed +such indigenous inhabitants as they found or drove them deeper into the +forest, and immediately began to develop industry and political +organization. They became skilled agriculturists, raising in some +localities a profusion of cereals, fruit, and vegetables such as manioc, +maize, yams, sweet potatoes, ground nuts, sorghum, gourds, beans, peas, +bananas, and plantains. Everywhere they showed skill in mining and the +welding of iron, copper, and other metals. They made weapons, wire and +ingots, cloth, and pottery, and a widespread system of trade arose. Some +tribes extracted rubber from the talamba root; others had remarkable +breeds of fowl and cattle, and still others divided their people by crafts +into farmers, smiths, boat builders, warriors, cabinet makers, armorers, +and speakers. Women here and there took part in public assemblies and were +rulers in some cases. Large towns were built, some of which required hours +to traverse from end to end. + +Many tribes developed intelligence of a high order. Wissmann called the Ba +Luba "a nation of thinkers." Bateman found them "thoroughly and +unimpeachably honest, brave to foolhardiness, and faithful to each other +and to their superiors." One of their kings, Calemba, "a really princely +prince," Bateman says would "amongst any people be a remarkable and indeed +in many respects a magnificent man."[27] + +These beginnings of human culture were, however, peculiarly vulnerable to +invading hosts of later comers. There were no natural protecting barriers +like the narrow Nile valley or the Kong mountains or the forests below +Lake Chad. Once the pathways to the valley were open and for hundreds of +years the newcomers kept arriving, especially from the welter of tribes +south of the Sudan and west of the Nile, which rising culture beyond kept +in unrest and turmoil. + +Against these intruders there was but one defense, the State. State +building was thus forced on the Congo valley. How early it started we +cannot say, but when the Portuguese arrived in the fifteenth century, +there had existed for centuries a large state among the Ba-Congo, with its +capital at the city now known as San Salvador. + +The Negro Mfumu, or emperor, was eventually induced to accept +Christianity. His sons and many young Negroes of high birth were taken to +Portugal to be educated. There several were raised to the Catholic +priesthood and one became bishop; others distinguished themselves at the +universities. Thus suddenly there arose a Catholic kingdom south of the +valley of the Congo, which lasted three centuries, but was partially +overthrown by invading barbarians from the interior in the seventeenth +century. A king of Congo still reigns as pensioner of Portugal, and on the +coast to-day are the remains of the kingdom in the civilized blacks and +mulattoes, who are intelligent traders and boat builders. + +Meantime the Luba-Lunda people to the eastward founded Kantanga and other +states, and in the sixteenth century the larger and more ambitious realm +of the Mwata Yamvo. The last of the fourteen rulers of this line was +feudal lord of about three hundred chiefs, who paid him tribute in ivory, +skins, corn, cloth, and salt. His territory included about one hundred +thousand square miles and two million or more inhabitants. Eventually this +state became torn by internal strife and revolt, especially by attacks +from the south across the Congo-Zambesi divide. + +Farther north, among the Ba-Lolo and the Ba-Songo, the village policy +persisted and the cannibals of the northeast pressed down on the more +settled tribes. The result was a curious blending of war and industry, +artistic tastes and savage customs. + +The organized slave trade of the Arabs penetrated the Congo valley in the +sixteenth century and soon was aiding all the forces of unrest and +turmoil. Industry was deranged and many tribes forced to take refuge in +caves and other hiding places. + +Here, as on the west coast, disintegration and retrogression followed, for +as the American traffic lessened, the Arabian traffic increased. When, +therefore, Stanley opened the Congo valley to modern knowledge, Leopold II +of Belgium conceived the idea of founding here a free international state +which was to bring civilization to the heart of Africa. Consequently there +was formed in 1878 an international committee to study the region. Stanley +was finally commissioned to inquire as to the best way of introducing +European trade and culture. "I am charged," he said, "to open and keep +open, if possible, all such districts and countries as I may explore, for +the benefit of the commercial world. The mission is supported by a +philanthropic society, which numbers nobleminded men of several nations. +It is not a religious society, but my instructions are entirely of that +spirit. No violence must be used, and wherever rejected, the mission must +withdraw to seek another field."[28] + +The Bula Matadi or Stone Breaker, as the natives called Stanley, threw +himself energetically into the work and had by 1881 built a road past the +falls to the plateau, where thousands of miles of river navigation were +thus opened. Stations were established, and by 1884 Stanley returned armed +with four hundred and fifty "treaties" with the native chiefs, and the new +"State" appealed to the world for recognition. + +The United States first recognized the "Congo Free State," which was at +last made a sovereign power under international guarantees by the Congress +of Berlin in the year 1885, and Leopold II was chosen its king. The state +had an area of about nine hundred thousand square miles, with a population +of about thirty million. + +One of the first tasks before the new state was to check the Arab slave +traders. The Arabs had hitherto acted as traders and middlemen along the +upper Congo, and when the English and Congo state overthrew Mzidi, the +reigning king in the Kantanga country, a general revolt of the Arabs and +mulattoes took place. For a time, 1892-93, the whites were driven out, but +in a year or two the Arabs and their allies were subdued. + +Humanity and commerce, however, did not replace the Arab slave traders. +Rather European greed and serfdom were substituted. The land was +confiscated by the state and farmed out to private Belgian corporations. +The wilder cannibal tribes were formed into a militia to prey on the +industrious, who were taxed with specific amounts of ivory and rubber, and +scourged and mutilated if they failed to pay. Harris declares that King +Leopold's regime meant the death of twelve million natives. + +"Europe was staggered at the Leopoldian atrocities, and they were terrible +indeed; but what we, who were behind the scenes, felt most keenly was the +fact that the real catastrophe in the Congo was the desolation and murder +in the larger sense. The invasion of family life, the ruthless destruction +of every social barrier, the shattering of every tribal law, the +introduction of criminal practices which struck the chiefs of the people +dumb with horror--in a word, a veritable avalanche of filth and immorality +overwhelmed the Congo tribes."[29] + +So notorious did the exploitation and misrule become that Leopold was +forced to take measures toward reform, and finally in 1909 the Free State +became a Belgian colony. Some reforms have been inaugurated and others may +follow, but the valley of the Congo will long stand as a monument of shame +to Christianity and European civilization. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[23] Quoted in Du Bois: _Timbuktu_. + +[24] Von Luschan: _Verhandlungen der berliner Gesellschaft fuer +Anthropologie_, etc., 1898. + +[25] Frobenius: _Voice of Africa_, Vol. I. + +[26] Cf. p. 58. + +[27] Keane: _Africa_, II, 117-118. + +[28] _The Congo_, I, Chap. III. + +[29] Harris: _Dawn in Africa_. + + + + +VI THE GREAT LAKES AND ZYMBABWE + + +We have already seen how a branch of the conquering Bantus turned eastward +by the Great Lakes and thus reached the sea and eventually both the Nile +and South Africa. + +This brought them into the ancient and mysterious land far up the Nile, +south of Ethiopia. Here lay the ancient Punt of the Egyptians (whether we +place it in Somaliland or, as seems far more likely, around the Great +Lakes) and here, as the Egyptians thought, their civilization began. The +earliest inhabitants of the land were apparently of the Bushman or +Hottentot type of Negro. These were gradually pushed southward and +westward by the intrusion of the Nilotic Negroes. Five thousand years +before Christ the mulatto Egyptians were in the Nile valley below the +First Cataract. The Negroes were in the Nile valley down as far as the +Second Cataract and between the First and Second Cataracts were Negroes +into whose veins Semitic blood had penetrated more or less. These mixed +elements became the ancestors of the modern Somali, Gala, Bishari, and +Beja and spread Negro blood into Arabia beyond the Red Sea. The Nilotic +Negroes to the south early became great traders in ivory, gold, leopard +skins, gums, beasts, birds, and slaves, and they opened up systematic +trade between Egypt and the Great Lakes. + +The result was endless movement and migration both in ancient and modern +days, which makes the cultural history of the Great Lakes region very +difficult to understand. Three great elements are, however, clear: first, +the Egyptian element, by the northward migration of the Negro ancestors of +predynastic Egypt and the southern conquests and trade of dynastic Egypt; +second, the Semitic influence from Arabia and Persia; third, the Negro +influences from western and central Africa. + +The migration of the Bantu is the first clearly defined movement of modern +times. As we have shown, they began to move southward at least a thousand +years before Christ, skirting the Congo forests and wandering along the +Great Lakes and down to the Zambesi. What did they find in this land? + +We do not know certainly, but from what we do know we may reconstruct the +situation in this way: the primitive culture of the Hottentots of Punt had +been further developed by them and by other stronger Negro stocks until it +reached a highly developed culture. Widespread agriculture, and mining of +gold, silver, and precious stones started a trade that penetrated to Asia +and North Africa. This may have been the source of the gold of the Ophir. + +The state that thus arose became in time strongly organized; it employed +slave labor in crushing the hard quartz, sinking pits, and carrying +underground galleries; it carried out a system of irrigation and built +stone buildings and fortifications. There exists to-day many remains of +these building operations in the Kalahari desert and in northern Rhodesia. +Five hundred groups, covering over an area of one hundred and fifty +thousand square miles, lie between the Limpopo and Zambesi rivers. Mining +operations have been carried on in these plains for generations, and one +estimate is that at least three hundred and seventy-five million dollars' +worth of gold had been extracted. Some have thought that the older +workings must date back to one or even three thousand years before the +Christian era. + +"There are other mines," writes De Barros in the seventeenth century,[30] +"in a district called Toroa, which is otherwise known as the kingdom of +Butua, whose ruler is a prince, by name Burrow, a vassal of Benomotapa. +This land is near the other which we said consisted of extensive plains, +and those ruins are the oldest that are known in that region. They are all +in a plain, in the middle of which stands a square fortress, all of +dressed stones within and without, well wrought and of marvelous size, +without any lime showing the joinings, the walls of which are over +twenty-five hands thick, but the height is not so great compared to the +thickness. And above the gateway of that edifice is an inscription which +some Moorish [Arab] traders who were there could not read, nor say what +writing it was. All these structures the people of this country call +Symbaoe [Zymbabwe], which with them means a court, for every place where +Benomotapa stays is so called." + +Later investigation has shown that these buildings were in many cases +carefully planned and built fortifications. At Niekerk, for instance, nine +or ten hills are fortified on concentric walls thirty to fifty feet in +number, with a place for the village at the top. The buildings are forts, +miniature citadels, and also workshops and cattle kraals. Iron implements +and handsome pottery were found here, and close to the Zambesi there are +extraordinary fortifications. Farther south at Inyanga there is less +strong defense, and at Umtali there are no fortifications, showing that +builders feared invasion from the north. + +These people worked in gold, silver, tin, copper, and bronze and made +beautiful pottery. There is evidence of religious significance in the +buildings, and what is called the temple was the royal residence and +served as a sort of acropolis. The surrounding residences in the valley +were evidently occupied by wealthy traders and were not fortified. Here +the gold was received from surrounding districts and bartered with +traders. + +As usual there have been repeated attempts to find an external and +especially an Asiatic origin for this culture. So far, however, +archeological research seems to confirm its African origin. The +implements, weapons, and art are characteristically African and there is +no evident connection with outside sources. How far back this civilization +dates it is difficult to say, a great deal depending upon the dating of +the iron age in South Africa. If it was the same as in the Mediterranean +regions, the earliest limit was 1000 B.C.; it might, however, have been +much earlier, especially if, as seems probable, the use of iron originated +in Africa. On the other hand the culmination of this culture has been +placed by some as late as the modern middle ages. + +What was it that overthrew this civilization? Undoubtedly the same sort of +raids of barbarous warriors that we have known in our day. For instance, +in 1570 there came upon the country of Mozambique, farther up the coast, +"such an inundation of pagans that they could not be numbered. They came +from that part of Monomotapa where is the great lake from which spring +these great rivers. They left no other signs of the towns they passed but +the heaps of ruins and the bones of inhabitants." So, too, it is told how +the Zimbas came, "a strange people never before seen there, who, leaving +their own country, traversed a great part of this Ethiopia like a scourge +of God, destroying every living thing they came across. They were twenty +thousand strong and marched without children or women," just as four +hundred years later the Zulu impi marched. Again in 1602 a horde of people +came from the interior called the Cabires, or cannibals. They entered the +kingdom of Monomotapa, and the reigning king, being weak, was in great +terror. Thus gradually the Monomotapa fell, and its power was scattered +until the Kaffir-Zulu raids of our day.[31] + +The Arab writer, Macoudi, in the tenth century visited the East African +coast somewhere north of the equator. He found the Indian Sea at that time +frequented by Arab and Persian vessels, but there were no Asiatic +settlements on the African shore. The Bantu, or as he calls them, Zenji, +inhabited the country as far south as Sofala, where they bordered upon the +Bushmen. These Bantus were under a ruler with the dynastic title of +Waklimi. He was paramount over all the other tribes of the north and could +put three hundred thousand men in the field. They used oxen as beasts of +burden and the country produced gold in abundance, while panther skin was +largely used for clothing. Ivory was sold to Asia and the Bantu used iron +for personal adornment instead of gold or silver. They rode on their oxen, +which ran with great speed, and they ate millet and honey and the flesh of +animals. + +Inland among the Bantu arose later the line of rulers called the +Monomotapa among the gifted Makalanga. Their state was very extensive, +ranging from the coast far into the interior and from Mozambique down to +the Limpopo. It was strongly organized, with feudatory allied states, and +carried on an extensive commerce by means of the traders on the coast. The +kings were converted to nominal Christianity by the Portuguese. + +There are indications of trade between Nupe in West Africa and Sofala on +the east coast, and certainly trade between Asia and East Africa is +earlier than the beginning of the Christian era. The Asiatic traders +settled on the coast and by means of mulatto and Negro merchants brought +Central Africa into contact with Arabia, India, China, and Malaysia. + +The coming of the Asiatics was in this wise: Zaide, great-grandson of Ali, +nephew and son-in-law of Mohammed, was banished from Arabia as a heretic. +He passed over to Africa and formed temporary settlements. His people +mingled with the blacks, and the resulting mulatto traders, known as the +Emoxaidi, seem to have wandered as far south as the equator. Soon other +Arabian families came over on account of oppression and founded the towns +of Magadosho and Brava, both not far north of the equator. The first town +became a place of importance and other settlements were made. The +Emoxaidi, whom the later immigrants regarded as heretics, were driven +inland and became the interpreting traders between the coast and the +Bantu. Some wanderers from Magadosho came into the Port of Sofala and +there learned that gold could be obtained. This led to a small Arab +settlement at that place. + +Seventy years later, and about fifty years before the Norman conquest of +England, certain Persians settled at Kilwa in East Africa, led by Ali, who +had been despised in his land because he was the son of a black Abyssinian +slave mother. Kilwa, because of this, eventually became the most important +commercial station on the East African coast, and in this and all these +settlements a very large mulatto population grew up, so that very soon the +whole settlement was indistinguishable in color from the Bantu. + +In 1330 Ibn Batuta visited Kilwa. He found an abundance of ivory and some +gold and heard that the inhabitants of Kilwa had gained victories over the +Zenji or Bantu. Kilwa had at that time three hundred mosques and was +"built of handsome houses of stone and lime, and very lofty, with their +windows like those of the Christians; in the same way it has streets, and +these houses have got terraces, and the wood-work is with the masonry, +with plenty of gardens, in which there are many fruit trees and much +water."[32] Kilwa after a time captured Sofala, seizing it from Magadosho. +Eventually Kilwa became mistress of the island of Zanzibar, of Mozambique, +and of much other territory. The forty-third ruler of Kilwa after Ali was +named Abraham, and he was ruling when the Portuguese arrived. The latter +reported that these people cultivated rice and cocoa, built ships, and had +considerable commerce with Asia. All the people, of whatever color, were +Mohammedans, and the richer were clothed in gorgeous robes of silk and +velvet. They traded with the inland Bantus and met numerous tribes, +receiving gold, ivory, millet, rice, cattle, poultry, and honey. + +On the islands the Asiatics were independent, but on the main lands south +of Kilwa the sheiks ruled only their own people, under the overlordship of +the Bantus, to whom they were compelled to pay large tribute each year. + +Vasco da Gama doubled the Cape of Good Hope in 1497 and went north on the +east coast as far as India. In the next ten years the Portuguese had +occupied more than six different points on that coast, including +Sofala.[33] + +Thus civilization waxed and waned in East Africa among prehistoric +Negroes, Arab and Persian mulattoes on the coast, in the Zend or Zeng +empire of Bantu Negroes, and later in the Bantu rule of the Monomotapa. +And thus, too, among later throngs of the fiercer, warlike Bantu, the +ancient culture of the land largely died. Yet something survived, and in +the modern Bantu state, language, and industry can be found clear links +that establish the essential identity of the absorbed peoples with the +builders of Zymbabwe. + +So far we have traced the history of the lands into which the southward +stream of invading Bantus turned, and have followed them to the Limpopo +River. We turn now to the lands north from Lake Nyassa. + +The aboriginal Negroes sustained in prehistoric time invasions from the +northeast by Negroids of a type like the ancient Egyptians and like the +modern Gallas, Masai, and Somalis. To these migrations were added attacks +from the Nile Negroes to the north and the Bantu invaders from the south. +This has led to great differences among the groups of the population and +in their customs. Some are fierce mountaineers, occupying hilly plateaus +six thousand feet above the sea level; others, like the Wa Swahili, are +traders on the coast. There are the Masai, chocolate-colored and +frizzly-haired, organized for war and cattle lifting; and Negroids like +the Gallas, who, blending with the Bantus, have produced the race of +modern Uganda. + +It was in this region that the kingdom of Kitwara was founded by the Galla +chief, Kintu. About the beginning of the nineteenth century the empire was +dismembered, the largest share falling to Uganda. The ensuing history of +Uganda is of great interest. When King Mutesa came to the throne in 1862, +he found Mohammedan influences in his land and was induced to admit +English Protestants and French Catholics. Uganda thereupon became an +extraordinary religious battlefield between these three beliefs. Mutesa's +successor, Mwanga, caused an English bishop to be killed in 1885, +believing (as has since proven quite true) that the religion he offered +would be used as a cloak for conquest. The final result was that, after +open war between the religions, Uganda was made an English protectorate in +1894. + +The Negroes of Uganda are an intelligent people who had organized a +complex feudal state. At the head stood the king, and under him twelve +feudal lords. The present king, Daudi Chua, is the young grandson of +Mutesa and rules under the overlordship of England. + +Many things show the connection between Egypt and this part of Africa. The +same glass beads are found in Uganda and Upper Egypt, and similar canoes +are built. Harps and other instruments bear great resemblance. Finally the +Bahima, as the Galla invaders are called, are startlingly Egyptian in +type; at the same time they are undoubtedly Negro in hair and color. +Perhaps we have here the best racial picture of what ancient Egyptian and +upper Nile regions were in predynastic times and later. + +Thus in outline was seen the mission of The People--La Bantu as they +called themselves. They migrated, they settled, they tore down, and they +learned, and they in turn were often overthrown by succeeding tribes of +their own folk. They rule with their tongue and their power all Africa +south of the equator, save where the Europeans have entered. They have +never been conquered, although the gold and diamond traders have sought to +debauch them, and the ivory and rubber capitalists have cruelly wronged +their weaker groups. They are the Africans with whom the world of +to-morrow must reckon, just as the world of yesterday knew them to its +cost. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[30] Quoted in Bent: _Ruined Cities of Mashonaland_, pp. 203 ff. + +[31] Cf. "Ethiopia Oriental," by J. Dos Santos, in Theal's _Records of +South Africa_, Vol. VII. + +[32] Barbosa, quoted in Keane, II, 482. + +[33] It was called Sofala, from an Arabic word, and may be associated with +the Ophir of Solomon. So, too, the river Sabi, a little off Sofala, may be +associated with the name of the Queen of Sheba, whose lineage was supposed +to be perpetuated in the powerful Monomotapa as well as the Abyssinians. + + + + +VII THE WAR OF RACES AT LAND'S END + + +Primitive man in Africa is found in the interior jungles and down at +Land's End in South Africa. The Pygmy people in the jungles represent +to-day a small survival from the past, but a survival of curious interest, +pushed aside by the torrent of conquest. Also pushed on by these waves of +Bantu conquest, moved the ancient Abatwa or Bushmen. They are small in +stature, yellow in color, with crisp-curled hair. The traditions of the +Bushmen say that they came southward from the regions of the Great Lakes, +and indeed the king and queen of Punt, as depicted by the Egyptians, were +Bushmen or Hottentots. + +Their tribes may be divided, in accordance with their noticeable artistic +talents, into the painters and the sculptors. The sculptors entered South +Africa by moving southward through the more central portions of the +country, crossing the Zambesi, and coming down to the Cape. The painters, +on the other hand, came through Damaraland on the west coast; when they +came to the great mountain regions, they turned eastward and can be traced +as far as the mountains opposite Delagoa Bay. The mass of them settled +down in the lower part of the Cape and in the Kalahari desert. The +painters were true cave dwellers, but the sculptors lived in large +communities on the stony hills, which they marked with their carvings. + +These Bushmen believed in an ancient race of people who preceded them in +South Africa. They attributed magic power to these unknown folk, and said +that some of them had been translated as stars to the sky. Before their +groups were dispersed the Bushmen had regular government. Tribes with +their chiefs occupied well-defined tracts of country and were subdivided +into branch tribes under subsidiary chiefs. The great cave represented the +dignity and glory of the entire tribe. + +The Bushmen suffered most cruelly in the succeeding migrations and +conquests of South Africa. They fought desperately in self-defense; they +saw their women and children carried into bondage and they themselves +hunted like wild beasts. Both savage and civilized men appropriated their +land. Still they were brave people. "In this struggle for existence their +bitterest enemies, of whatever shade of color they might be, were forced +to make an unqualified acknowledgement of the courage and daring they so +invariably exhibited."[34] + +Here, to a remote corner of the world, where, as one of their number said, +they had supposed that the only beings in the world were Bushmen and +lions, came a series of invaders. It was the outer ripples of civilization +starting far away, the indigenous and external civilizations of Africa +beating with great impulse among the Ethiopians and the Egyptian mulattoes +and Sudanese Negroes and Yorubans, and driving the Bantu race southward. +The Bantus crowded more and more upon the primitive Bushmen, and probably +a mingling of the Bushmen and the Bantus gave rise to the Hottentots. + +The Hottentots, or as they called themselves, Khoi Khoin (Men of Men), +were physically a stronger race than the Abatwa and gave many evidences of +degeneration from a high culture, especially in the "phenomenal +perfection" of a language which "is so highly developed, both in its rich +phonetic system, as represented by a very delicately graduated series of +vowels and diphthongs, and in its varied grammatical structure, that +Lepsius sought for its affinities in the Egyptian at the other end of the +continent." + +When South Africa was first discovered there were two distinct types of +Hottentot. The more savage Hottentots were simply large, strong Bushmen, +using weapons superior to the Bushmen, without domestic cattle or sheep. +Other tribes nearer the center of South Africa were handsomer in +appearance and raised an Egyptian breed of cattle which they rode. + +In general the Hottentots were yellow, with close-curled hair, high cheek +bones, and somewhat oblique eyes. Their migration commenced about the end +of the fourteenth century and was, as is usual in such cases, a scattered, +straggling movement. The traditions of the Hottentots point to the lake +country of Central Africa as their place of origin, whence they were +driven by the Bechuana tribes of the Bantu. They fled westward to the +ocean and then turned south and came upon the Bushmen, whom they had only +partially subdued when the Dutch arrived as settlers in 1652. + +The Dutch "Boers" began by purchasing land from the Hottentots and then, +as they grew more powerful, they dispossessed the dark men and tried to +enslave them. There grew up a large Dutch-Hottentot class. Indeed the +filtration of Negro blood noticeable in modern Boers accounts for much +curious history. Soon after the advent of the Dutch some of the +Hottentots, of whom there were not more than thirty or forty thousand, led +by the Korana clans, began slowly to retreat northward, followed by the +invading Dutch and fighting the Dutch, each other, and the wretched +Bushmen. In the latter part of the eighteenth century the Hottentots had +reached the great interior plain and met the on-coming outposts of the +Bantu nations. + +The Bechuana, whom the Hottentots first met, were the most advanced of the +Negro tribes of Central Africa. They had crossed the Zambesi in the +fourteenth or fifteenth century; their government was a sort of feudal +system with hereditary chiefs and vassals; they were careful +agriculturists, laid out large towns with great regularity, and were the +most skilled of smiths. They used stone in building, carved on wood, and +many of them, too, were keen traders. These tribes, coming southward, +occupied the east-central part of South Africa comprising modern +Bechuanaland. Apparently they had started from the central lake country +somewhere late in the fifteenth century, and by the middle of the +eighteenth century one of their great chiefs, Tao, met the on-coming +Hottentots. + +The Hottentots compelled Tao to retreat, but the mulatto Gricquas arrived +from the south, and, allying themselves with the Bechuana, stopped the +rout. The Gricquas sprang from and took their name from an old Hottentot +tribe. They were led by Kok and Barends, and by adding other elements they +became, partly through their own efforts and partly through the efforts of +the missionaries, a community of fairly well civilized people. In +Gricqualand West the mulatto Gricquas, under their chiefs Kok and +Waterboer, lived until the discovery of diamonds. + +The Griquas and Bechuana tribes were thus gradually checking the +Hottentots when, in the nineteenth century, there came two new +developments: first, the English took possession of Cape Colony, and the +Dutch began to move in larger numbers toward the interior; secondly, a +newer and fiercer element of the Bantu tribes, the Zulu-Kaffirs, appeared. +The Kaffirs, or as they called themselves, the Amazosas, claimed descent +from Zuide, a great chief of the fifteenth century in the lake country. +They are among the tallest people in the world, averaging five feet ten +inches, and are slim, well-proportioned, and muscular. The more warlike +tribes were usually clothed in leopard or ox skins. Cattle formed their +chief wealth, stock breeding and hunting and fighting their main pursuits. +Mentally they were men of tact and intelligence, with a national religion +based upon ancestor worship, while their government was a patriarchal +monarchy limited by an aristocracy and almost feudal in character. The +common law which had grown up from the decisions of the chiefs made the +head of the family responsible for the conduct of its branches, a village +for all its residents, and the clan for all its villages. Finally there +was a paramount chief, who was the civil and military father of his +people. These people laid waste to the coast regions and in 1779 came in +contact with the Dutch. A series of Dutch-Kaffir wars ensued between 1779 +and 1795 in which the Dutch were hard pressed. + +In 1806 the English took final possession of Cape Colony. At that time +there were twenty-five thousand Boers, twenty-five thousand pure and mixed +Hottentots, and twenty-five thousand slaves secured from the east coast. +Between 1811 and 1877 there were six Kaffir-English wars. One of these in +1818 grew out of the ignorant interference of the English with the Kaffir +tribal system; then there came a terrible war between 1834 and 1835, +followed by the annexation of all the country as far as the Kei River. The +war of the Axe (1846-48) led to further annexation by the British. + +Hostilities broke out again in 1856 and 1863. In the former year, +despairing of resistance to invading England, a prophet arose who advised +the wholesale destruction of all Kaffir property except weapons, in order +that this faith might bring back their dead heroes. The result was that +almost a third of the nation perished from hunger. Fresh troubles occurred +in 1877, when the Ama-Xosa confederacy was finally broken up, and to-day +gradually these tribes are passing from independence to a state of mild +vassalage to the British. + +Meantime the more formidable part of the Zulu-Kaffirs had been united +under the terrible Chief Chaka. He had organized a military system, not a +new one by any means, but one of which we hear rumors back in the lake +regions in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. McDonald says, "There +has probably never been a more perfect system of discipline than that by +which Chaka ruled his army and kingdom. At a review an order might be +given in the most unexpected manner, which meant death to hundreds. If the +regiment hesitated or dared to remonstrate, so perfect was the discipline +and so great the jealousy that another was ready to cut them down. A +warrior returning from battle without his arms was put to death without +trial. A general returning unsuccessful in the main purpose of his +expedition shared the same fate. Whoever displeased the king was +immediately executed. The traditional courts practically ceased to exist +so far as the will and action of the tyrant was concerned." With this army +Chaka fell on tribe after tribe. The Bechuana fled before him and some +tribes of them were entirely destroyed. The Hottentots suffered severely +and one of his rival Zulu tribes under Umsilikatsi fled into Matabililand, +pushing back the Bechuana. By the time the English came to Port Natal, +Chaka was ruling over the whole southeastern seaboard, from the Limpopo +River to Cape Colony, including the Orange and Transvaal states and the +whole of Natal. Chaka was killed in 1828 and was eventually succeeded by +his brother Dingan, who reigned twelve years. It was during Dingan's reign +that England tried to abolish slavery in Cape Colony, but did not pay +promptly for the slaves, as she had promised; the result was the so-called +"Great Trek," about 1834, when thousands of Boers went into the interior +across the Orange and Vaal rivers. + +Dingan and these Boers were soon engaged in a death struggle in which the +Zulus were repulsed and Dingan replaced by Panda. Under this chief there +was something like repose for sixteen years, but in 1856 civil war broke +out between his sons, one of whom, Cetewayo, succeeded his father in 1882. +He fell into border disputes with the English, and the result was one of +the fiercest clashes of Europe and Africa in modern days. The Zulus fought +desperately, annihilating at one time a whole detachment and killing the +young prince Napoleon. But after all it was assagais against machine guns, +and the Zulus were finally defeated at Ulundi, July 4, 1879. Thereupon +Zululand was divided among thirteen semi-independent chiefs and became a +British protectorate. + +[Illustration: Ancient Kingdom of Africa] + +Since then the best lands have been gradually reoccupied by a large number +of tribes--Kaffirs from the south and Zulus from the north. The tribal +organization, without being actually broken up, has been deprived of its +dangerous features by appointing paid village headmen and transforming the +hereditary chief into a British government official. In Natal there are +about one hundred and seventy tribal chiefs, and nearly half of these have +been appointed by the governor. + +Umsilikatsi, who had been driven into Matabililand by the terrible Chaka +in 1828 and defeated by the Dutch in 1837, had finally reestablished his +headquarters in Rhodesia in 1838. Here he introduced the Zulu military +system and terrorized the peaceful and industrious Bechuana populations. +Lobengula succeeded Umsilikatsi in 1870 and, realizing that his power was +waning, began to retreat northward toward the Zambesi. He was finally +defeated by the British and native forces in 1893 and the land was +incorporated into South Central Africa. + +The result of all these movements was to break the inhabitants of +Bechuanaland into numerous fragments. There were small numbers of mulatto +Gricquas in the southwest and similar Bastaards in the northwest. The +Hottentots and Bushmen were dispersed into groups and seem doomed to +extinction, the last Hottentot chief being deposed in 1810 and replaced by +an English magistrate. Partially civilized Hottentots still live grouped +together in their kraals and are members of Christian churches. The +Bechuana hold their own in several centers; one is in Basutoland, west of +Natal, where a number of tribes were welded together under the far-sighted +Moshesh into a modern and fairly well civilized nation. In the north part +of Bechuanaland are the self-governing Bamangwato and the Batwana, the +former ruled by Khama, one of the canniest of modern rulers in Africa. + +Meantime, in Portuguese territory south of the Zambesi, there arose Gaza, +a contemporary and rival of Chaka. His son, Manikus, was deputed by +Dingan, Chaka's successor, to drive out the Portuguese. This Manikus +failed to do, and to escape vengeance he migrated north of the Limpopo. +Here he established his military kraal in a district thirty-six hundred +and fifty feet above the sea and one hundred and twenty miles inland from +Sofala. From this place his soldiery nearly succeeded in driving the +Portuguese out of East Africa. He was succeeded by his son, Umzila, and +Umzila's brother, Guzana (better known as Gungunyana), who exercised for a +time joint authority. Gungunyana was finally overthrown in November, 1895, +captured, and removed to the Azores. + +[Illustration: Races in Africa] + +North of the Zambesi, in British territory, the chief role in recent times +has been played by the Bechuana, the first of the Bantu to return +northward after the South African migration. Livingstone found there the +Makolo, who with other tribes had moved northward on account of the +pressure of the Dutch and Zulus below, and by conquering various tribes +in the Zambesi region had established a strong power. This kingdom was +nearly overthrown by the rebellion of the Barotse, and in 1875 the Barotse +kingdom comprised a large territory. To-day their king, Lewanika, rules +directly and indirectly fifty thousand square miles, with a population +between one and two and a half million. They are under a protectorate of +the British. + +In Southwest Africa, Hottentot mulattoes crossing from the Cape caused +widespread change. They were strong men and daring fighters and soon +became dominant in what is now German Southwest Africa, where they fought +fiercely with the Bantu Ova-Hereros. Armed with fire arms, these Namakwa +Hottentots threatened Portuguese West Africa, but Germany intervened, +ostensibly to protect missionaries. By spending millions of dollars and +thousands of soldiers Germany has nearly exterminated these brave men. + +Thus we have between the years 1400 and 1900 a great period of migration +up to 1750, when Bushmen, Hottentot, Bantu, and Dutch appeared in +succession at Land's End. In the latter part of the eighteenth century we +have the clash of the Hottentots and Bechuana, followed in the nineteenth +century by the terrible wars of Chaka, the Kaffirs, and Matabili. Finally, +in the latter half of the nineteenth century, we see the gradual +subjection of the Kaffir-Zulus and the Bechuana under the English and the +final conquest of the Dutch. The resulting racial problem in South Africa +is one of great intricacy. + +To the racial problem has been added the tremendous problem of modern +capital brought by the discovery of gold and diamond mines, so that the +future of the Negro race is peculiarly bound up in developments here at +Land's End, where the ship of the Flying Dutchman beats back and forth on +its endless quest. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[34] Stowe: Native Races of South Africa, pp. 215-216. + + + + +VIII AFRICAN CULTURE + + +We have followed the history of mankind in Africa down the valley of the +Nile, past Ethiopia to Egypt; we have seen kingdoms arise along the great +bend of the Niger and strive with the ancient culture at its mouth. We +have seen the remnants of mankind at Land's End, the ancient culture at +Punt and Zymbabwe, and followed the invading Bantu east, south, and west +to their greatest center in the vast jungle of the Congo valleys. + +We must now gather these threads together and ask what manner of men these +were and how far and in what way they progressed on the road of human +culture. + +That Negro peoples were the beginners of civilization along the Ganges, +the Euphrates, and the Nile seems proven. Early Babylon was founded by a +Negroid race. Hammurabi's code, the most ancient known, says "Anna and Bel +called me, Hammurabi the exalted prince, the worshiper of the gods; to +cause justice to prevail in the land, to destroy the wicked, to prevent +the strong from oppressing the weak, to go forth like the sun over the +black-head race, to enlighten the land, and to further the welfare of the +people." The Assyrians show a distinct Negroid strain and early Egypt was +predominantly Negro. These earliest of cultures were crude and primitive, +but they represented the highest attainment of mankind after tens of +thousands of years in unawakened savagery. + +It has often been assumed that the Negro is physically inferior to other +races and markedly distinguishable from them; modern science gives no +authority for such an assumption. The supposed inferiority cannot rest on +color,[35] for that is "due to the combined influences of a great number +of factors of environment working through physiological processes," and +"however marked the contrasts may be, there is no corresponding difference +in anatomical structure discoverable."[36] So, too, difference in texture +of hair is a matter of degree, not kind, and is caused by heat, moisture, +exposure, and the like. + +The bony skeleton presents no distinctly racial lines of variation. +Prognathism "presents too many individual varieties to be taken as a +distinctive character of race."[37] Difference in physical measurements +does not show the Negro to be a more primitive evolutionary form. +Comparative ethnology to-day affords "no support to the view which sees in +the so-called lower races of mankind a transition stage from beast to +man."[38] + +Much has been made of the supposed smaller brain of the Negro race; but +this is as yet an unproved assumption, based on the uncritical measurement +of less than a thousand Negro brains as compared with eleven thousand or +more European brains. Even if future measurement prove the average Negro +brain lighter, the vast majority of Negro brain weights fall within the +same limits as the whites; and finally, "neither size nor weight of the +brain seems to be of importance" as an index of mental capacity. We may, +therefore, say with Ratzel, "There is only one species of man. The +variations are numerous, but do not go deep."[39] + +To this we may add the word of the Secretary of the First Races Congress: +"We are, then, under the necessity of concluding that an impartial +investigator would be inclined to look upon the various important peoples +of the world as to all intents and purposes essentially equal in +intellect, enterprise, morality, and physique."[40] + +If these conclusions are true, we should expect to see in Africa the +human drama play itself out much as in other lands, and such has actually +been the fact. At the same time we must expect peculiarities arising from +the physiography of the land--its climate, its rainfall, its deserts, and +the peculiar inaccessibility of the coast. + +Three principal zones of habitation appear: first, the steppes and deserts +around the Sahara in the north and the Kalahari desert in the south; +secondly, the grassy highlands bordering the Great Lakes and connecting +these two regions; thirdly, the forests and rivers of Central and West +Africa. In the deserts are the nomads, and the Pygmies are in the forest +fastnesses. Herdsmen and their cattle cover the steppes and highlands, +save where the tsetse fly prevents. In the open forests and grassy +highlands are the agriculturists. + +Among the forest farmers the village is the center of life, while in the +open steppes political life tends to spread into larger political units. +Political integration is, however, hindered by an ease of internal +communication almost as great as the difficulty of reaching outer worlds +beyond the continent. The narrow Nile valley alone presented physical +barriers formidable enough to keep back the invading barbarians of the +south, and even then with difficulty. Elsewhere communication was all too +easy. For a while the Congo forests fended away the restless, but this +only temporarily. + +On the whole Africa from the Sahara to the Cape offered no great physical +barrier to the invader, and we continually have whirlwinds of invading +hosts rushing now southward, now northward, from the interior to the coast +and from the coast inland, and hurling their force against states, +kingdoms, and cities. Some resisted for generations, some for centuries, +some but a few years. It is, then, this sudden change and the fear of it +that marks African culture, particularly in its political aspects, and +which makes it so difficult to trace this changing past. Nevertheless +beneath all change rests the strong substructure of custom, religion, +industry, and art well worth the attention of students. + +Starting with agriculture, we learn that "among all the great groups of +the 'natural' races, the Negroes are the best and keenest tillers of the +ground. A minority despise agriculture and breed cattle; many combine both +occupations. Among the genuine tillers the whole life of the family is +taken up in agriculture, and hence the months are by preference called +after the operations which they demand. Constant clearings change forests +to fields, and the ground is manured with the ashes of the burnt thicket. +In the middle of the fields rise the light watch-towers, from which a +watchman scares grain-eating birds and other thieves. An African +cultivated landscape is incomplete without barns. The rapidity with which, +when newly imported, the most various forms of cultivation spread in +Africa says much for the attention which is devoted to this branch of +economy. Industries, again, which may be called agricultural, like the +preparation of meal from millet and other crops, also from cassava, the +fabrication of fermented drinks from grain, or the manufacture of cotton, +are widely known and sedulously fostered."[41] + +Buecher reminds us of the deep impression made upon travelers when they +sight suddenly the well-attended fields of the natives on emerging from +the primeval forests. "In the more thickly populated parts of Africa these +fields often stretch for many a mile, and the assiduous care of the Negro +women shines in all the brighter light when we consider the insecurity of +life, the constant feuds and pillages, in which no one knows whether he +will in the end be able to harvest what he has sown. Livingstone gives +somewhere a graphic description of the devastations wrought by slave +hunts; the people were lying about slain, the dwellings were demolished; +in the fields, however, the grain was ripening and there was none to +harvest it."[42] + +Sheep, goat, and chickens are domestic animals all over Africa, and Von +Franzius considers Africa the home of the house cattle and the Negro as +the original tamer. Northeastern Africa especially is noted for +agriculture, cattle raising, and fruit culture. In the eastern Sudan, and +among the great Bantu tribes extending from the Sudan down toward the +south, cattle are evidences of wealth; one tribe, for instance, having so +many oxen that each village had ten or twelve thousand head. Lenz (1884), +Bouet-Williaumez (1848), Hecquard (1854), Bosman (1805), and Baker (1868) +all bear witness to this, and Schweinfurth (1878) tells us of great cattle +parks with two to three thousand head and of numerous agricultural and +cattle-raising tribes. Von der Decken (1859-61) described the paradise of +the dwellers about Kilimanjaro--the bananas, fruit, beans and peas, cattle +raising with stall feed, the fertilizing of the fields, and irrigation. +The Negroid Gallas have seven or eight cattle to each inhabitant. +Livingstone bears witness to the busy cattle raising of the Bantus and +Kaffirs. Hulub (1881) and Chapman (1868) tell of agriculture and fruit +raising in South Africa. Shutt (1884) found the tribes in the southwestern +basin of the Congo with sheep, swine, goats, and cattle. On this +agricultural and cattle-raising economic foundation has arisen the +organized industry of the artisan, the trader, and the manufacturer. + +While the Pygmies, still living in the age of wood, make no iron or stone +implements, they seem to know how to make bark cloth and fiber baskets and +simple outfits for hunting and fishing. Among the Bushmen the art of +making weapons and working in hides is quite common. The Hottentots are +further advanced in the industrial arts, being well versed in the +manufacture of clothing, weapons, and utensils. In the dressing of skins +and furs, as well as in the plaiting of cords and the weaving of mats, we +find evidences of their workmanship. In addition they are good workers in +iron and copper, using the sheepskin bellows for this purpose. The +Ashantis of the Gold Coast know how to make "cotton fabrics, turn and +glaze earthenware, forge iron, fabricate instruments and arms, embroider +rugs and carpets, and set gold and precious stones."[43] Among the people +of the banana zone we find rough basket work, coarse pottery, grass cloth, +and spoons made of wood and ivory. The people of the millet zone, because +of uncertain agricultural resources, quite generally turn to +manufacturing. Charcoal is prepared by the smiths, iron is smelted, and +numerous implements are manufactured. Among them we find axes, hatchets, +hoes, knives, nails, scythes, and other hardware. Cloaks, shoes, sandals, +shields, and water and oil vessels are made from leather which the natives +have dressed. Soap is manufactured in the Bautschi district, glass is +made, formed, and colored by the people of Nupeland, and in almost every +city cotton is spun and woven and dyed. Barth tells us that the weaving of +cotton was known in the Sudan as early as the eleventh century. There is +also extensive manufacture of wooden ware, tools, implements, and +utensils. + +In describing particular tribes, Baker and Felkin tell of smiths of +wonderful adroitness, goatskins prepared better than a European tanner +could do, drinking cups and kegs of remarkable symmetry, and polished clay +floors. Schweinfurth says, "The arrow and the spear heads are of the +finest and most artistic work; their bristlelike barbs and points are +baffling when one knows how few tools these smiths have." Excellent wood +carving is found among the Bongo, Ovambo, and Makololo. Pottery and +basketry and careful hut building distinguish many tribes. Cameron (1877) +tells of villages so clean, with huts so artistic, that, save in book +knowledge, the people occupied no low plane of civilization. The Mangbettu +work both iron and copper. "The masterpieces of the Monbutto [Mangbettu] +smiths are the fine chains worn as ornaments, and which in perfection of +form and fineness compare well with our best steel chains." Shubotz in +1911 called the Mangbettu "a highly cultivated people" in architecture and +handicraft. Barth found copper exported from Central Africa in competition +with European copper at Kano. + +Nor is the iron industry confined to the Sudan. About the Great Lakes and +other parts of Central Africa it is widely distributed. Thornton says, +"This iron industry proves that the East Africans stand by no means on so +low a plane of culture as many travelers would have us think. It is +unnecessary to be reminded what a people without instruction, and with the +rudest tools to do such skilled work, could do if furnished with steel +tools." Arrows made east of Lake Nyanza were found to be nearly as good as +the best Swedish iron in Birmingham. From Egypt to the Cape, Livingstone +assures us that the mortar and pestle, the long-handled axe, the goatskin +bellows, etc., have the same form, size, etc., pointing to a migration +southwestward. Holub (1879), on the Zambesi, found fine workers in iron +and bronze. The Bantu huts contain spoons, wooden dishes, milk pails, +calabashes, handmills, and axes. + +Kaffirs and Zulus, in the extreme south, are good smiths, and the latter +melt copper and tin together and draw wire from it, according to Kranz +(1880). West of the Great Lakes, Stanley (1878) found wonderful examples +of smith work: figures worked out of brass and much work in copper. +Cameron (1878) saw vases made near Lake Tanganyika which reminded him of +the amphorae in the Villa of Diomedes, Pompeii. Horn (1882) praises tribes +here for iron and copper work. Livingstone (1871) passed thirty smelting +houses in one journey, and Cameron came across bellows with valves, and +tribes who used knives in eating. He found tribes which no Europeans had +ever visited, who made ingots of copper in the form of the St. Andrew's +cross, which circulated even to the coast. In the southern Congo basin +iron and copper are worked; also wood and ivory carving and pottery making +are pursued. In equatorial West Africa, Lenz and Du Chaillu (1861) found +iron workers with charcoal, and also carvers of bone and ivory. Near Cape +Lopez, Huebbe-Schleiden found tribes making ivory needles inlaid with +ebony, while the arms and dishes of the Osaka are found among many tribes +even as far as the Atlantic Ocean. Wilson (1856) found natives in West +Africa who could repair American watches. + +Gold Coast Negroes make gold rings and chains, forming the metal into all +kinds of forms. Soyaux says, "The works in relief which natives of Lower +Guinea carve with their own knives out of ivory and hippopotamus teeth are +really entitled to be called works of art, and many wooden figures of +fetishes in the Ethnographical Museum of Berlin show some understanding of +the proportions of the human body." Great Bassam is called by Hecquard the +"Fatherland of Smiths." The Mandingo in the northwest are remarkable +workers in iron, silver, and gold, we are told by Mungo Park (1800), while +there is a mass of testimony as to the work in the north-west of Africa in +gold, tin, weaving, and dyeing. Caille found the Negroes in Bambana +manufacturing gunpowder (1824-28), and the Hausa make soap; so, too, +Negroes in Uganda and other parts have made guns after seeing European +models. + +So marked has been the work of Negro artisans and traders in the +manufacture and exchange of iron implements that a growing number of +archeologists are disposed to-day to consider the Negro as the originator +of the art of smelting iron. Gabriel de Mortillet (1883) declared Negroes +the only iron users among primitive people. Some would, therefore, argue +that the Negro learned it from other folk, but Andree declares that the +Negro developed his own "Iron Kingdom." Schweinfurth, Von Luschan, Boaz, +and others incline to the belief that the Negroes invented the smelting of +iron and passed it on to the Egyptians and to modern Europe. + +Boaz says, "It seems likely that at a time when the European was still +satisfied with rude stone tools, the African had invented or adopted the +art of smelting iron. Consider for a moment what this invention has meant +for the advance of the human race. As long as the hammer, knife, saw, +drill, the spade, and the hoe had to be chipped out of stone, or had to be +made of shell or hard wood, effective industrial work was not impossible, +but difficult. A great progress was made when copper found in large +nuggets was hammered out into tools and later on shaped by melting, and +when bronze was introduced; but the true advancement of industrial life +did not begin until the hard iron was discovered. It seems not unlikely +that the people who made the marvelous discovery of reducing iron ores by +smelting were the African Negroes. Neither ancient Europe, nor ancient +western Asia, nor ancient China knew the iron, and everything points to +its introduction from Africa. At the time of the great African discoveries +toward the end of the past century, the trade of the blacksmith was found +all over Africa, from north to south and from east to west. With his +simple bellows and a charcoal fire he reduced the ore that is found in +many parts of the continent and forged implements of great usefulness and +beauty."[44] + +Torday has argued recently, "I feel convinced by certain arguments that +seem to prove to my satisfaction that we are indebted to the Negro for the +very keystone of our modern civilization and that we owe him the discovery +of iron. That iron could be discovered by accident in Africa seems beyond +doubt: if this is so in other parts of the world, I am not competent to +say. I will only remind you that Schweinfurth and Petherick record the +fact that in the northern part of East Africa smelting furnaces are worked +without artificial air current and, on the other hand, Stuhlmann and +Kollmann found near Victoria Nyanza that the natives simply mixed powdered +ore with charcoal and by introduction of air currents obtained the metal. +These simple processes make it simple that iron should have been +discovered in East or Central Africa. No bronze implements have ever been +found in black Africa; had the Africans received iron from the Egyptians, +bronze would have preceded this metal and all traces of it would not have +disappeared. Black Africa was for a long time an exporter of iron, and +even in the twelfth century exports to India and Java are recorded by +Idrisi. + +"It is difficult to imagine that Egypt should have obtained it from +Europe where the oldest find (in Hallstadt) cannot be of an earlier period +than 800 B.C., or from Asia, where iron is not known before 1000 B.C., and +where, in the times of Ashur Nazir Pal, it was still used concurrently +with bronze, while iron beads have been only recently discovered by +Messrs. G.A. Wainwright and Bushe Fox in a predynastic grave, and where a +piece of this metal, possibly a tool, was found in the masonry of the +great pyramid."[45] + +The Negro is a born trader. Lenz says, "our sharpest European merchants, +even Jews and Armenians, can learn much of the cunning and trade of the +Negroes." We know that the trade between Central Africa and Egypt was in +the hands of Negroes for thousands of years, and in early days the cities +of the Sudan and North Africa grew rich through Negro trade. + +Leo Africanus, writing of Timbuktu in the sixteenth century, said, "It is +a wonder to see what plentie of Merchandize is daily brought hither and +how costly and sumptuous all things be.... Here are many shops of +artificers and merchants and especially of such as weave linnen and +cloth." + +Long before cotton weaving was a British industry, West Africa and the +Sudan were supplying a large part of the world with cotton cloth. Even +to-day cities like Kuka on the west shore of Lake Chad and Sokota are +manufacturing centers where cotton is spun and woven, skins tanned, +implements and iron ornaments made. + +"Travelers," says Buecher, "have often observed this tribal or local +development of industrial technique. 'The native villages,' relates a +Belgian observer of the Lower Congo, 'are often situated in groups. Their +activities are based upon reciprocality, and they are to a certain extent +the complements of one another. Each group has its more or less strongly +defined specialty. One carries on fishing; another produces palm wine; a +third devotes itself to trade and is broker for the others, supplying the +community with all products from outside; another has reserved to itself +work in iron and copper, making weapons for war and hunting, various +utensils, etc. None may, however, pass beyond the sphere of its own +specialty without exposing itself to the risk of being universally +proscribed.'" + +From the Loango Coast, Bastian tells of a great number of centers for +special products of domestic industry. "Loango excels in mats and fishing +baskets, while the carving of elephants' tusks is specially followed in +Chilungo. The so-called Mafooka hats with raised patterns are drawn +chiefly from the bordering country of Kakongo and Mayyume. In Bakunya are +made potter's wares, which are in great demand; in Basanza, excellent +swords; in Basundi, especially beautiful ornamented copper rings; on the +Congo, clever wood and tablet carvings; in Loango, ornamented clothes and +intricately designed mats; in Mayumbe, clothing of finely woven mat-work; +in Kakongo, embroidered hats and also burnt clay pitchers; and among the +Bayakas and Mantetjes, stuffs of woven grass."[46] + +A native Negro student tells of the development of trade among the +Ashanti. "It was a part of the state system of Ashanti to encourage trade. +The king once in every forty days, at the Adai custom, distributed among a +number of chiefs various sums of gold dust with a charge to turn the same +to good account. These chiefs then sent down to the coast caravans of +tradesmen, some of whom would be their slaves, sometimes some two or three +hundred strong, to barter ivory for European goods, or buy such goods with +gold dust, which the king obtained from the royal alluvial workings. Down +to 1873 a constant stream of Ashanti traders might be seen daily wending +their way to the merchants of the coast and back again, yielding more +certain wealth and prosperity to the merchants of the Gold Coast and Great +Britain than may be expected for some time yet to come from the mining +industry and railway development put together. The trade chiefs would, in +due time, render a faithful account to the king's stewards, being allowed +to retain a fair portion of the profit. In the king's household, too, he +would have special men who directly traded for him. Important chiefs +carried on the same system of trading with the coast as did the king. Thus +every member of the state, from the king downward, took an active interest +in the promotion of trade and in the keeping open of trade routes into the +interior."[47] + +The trade thus encouraged and carried on in various parts of West Africa +reached wide areas. From the Fish River to Kuka, and from Lagos to +Zanzibar, the markets have become great centers of trade, the leading +implement to civilization. Permanent markets are found in places like +Ujiji and Nyangwe, where everything can be bought and sold from +earthenware to wives; from the one to three thousand traders flocked here. + +"How like is the market traffic, with all its uproar and sound of human +voices, to one of our own markets! There is the same rivalry in praising +the goods, the violent, brisk movements, the expressive gesture, the +inquiring, searching glance, the changing looks of depreciation or +triumph, of apprehension, delight, approbation. So says Stanley. Trade +customs are not everywhere alike. If when negotiating with the Bangalas of +Angola you do not quickly give them what they want, they go away and do +not come back. Then perhaps they try to get possession of the coveted +object by means of theft. It is otherwise with the Songos and Kiokos, who +let you deal with them in the usual way. To buy even a small article you +must go to the market; people avoid trading anywhere else. If a man says +to another; 'Sell me this hen' or 'that fruit,' the answer as a rule will +be, 'Come to the market place.' The crowd gives confidence to individuals, +and the inviolability of the visitor to the market, and of the market +itself, looks like an idea of justice consecrated by long practice. Does +not this remind us of the old Germanic 'market place'?"[48] + +Turning now to Negro family and social life we find, as among all +primitive peoples, polygamy and marriage by actual or simulated purchase. +Out of the family develops the typical African village organization, which +is thus described in Ashanti by a native Gold Coast writer: "The headman, +as his name implies, is the head of a village community, a ward in a +township, or of a family. His position is important, inasmuch as he has +directly to deal with the composite elements of the general bulk of the +people. + +"It is the duty of the head of a family to bring up the members thereof in +the way they should go; and by 'family' you must understand the entire +lineal descendants of a materfamilias, if I may coin a convenient phrase. +It is expected of him by the state to bring up his charge in the knowledge +of matters political and traditional. It is his work to train up his wards +in the ways of loyalty and obedience to the powers that be. He is held +responsible for the freaks of recalcitrant members of his family, and he +is looked to to keep them within bounds and to insist upon conformity of +their party with the customs, laws, and traditional observances of the +community. In early times he could send off to exile by sale a troublesome +relative who would not observe the laws of the community. + +"It is a difficult task that he is set to, but in this matter he has +all-powerful helpers in the female members of the family, who will be +either the aunts, or the sisters, or the cousins, or the nieces of the +headman; and as their interests are identical with his in every +particular, the good women spontaneously train up their children to +implicit obedience to the headman, whose rule in the family thus becomes a +simple and an easy matter. 'The hand that rocks the cradle rules the +world.' What a power for good in the native state system would the mothers +of the Gold Coast and Ashanti become by judicious training upon native +lines! + +"The headman is par excellence the judge of his family or ward. Not only +is he called upon to settle domestic squabbles, but frequently he sits +judge over more serious matters arising between one member of the ward and +another; and where he is a man of ability and influence, men from other +wards bring him their disputes to settle. When he so settles disputes, he +is entitled to a hearing fee, which, however, is not so much as would be +payable in the regular court of the king or chief. + +"The headman is naturally an important member of his company and often is +a captain thereof. When he combines the two offices of headman and +captain, he renders to the community a very important service. For in +times of war, where the members of the ward would not serve cordially +under a stranger, they would in all cases face any danger with their own +kinsman as their leader. The headman is always succeeded by his uterine +brother, cousin, or nephew--the line of succession, that is to say, +following the customary law."[49] + +We may contrast this picture with the more warlike Bantus of Southeast +Africa. Each tribe lived by itself in a town with from five to fifteen +thousand inhabitants, surrounded by gardens of millet, beans, and +watermelon. Beyond these roamed their cattle, sheep, and goats. Their +religion was ancestor worship with sacrifice to spirits and the dead, and +some of the tribes made mummies of the corpses and clothed them for +burial. They wove cloth of cotton and bark, they carved wood and built +walls of unhewn stone. They had a standing military organization, and the +tribes had their various totems, so that they were known as the Men of +Iron, the Men of the Sun, the Men of the Serpents, Sons of the Corn +Cleaners, and the like. Their system of common law was well conceived and +there were organized tribunals of justice. In difficult cases precedents +were sought and learned antiquaries consulted. At the age of fifteen or +sixteen the boys were circumcised and formed into guilds. The land was +owned by the tribe and apportioned to the chief by each family, and the +main wealth of the tribe was in its cattle. + +In general, among the African clans the idea of private property was but +imperfectly developed and never included land. The main mass of visible +wealth belonged to the family and clan rather than to the individual; only +in the matter of weapons and ornaments was exclusive private ownership +generally recognized. + +The government, vested in fathers and chiefs, varied in different tribes +from absolute despotisms to limited monarchies, almost republican. Viewing +the Basuto National Assembly in South Africa, Lord Bryce recently wrote, +"The resemblance to the primary assemblies of the early peoples of Europe +is close enough to add another to the arguments which discredit the theory +that there is any such thing as an Aryan type of institutions."[50] + +While women are sold into marriage throughout Africa, nevertheless their +status is far removed from slavery. In the first place the tracing of +relationships through the female line, which is all but universal in +Africa, gives the mother great influence. Parental affection is very +strong, and throughout Negro Africa the mother is the most influential +councilor, even in cases of tyrants like Chaka or Mutesa. + +"No mother can love more tenderly or be more deeply beloved than the Negro +mother. Robin tells of a slave in Martinique who, with his savings, freed +his mother instead of himself. 'Everywhere in Africa,' writes Mungo Park, +'I have noticed that no greater affront can be offered a Negro than +insulting his mother. 'Strike me,' cried a Mandingo to his enemy, 'but +revile not my mother!' ... The Herero swears 'By my mother's tears!'.. The +Angola Negroes have a saying, 'As a mist lingers on the swamps, so lingers +the love of father and mother.'"[51] + +Black queens have often ruled African tribes. Among the Ba-Lolo, we are +told, women take part in public assemblies where all-important questions +are discussed. The system of educating children among such tribes as the +Yoruba is worthy of emulation by many more civilized peoples. + +Close knit with the family and social organization comes the religious +life of the Negro. The religion of Africa is the universal animism or +fetishism of primitive peoples, rising to polytheism and approaching +monotheism chiefly, but not wholly, as a result of Christian and Islamic +missions. Of fetishism there is much misapprehension. It is not mere +senseless degradation. It is a philosophy of life. Among primitive Negroes +there can be, as Miss Kingsley reminds us, no such divorce of religion +from practical life as is common in civilized lands. Religion is life, and +fetish an expression of the practical recognition of dominant forces in +which the Negro lives. To him all the world is spirit. Miss Kingsley says, +"If you want, for example, to understand the position of man in nature +according to fetish, there is, as far as I know, no clearer statement of +it made than is made by Goethe in his superb 'Prometheus.'"[52] Fetish is +a severely logical way of accounting for the world in terms of good and +malignant spirits. + +"It is this power of being able logically to account for everything that +is, I believe, at the back of the tremendous permanency of fetish in +Africa, and the cause of many of the relapses into it by Africans +converted to other religions; it is also the explanation of the fact that +white men who live in the districts where death and danger are everyday +affairs, under a grim pall of boredom, are liable to believe in fetish, +though ashamed of so doing. For the African, whose mind has been soaked in +fetish during his early and most impressionable years, the voice of fetish +is almost irresistible when affliction comes to him."[53] + +Ellis tells us of the spirit belief of the Ewe people, who believe that +men and all nature have the indwelling "Kra," which is immortal; that the +man himself after death may exist as a ghost, which is often conceived of +as departed from the "Kra," a shadowy continuing of the man. Bryce, +speaking of the Kaffirs of South Africa, says, "To the Kaffirs, as to the +most savage races, the world was full of spirits--spirits of the rivers, +the mountains, and the woods. Most important were the ghosts of the dead, +who had power to injure or help the living, and who were, therefore, +propitiated by offerings at stated periods, as well as on occasions when +their aid was especially desired. This kind of worship, the worship once +most generally diffused throughout the world, and which held its ground +among the Greeks and Italians in the most flourishing period of ancient +civilization, as it does in China and Japan to-day, was, and is, virtually +the religion of the Kaffirs."[54] + +African religion does not, however, stop with fetish, but, as in the case +of other peoples, tends toward polytheism and monotheism. Among the +Yoruba, for instance, Frobenius shows that religion and city-state go hand +in hand. + +"The first experienced glance will here detect the fact that this nation +originally possessed a clear and definite organization so duly ordered and +so logical that we but seldom meet with its like among all the peoples of +the earth. And the basic idea of every clan's progeniture is a powerful +God; the legitimate order in which the descendants of a particular clan +unite in marriage to found new families, the essential origin of every +new-born babe's descent in the founder of its race and its consideration +as a part of the God in Chief; the security with which the newly wedded +wife not only may, but should, minister to her own God in an unfamiliar +home."[55] + +The Yoruba have a legend of a dying divinity. "This people ... give +evidence of a generalized system; a theocratic scheme, a well-conceived +perceptible organization, reared in rhythmically proportioned manner." + +Miss Kingsley says, "The African has a great Over God."[56] Nassau, the +missionary, declares, "After more than forty years' residence among these +tribes, fluently using their language, conversant with their customs, +dwelling intimately in their huts, associating with them in the various +relations of teacher, pastor, friend, master, fellow-traveler, and guest, +and in my special office as missionary, searching after their religious +thought (and therefore being allowed a deeper entrance into the arcana of +their soul than would be accorded to a passing explorer), I am able +unhesitatingly to say that among all the multitude of degraded ones with +whom I have met, I have seen or heard of none whose religious thought was +only a superstition. + +"Standing in the village street, surrounded by a company whom their chief +has courteously summoned at my request, when I say to him, 'I have come to +speak to your people,' I do not need to begin by telling them that there +is a God. Looking on that motley assemblage of villagers,--the bold, gaunt +cannibal with his armament of gun, spear, and dagger; the artisan with +rude adze in hand, or hands soiled at the antique bellows of the village +smithy; women who have hasted from their kitchen fire with hands white +with the manioc dough or still grasping the partly scaled fish; and +children checked in their play with tiny bow and arrow or startled from +their dusty street pursuit of dog or goat,--I have yet to be asked, 'Who +is God?'"[57] + +The basis of Egyptian religion was "of a purely Nigritian character,"[58] +and in its developed form Sudanese tribal gods were invoked and venerated +by the priests. In Upper Egypt, near the confines of Ethiopia, paintings +repeatedly represent black priests conferring on red Egyptian priests the +instruments and symbols of priesthood. In the Sudan to-day Frobenius +distinguishes four principal religions: first, earthly ancestor worship; +next, the social cosmogony of the Atlantic races; third, the religion of +the Bori, and fourth, Islam. The Bori religion spreads from Nubia as far +as the Hausa, and from Lake Chad in the Niger as far as the Yoruba. It is +the religion of possession and has been connected by some with Asiatic +influences. + +From without have come two great religious influences, Islam and +Christianity. Islam came by conquest, trade, and proselytism. As a +conqueror it reached Egypt in the seventh century and had by the end of +the fourteenth century firm footing in the Egyptian Sudan. It overran the +central Sudan by the close of the seventeenth century, and at the +beginning of the nineteenth century had swept over Senegambia and the +whole valley of the Niger down to the Gulf of Guinea. On the east Islam +approached as a trader in the eighth century; it spread into Somaliland +and overran Nubia in the fourteenth century. To-day Islam dominates Africa +north of ten degrees north latitude and is strong between five and ten +degrees north latitude. In the east it reaches below the Victoria Nyanza. + +Christianity early entered Africa; indeed, as Mommsen says, "It was +through Africa that Christianity became the religion of the world. +Tertullian and Cyprian were from Carthage, Arnobius from Sicca Veneria, +Lactantius, and probably in like manner Minucius Felix, in spite of their +Latin names, were natives of Africa, and not less so Augustine. In Africa +the Church found its most zealous confessors of the faith and its most +gifted defenders."[59] + +The Africa referred to here, however, was not Negroland, but Africa above +the desert, where Negro blood was represented in the ancient Mediterranean +race and by intercourse across the desert. On the other hand Christianity +was early represented in the valley of the Nile under "the most holy pope +and patriarch of the great city of Alexandria and of all of the land of +Egypt, of Jerusalem, the holy city, of Nubia, Abyssinia, and Pentapolis, +and all the preaching of St. Mark." This patriarchate had a hundred +bishoprics in the fourth century and included thousands of black +Christians. Through it the Cross preceded the Crescent in some of the +remotest parts of black Africa. + +All these beginnings were gradually overthrown by Islam except among the +Copts in Egypt, and in Abyssinia. The Portuguese in the sixteenth century +began to replant the Christian religion and for a while had great success, +both on the east and west coasts. Roman Catholic enterprise halted in the +eighteenth century and the Protestants began. To-day the west coast is +studded with English and German missions, South Africa is largely +Christian through French and English influence, and the region about the +Great Lakes is becoming christianized. The Roman Catholics have lately +increased their activities, and above all the Negroes of America have +entered with their own churches and with the curiously significant +"Ethiopian" movement. + +Coming now to other spiritual aspects of African culture, we can speak at +present only in a fragmentary way. Roughly speaking, Africa can be divided +into two language zones: north of the fifth degree of north latitude is +the zone of diversity, with at least a hundred groups of widely divergent +languages; south of the line there is one minor language +(Bushman-Hottentot), spoken by less than fifty thousand people, and +elsewhere the predominant Bantu tongue with its various dialects, spoken +by at least fifty million. The Bantu tongue, which thus rules all Central, +West, and South Africa, is an agglutinative tongue which makes especial +use of prefixes. The hundreds of Negro tongues or dialects in the north +represent most probably the result of war and migration and the breaking +up of ancient centers of culture. In Abyssinia and the great horn of East +Africa the influence of Semitic tongues is noted. Despite much effort on +the part of students, it has been impossible to show any Asiatic origin +for the Egyptian language. As Sergi maintains, "everything favors an +African origin."[60] The most brilliant suggestion of modern days links +together the Egyptian of North Africa and the Hottentot and Bushmen +tongues of South Africa. + +Language was reduced to writing among the Egyptians and Ethiopians and to +some extent elsewhere in Africa. Over 100 manuscripts of Ethiopian and +Ethiopic-Arabian literature are extant, including a version of the Bible +and historical chronicles. The Arabic was used as the written tongue of +the Sudan, and Negroland has given us in this tongue many chronicles and +other works of black authors. The greatest of these, the Epic of the Sudan +(Tarikh-es-Soudan), deserves to be placed among the classics of all +literature. In other parts of Africa there was no written language, but +there was, on the other hand, an unusual perfection of oral tradition +through bards, and extraordinary efficiency in telegraphy by drum and +horn. + +The folklore and proverbs of the African tribes are exceedingly rich. Some +of these have been made familiar to English writers through the work of +"Uncle Remus." Others have been collected by Johnston, Ellis, and Theal. + +A black bard of our own day has described the onslaught of the Matabili in +poetry of singular force and beauty: + + They saw the clouds ascend from the plains: + It was the smoke of burning towns. + The confusion of the whirlwind +Was in the heart of the great chief of the blue-colored cattle. + The shout was raised, + "They are friends!" + But they shouted again, + "They are foes!" +Till their near approach proclaimed them Matabili. + The men seized their arms, +And rushed out as if to chase the antelope. + The onset was as the voice of lightning, +And their javelins as the shaking of the forest in the autumn storm.[61] + +There can be no doubt of the Negro's deep and delicate sense of beauty in +form, color, and sound. Soyaux says of African industry, "Whoever denies +to them independent invention and individual taste in their work either +shuts his eyes intentionally before perfectly evident facts, or lack of +knowledge renders him an incompetent judge."[62] M. Rutot had lately told +us how the Negro race brought art and sculpture to pre-historic Europe. +The bones of the European Negroids are almost without exception found in +company with drawings and sculpture in high and low relief; some of their +sculptures, like the Wellendorff "Venus," are unusually well finished for +primitive man. So, too, the painting and carving of the Bushmen and their +forerunners in South Africa has drawn the admiration of students. The +Negro has been prolific in the invention of musical instruments and has +given a new and original music to the western world. + +Schweinfurth, who has preserved for us much of the industrial art of the +Negroes, speaks of their delight in the production of works of art for the +embellishment and convenience of life. Frobenius expressed his +astonishment at the originality of the African in the Yoruba temple which +he visited. "The lofty veranda was divided from the passageway by +fantastically carved and colored pillars. On the pillars were sculptured +knights, men climbing trees, women, gods, and mythical beings. The dark +chamber lying beyond showed a splendid red room with stone hatchets, +wooden figures, cowry beads, and jars. The whole picture, the columns +carved in colors in front of the colored altar, the old man sitting in the +circle of those who reverenced him, the open scaffolding of ninety +rafters, made a magnificent impression."[63] + +The Germans have found, in Kamarun, towns built, castellated, and +fortified in a manner that reminds one of the prehistoric cities of Crete. +The buildings and fortifications of Zymbabwe have already been described +and something has been said of the art of Benin, with its brass and bronze +and ivory. All the work of Benin in bronze and brass was executed by +casting, and by methods so complicated that it would be no easy task for a +modern European craftsman to imitate them. + +Perhaps no race has shown in its earlier development a more magnificent +art impulse than the Negro, and the student must not forget how far Negro +genius entered into the art in the valley of the Nile from Meroe and +Nepata down to the great temples of Egypt. + +Frobenius has recently directed the world's attention to art in West +Africa. Quartz and granite he found treated with great dexterity. But more +magnificent than the stone monument is the proof that at some remote era +glass was made and molded in Yorubaland and that the people here were +brilliant in the production of terra-cotta images. The great mass of +potsherds, lumps of glass, heaps of slag, etc., "proves, at all events, +that the glass industry flourished in this locality in ages past. It is +plain that the glass beads found to have been so very common in Africa +were not only not imported, but were actually manufactured in great +quantities at home." + +The terra-cotta pieces are "remains of another ancient and fine type of +art" and were "eloquent of a symmetry, a vitality, a delicacy of form, and +practically a reminiscence of the ancient Greeks." The antique bronze head +Frobenius describes as "a head of marvelous beauty, wonderfully cast," and +"almost equal in beauty and, at least, no less noble in form, and as +ancient as the terra-cotta heads."[64] + +In a park of monuments Frobenius saw the celebrated forge and hammer: a +mighty mass of iron, like a falling drop in shape, and a block of quartz +fashioned like a drum. Frobenius thinks these were relics dating from past +ages of culture, when the manipulation of quartz and granite was +thoroughly understood and when iron manipulation gave evidence of a skill +not met with to-day. + +Even when we contemplate such revolting survivals of savagery as +cannibalism we cannot jump too quickly at conclusions. Cannibalism is +spread over many parts of Negro Africa, yet the very tribes who practice +cannibalism show often other traits of industry and power. "These cannibal +Bassonga were, according to the types we met with, one of those rare +nations of the African interior which can be classed with the most +esthetic and skilled, most discreet and intelligent of all those generally +known to us as the so-called natural races. Before the Arabic and European +invasion they did not dwell in 'hamlets,' but in towns with twenty or +thirty thousand inhabitants, in towns whose highways were shaded by +avenues of splendid palms planted at regular intervals and laid out with +the symmetry of colonnades. Their pottery would be fertile in suggestion +to every art craftsman in Europe. Their weapons of iron were so perfectly +fashioned that no industrial art from abroad could improve upon their +workmanship. The iron blades were cunningly ornamented with damascened +copper, and the hilts artistically inlaid with the same metal. Moreover, +they were most industrious and capable husbandmen, whose careful tillage +of the suburbs made them able competitors of any gardener in Europe. Their +sexual and parental relations evidenced an amount of tact and delicacy of +feelings unsurpassed among ourselves, either in the simplicity of the +country or the refinements of the town. Originally their political and +municipal system was organized on the lines of a representative republic. +True, it is on record that these well-governed towns often waged an +internecine warfare; but in spite of this it had been their invariable +custom from time immemorial, even in times of strife, to keep the trade +routes open and to allow their own and foreign merchants to go their ways +unharmed. And the commerce of these nations ebbed and flowed along a road +of unknown age, running from Itimbiri to Batubenge, about six hundred +miles in length. This highway was destroyed by the 'missionaries of +civilization' from Arabia only toward the close of the eighteenth century. +But even in my own time there were still smiths who knew the names of +places along that wonderful trade route driven through the heart of the +'impenetrable forests of the Congo.' For every scrap of imported iron was +carried over it."[65] + +In disposition the Negro is among the most lovable of men. Practically all +the great travelers who have spent any considerable time in Africa testify +to this and pay deep tribute to the kindness with which they were +received. One has but to remember the classic story of Mungo Park, the +strong expressions of Livingstone, the words of Stanley and hundreds of +others to realize this. + +Ceremony and courtesy mark Negro life. Livingstone again and again reminds +us of "true African dignity." "When Ilifian men or women salute each +other, be it with a plain and easy curtsey (which is here the simplest +form adopted), or kneeling down, or throwing oneself upon the ground, or +kissing the dust with one's forehead, no matter which, there is yet a +deliberateness, a majesty, a dignity, a devoted earnestness in the manner +of its doing, which brings to light with every gesture, with every fold of +clothing, the deep significance and essential import of every single +action. Everyone may, without too greatly straining his attention, notice +the very striking precision and weight with which the upper and lower +native classes observe these niceties of intercourse."[66] + +All this does not mean that the African Negro is not human with the +all-too-well-known foibles of humanity. Primitive life among them is, +after all, as bare and cruel as among primitive Germans or Chinese, but it +is not more so, and the more we study the Negro the more we realize that +we are dealing with a normal human stock which under reasonable conditions +has developed and will develop in the same lines as other men. Why is it, +then, that so much of misinformation and contempt is widespread concerning +Africa and its people, not simply among the unthinking mass, but among men +of education and knowledge? + +One reason lies undoubtedly in the connotation of the term "Negro." In +North America a Negro may be seven-eights white, since the term refers to +any person of Negro descent. If we use the term in the same sense +concerning the inhabitants of the rest of world, we may say truthfully +that Negroes have been among the leaders of civilization in every age of +the world's history from ancient Babylon to modern America; that they have +contributed wonderful gifts in art, industry, political organization, and +religion, and that they are doing the same to-day in all parts of the +world. + +In sharp contrast to this usage the term "Negro" in Africa has been more +and more restricted until some scientists, late in the last century, +declared that the great mass of the black and brown people of Africa were +not Negroes at all, and that the "real" Negro dwells in a small space +between the Niger and the Senegal. Ratzel says, "If we ask what justifies +so narrow a limitation, we find that the hideous Negro type, which the +fancy of observers once saw all over Africa, but which, as Livingstone +says, is really to be seen only as a sign in front of tobacco shops, has +on closer inspection evaporated from all parts of Africa, to settle no one +knows how in just this region. If we understand that an extreme case may +have been taken for the genuine and pure form, even so we do not +comprehend the ground of its geographical limitation and location; for +wherever dark, woolly-haired men dwell, this ugly type also crops up. We +are here in the presence of a refinement of science which to an +unprejudiced eye will hardly hold water."[67] + +In this restricted sense the Negro has no history, culture, or ability, +for the simple fact that such human beings as have history and evidence +culture and ability are not Negroes! Between these two extreme +definitions, with unconscious adroitness, the most extraordinary and +contradictory conclusions have been reached. + +Let it therefore be said, once for all, that racial inferiority is not the +cause of anti-Negro prejudice. Boaz, the anthropologist, says, "An +unbiased estimate of the anthropological evidence so far brought forward +does not permit us to countenance the belief in a racial inferiority which +would unfit an individual of the Negro race to take his part in modern +civilization. We do not know of any demand made on the human body or mind +in modern life that anatomical or ethnological evidence would prove to be +beyond the powers of the Negro."[68] + +"We have every reason to suppose that all races are capable, under proper +guidance, of being fitted into the complex scheme of our modern +civilization, and the policy of artificially excluding them from its +benefits is as unjustifiable scientifically as it is ethically +abhorrent."[69] What is, then, this so-called "instinctive" modern +prejudice against black folk? + +Lord Bryce says of the intermingling of blacks and whites in South +America, "The ease with which the Spaniards have intermingled by marriage +with the Indian tribes--and the Portuguese have done the like, not only +with the Indians, but with the more physically dissimilar Negroes--shows +that race repugnance is no such constant and permanent factor in human +affairs as members of the Teutonic peoples are apt to assume. Instead of +being, as we Teutons suppose, the rule in the matter, we are rather the +exception, for in the ancient world there seems to have been little race +repulsion." + +In nearly every age and land men of Negro descent have distinguished +themselves. In literature there is Terence in Rome, Nosseyeb and Antar in +Arabia, Es-Sa'di in the Sudan, Pushkin in Russia, Dumas in France, Al +Kanemi in Spain, Heredia in the West Indies, and Dunbar in the United +States, not to mention the alleged Negro strain in AEsop and Robert +Browning. As rulers and warriors we remember such Negroes as Queen +Nefertari and Amenhotep III among many others in Egypt; Candace and +Ergamenes in Ethiopia; Mansa Musa, Sonni Ali, and Mohammed Askai in the +Sudan; Diaz in Brazil, Toussaint L'Ouverture in Hayti, Hannivalov in +Russia, Sakanouye Tamuramaro in Japan, the elder Dumas in France, Cazembe +and Chaka among the Bantu, and Menelik, of Abyssinia; the numberless black +leaders of India, and the mulatto strain of Alexander Hamilton. In music +and art we recall Bridgewater, the friend of Beethoven, and the +unexplained complexion of Beethoven's own father; Coleridge-Taylor in +England, Tanner in America, Gomez in Spain; Ira Aldridge, the actor, and +Johnson, Cook, and Burleigh, who are making the new American syncopated +music. In the Church we know that Negro blood coursed in the veins of many +of the Catholic African fathers, if not in certain of the popes; and there +were in modern days Benoit of Palermo, St. Benedict, Bishop Crowther, the +Mahdi who drove England from the Sudan, and Americans like Allen, Lot +Carey, and Alexander Crummell. In science, discovery, and invention the +Negroes claim Lislet Geoffroy of the French Academy, Latino and Amo, well +known in European university circles; and in America the explorers +Dorantes and Henson; Banneker, the almanac maker; Wood, the telephone +improver; McCoy, inventor of modern lubrication; Matseliger, who +revolutionized shoemaking. Here are names representing all degrees of +genius and talent from the mediocre to the highest, but they are strong +human testimony to the ability of this race. + +We must, then, look for the origin of modern color prejudice not to +physical or cultural causes, but to historic facts. And we shall find the +answer in modern Negro slavery and the slave trade. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[35] "Some authors write that the Ethiopians paint the devil white, in +disdain of our complexions."--Ludolf: _History of Ethiopia_, p. 72. + +[36] Ripley: _Races of Europe_, pp. 58, 62. + +[37] Denniker: _Races of Men_, p. 63. + +[38] G. Finot: _Race Prejudice_. F. Herz: _Moderne Rassentheorien_. + +[39] Ratzel: quoted in Spiller: _Inter-Racial Problems_, p. 31. + +[40] Spiller: _Inter-Racial Problems_, p. 35. + +[41] Ratzel: _History of Mankind_, II, 380 ff. + +[42] _Industrial Evolution_, p. 47. + +[43] These and other references in this chapter are from Schneider: +Culturfaehigkeit des Negers. + +[44] Atlanta University Leaflet, No. 19. + +[45] _Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute_, XLIII, 414, 415. +Cf. also _The Crisis_, Vol. IX, p. 234. + +[46] Buecher: _Industrial Revolution_ (tr. by Wickett), pp. 57-58. + +[47] Hayford: _Native Institutions_, pp. 95-96. + +[48] Ratzel, II, 376. + +[49] Hayford: _Native Institutions_, pp. 76 ff. + +[50] _Impressions of South Africa_, 3d ed., p. 352. + +[51] William Schneider. + +[52] _West African Studies_, Chap. V. + +[53] _Op. cit._ + +[54] _Impressions of South Africa._ + +[55] Frobenius: _Voice of Africa_, Vol. I. + +[56] _West African Studies_, p. 107. + +[57] Nassau: _Fetishism in West Africa_, p. 36. + +[58] _Encyclopaedia Britannica_, 9th ed., XX, 362. + +[59] _The African Provinces_, II, 345. + +[60] _Mediterranean Race_, p. 10. + +[61] Stowe: _Native Races_, etc., pp. 553-554. + +[62] Quoted in Schneider. + +[63] Frobenius: _Voice of Africa_, Vol. I, Chap. XIV. + +[64] Frobenius: _Voice of Africa_, Vol. I. + +[65] Frobenius: _Voice of Africa_, I, 14-15. + +[66] Frobenius: _Voice of Africa_, I, 272. + +[67] Ratzel: _History of Mankind_, II, 313. + +[68] Atlanta University Publications, No. 11. + +[69] Robert Lowie in the _New Review_, Sept., 1914. + + + + +IX THE TRADE IN MEN + + +Color was never a badge of slavery in the ancient or medieval world, nor +has it been in the modern world outside of Christian states. Homer sings +of a black man, a "reverend herald" + + Of visage solemn, sad, but sable hue, + Short, woolly curls, o'erfleeced his bending head,... + Eurybiates, in whose large soul alone, + Ulysses viewed an image of his own. + +Greece and Rome had their chief supplies of slaves from Europe and Asia. +Egypt enslaved races of all colors, and if there were more blacks than +others among her slaves, there were also more blacks among her nobles and +Pharaohs, and both facts are explained by her racial origin and +geographical position. The fall of Rome led to a cessation of the slave +trade, but after a long interval came the white slave trade of the +Saracens and Moors, and finally the modern trade in Negroes. + +Slavery as it exists universally among primitive people is a system +whereby captives in war are put to tasks about the homes and in the +fields, thus releasing the warriors for systematic fighting and the women +for leisure. Such slavery has been common among all peoples and was +wide-spread in Africa. The relative number of African slaves under these +conditions was small and the labor not hard; they were members of the +family and might and did often rise to high position in the tribe. + +Remembering that in the fifteenth century there was no great disparity +between the civilization of Negroland and that of Europe, what made the +striking difference in subsequent development? European civilization, cut +off by physical barriers from further incursions of barbaric races, +settled more and more to systematic industry and to the domination of one +religion; African culture and industries were threatened by powerful +barbarians from the west and central regions of the continent and by the +Moors in the north, and Islam had only partially converted the leading +peoples. + +When, therefore, a demand for workmen arose in America, European +exportation was limited by religious ties and economic stability. African +exportation was encouraged not simply by the Christian attitude toward +heathen, but also by the Moslem enmity toward the unconverted Negroes. Two +great modern religions, therefore, agreed at least in the policy of +enslaving heathen blacks, while the overthrow of black Askias by the Moors +at Tenkadibou brought that economic chaos among the advanced Negro peoples +and movement among the more barbarous tribes which proved of prime +advantage to the development of a systematic trade in men. + +The modern slave trade began with the Mohammedan conquests in Africa, when +heathen Negroes were seized to supply the harems, and as soldiers and +servants. They were bought from the masters and seized in war, until the +growing wealth and luxury of the conquerors demanded larger numbers. Then +Negroes from the Egyptian Sudan, Abyssinia, and Zanzibar began to pass +into Arabia, Persia, and India in increased numbers. As Negro kingdoms and +tribes rose to power they found the slave trade lucrative and natural, +since the raids in which slaves were captured were ordinary inter-tribal +wars. It was not until the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries that the +demand for slaves in Christian lands made slaves the object, and not the +incident, of African wars. + +In Mohammedan countries there were gleams of hope in slavery. In fiction +and in truth the black slave had a chance. Once converted to Islam, he +became a brother to the best, and the brotherhood of the faith was not the +sort of idle lie that Christian slave masters made it. In Arabia black +leaders arose like Antar; in India black slaves carved out principalities +where their descendants still rule. + +Some Negro slaves were brought to Europe by the Spaniards in the +fourteenth century, and a small trade was continued by the Portuguese, who +conquered territory from the "tawny" Moors of North Africa in the early +fifteenth century. Later, after their severe repulse at Al-Kasr-Al-Kabu, +the Portuguese began to creep down the west coast in quest of trade. They +reached the River of Gold in 1441, and their story is that their leader +seized certain free Moors and the next year exchanged them for ten black +slaves, a target of hide, ostrich eggs, and some gold dust. The trade was +easily justified on the ground that the Moors were Mohammedans and refused +to be converted to Christianity, while heathen Negroes would be better +subjects for conversion and stronger laborers. In the next few years a +small number of Negroes continued to be imported into Spain and Portugal +as servants. We find, for instance, in 1474, that Negro slaves were common +in Seville. There is a letter from Ferdinand and Isabella in the year 1474 +to a celebrated Negro, Juan de Valladolid, commonly called the "Negro +Count" (El Conde Negro), nominating him to the office of "mayoral of the +Negroes" in Seville. The slaves were apparently treated kindly, allowed to +keep their own dances and festivals, and to have their own chief, who +represented them in the courts, as against their own masters, and settled +their private quarrels. + +Between 1455 and 1492 little mention is made of slaves in the trade with +Africa. Columbus is said to have suggested Negroes for America, but +Ferdinand and Isabella refused. Nevertheless, by 1501, we have the first +incidental mention of Negroes going to America in a declaration that Negro +slaves "born in the power of Christians were to be allowed to pass to the +Indies, and the officers of the royal revenue were to receive the money to +be paid for their permits." + +About 1501 Ovando, Governor of Spanish America, was objecting to Negro +slaves and "solicited that no Negro slaves should be sent to Hispaniola, +for they fled amongst the Indians and taught them bad customs, and never +could be captured." Nevertheless a letter from the king to Ovando, dated +Segovia, the fifteenth of September, 1505, says, "I will send more Negro +slaves as you request; I think there may be a hundred. At each time a +trustworthy person will go with them who may have some share in the gold +they may collect and may promise them ease if they work well."[70] There +is a record of a hundred slaves being sent out this very year, and Diego +Columbus was notified of fifty to be sent from Seville for the mines in +1510. + +After this time frequent notices show that Negroes were common in the new +world.[71] When Pizarro, for instance, had been slain in Peru, his body +was dragged to the cathedral by two Negroes. After the battle of Anaquito +the head of the viceroy was cut off by a Negro, and during the great +earthquake in Guatemala a most remarkable figure was a gigantic Negro seen +in various parts of the city. Nunez had thirty Negroes with him on the top +of the Sierras, and there was rumor of an aboriginal tribe of Negroes in +South America. One of the last acts of King Ferdinand was to urge that no +more Negroes be sent to the West Indies, but under Charles V, Bishop Las +Casas drew up a plan of assisted migration to America and asked in 1517 +the right for immigrants to import twelve Negro slaves, in return for +which the Indians were to be freed. + +Las Casas, writing in his old age, owns his error: "This advice that +license should be given to bring Negro slaves to these lands, the Clerigo +Casas first gave, not considering the injustice with which the Portuguese +take them and make them slaves; which advice, after he had apprehended the +nature of the thing, he would not have given for all he had in the world. +For he always held that they had been made slaves unjustly and +tyrannically; for the same reason holds good of them as of the +Indians[72]." + +As soon as the plan was broached a Savoyard, Lorens de Gomenot, Governor +of Bresa, obtained a monopoly of this proposed trade and shrewdly sold it +to the Genoese for twenty-five thousand ducats. Other monopolies were +granted in 1523, 1527, and 1528[73]. Thus the American trade became +established and gradually grew, passing successively into the hands of the +Portuguese, the Dutch, the French, and the English. + +At first the trade was of the same kind and volume as that already passing +northward over the desert routes. Soon, however, the American trade +developed. A strong, unchecked demand for brute labor in the West Indies +and on the continent of America grew until it culminated in the eighteenth +century, when Negro slaves were crossing the Atlantic at the rate of fifty +to one hundred thousand a year. This called for slave raiding on a scale +that drew upon every part of Africa--upon the west coast, the western and +Egyptian Sudan, the valley of the Congo, Abyssinia, the lake regions, the +east coast, and Madagascar. Not simply the degraded and weaker types of +Negroes were seized, but the strong Bantu, the Mandingo and Songhay, the +Nubian and Nile Negroes, the Fula, and even the Asiatic Malay, were +represented in the raids. + +There was thus begun in modern days a new slavery and slave trade. It was +different from that of the past, because more and more it came in time to +be founded on racial caste, and this caste was made the foundation of a +new industrial system. For four hundred years, from 1450 to 1850, European +civilization carried on a systematic trade in human beings of such +tremendous proportions that the physical, economic, and moral effects are +still plainly to be remarked throughout the world. To this must be added +the large slave trade of Mussulman lands, which began with the seventh +century and raged almost unchecked until the end of the nineteenth +century. + +These were not days of decadence, but a period that gave the world +Shakespeare, Martin Luther, and Raphael, Haroun-al-Raschid and Abraham +Lincoln. It was the day of the greatest expansion of two of the world's +most pretentious religions and of the beginnings of the modern +organization of industry. In the midst of this advance and uplift this +slave trade and slavery spread more human misery, inculcated more +disrespect for and neglect of humanity, a greater callousness to +suffering, and more petty, cruel, human hatred than can well be +calculated. We may excuse and palliate it, and write history so as to let +men forget it; it remains the most inexcusable and despicable blot on +modern human history. + +The Portuguese built the first slave-trading fort at Elmina, on the Gold +Coast, in 1482, and extended their trade down the west coast and up the +east coast. Under them the abominable traffic grew larger and larger, +until it became far the most important in money value of all the commerce +of the Zambesi basin. There could be no extension of agriculture, no +mining, no progress of any kind where it was so extensively carried +on[74]. + +It was the Dutch, however, who launched the oversea slave trade as a +regular institution. They began their fight for freedom from Spain in +1579; in 1595, as a war measure against Spain, who at that time was +dominating Portugal, they made their first voyage to Guinea. By 1621 they +had captured Portugal's various slave forts on the west coast and they +proceeded to open sixteen forts along the coast of the Gulf of Guinea. +Ships sailed from Holland to Africa, got slaves in exchange for their +goods, carried the slaves to the West Indies or Brazil, and returned home +laden with sugar. In 1621 the private companies trading in the west were +all merged into the Dutch West India Company, which sent in four years +fifteen thousand four hundred and thirty Negroes to Brazil, carried on war +with Spain, supplied even the English plantations, and gradually became +the great slave carrier of the day. + +The commercial supremacy of the Dutch early excited the envy and emulation +of the English. The Navigation Ordinance of 1651 was aimed at them, and +two wars were necessary to wrest the slave trade from them and place it in +the hands of the English. The final terms of peace, among other things, +surrendered New Netherlands to England and opened the way for England to +become henceforth the world's greatest slave trader. + +The English trade began with Sir John Hawkins' voyages in 1562 and later, +in which "the Jesus, our chiefe shippe" played a leading part. Desultory +trade was kept up by the English until the middle of the seventeenth +century, when English chartered slave-trading companies began to appear. +In 1662 the "Royal Adventurers," including the king, the queen dowager, +and the Duke of York, invested in the trade, and finally the Royal African +Company, which became the world's chief slave trader, was formed in 1672 +and carried on a growing trade for a quarter of a century. Jamaica had +finally been captured and held by Oliver Cromwell in 1655 and formed a +West Indian base for the trade in men. + +The chief contract for trade in Negroes was the celebrated "Asiento" or +agreement of the King of Spain to the importation of slaves into Spanish +domains. The Pope's Bull or Demarkation, 1493, debarred Spain from African +possessions, and compelled her to contract with other nations for slaves. +This contract was in the hands of the Portuguese in 1600; in 1640 the +Dutch received it, and in 1701 the French. The War of the Spanish +Succession brought this monopoly to England. + +This Asiento of 1713 was an agreement between England and Spain by which +the latter granted the former a monopoly of the Spanish colonial slave +trade for thirty years, and England engaged to supply the colonies within +that time with at least one hundred and forty-four thousand slaves at the +rate of forty-eight hundred per year. The English counted this prize as +the greatest result of the Treaty of Utrecht (1713), which ended the +mighty struggle against the power of Louis XIV. The English held the +monopoly until the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle (1748), although they had to +go to war over it in 1739. + +From this agreement the slave traders reaped a harvest. The trade centered +at Liverpool, and that city's commercial greatness was built largely on +this foundation. In 1709 it sent out one slaver of thirty tons' burden; +encouraged by Parliamentary subsidies which amounted to nearly half a +million dollars between 1729 and 1750, the trade amounted to fifty-three +ships in 1751; eighty-six in 1765, and at the beginning of the nineteenth +century one hundred and eighty-five, which carried forty-nine thousand two +hundred and thirteen slaves in one year. + +The slave trade thus begun by the Portuguese, enlarged by the Dutch, and +carried to its culmination by the English centered on the west coast near +the seat of perhaps the oldest and most interesting culture of Africa. It +came at a critical time. The culture of Yoruba, Benin, Mossiland, and Nupe +had exhausted itself in a desperate attempt to stem the on-coming flood of +Mohammedan culture. It has succeeded in maintaining its small, loosely +federated city-states suited to trade, industry, and art. It had developed +strong resistance toward the Sudan state builders toward the north, as in +the case of the fighting Mossi; but behind this warlike resistance lay the +peaceful city life which gave industrial ideas to Byzantium and shared +something of Ethiopian and Mediterranean culture. + +The first advent of the slave traders increased and encouraged native +industry, as is evidenced by the bronze work of Benin; but soon this was +pushed into the background, for it was not bronze metal but bronze flesh +that Europe wanted. A new tyranny, blood-thirsty, cruel, and built on war, +forced itself forward in the Niger delta. The powerful state of Dahomey +arose early in the eighteenth century and became a devastating tyranny, +reaching its highest power early in the nineteenth century. Ashanti, a +similar kingdom, began its conquests in 1719 and grew with the slave +trade. Thus state building in West Africa began to replace the city +economy, but it was a state built on war and on war supported and +encouraged largely for the sake of trade in human flesh. The native +industries were changed and disorganized. Family ties and government were +weakened. Far into the heart of Africa this devilish disintegration, +coupled with Christian rum and Mohammedan raiding, penetrated. The face of +Africa was turned south on these slave traders instead of northward toward +the Mediterranean, where for two thousand years and more Europe and Africa +had met in legitimate trade and mutual respect. The full significance of +the battle of Tenkadibou, which overthrew the Askias, was now clear. +Hereafter Africa for centuries was to appear before the world, not as the +land of gold and ivory, of Mansa Musa and Meroe, but as a bound and +captive slave, dumb and degraded. + +The natural desire to avoid a painful subject has led historians to gloss +over the details of the slave trade and leave the impression that it was a +local west-coast phenomenon and confined to a few years. It was, on the +contrary, continent wide and centuries long and an economic, social, and +political catastrophe probably unparalleled in human history. + +The exact proportions of the slave trade can be estimated only +approximately. From 1680 to 1688 we know that the English African Company +alone sent 249 ships to Africa, shipped there 60,783 Negro slaves, and +after losing 14,387 on the middle passage, delivered 46,396 in America. + +It seems probable that 25,000 Negroes a year arrived in America between +1698 and 1707. After the Asiento of 1713 this number rose to 30,000 +annually, and before the Revolutionary War it had reached at least 40,000 +and perhaps 100,000 slaves a year. + +The total number of slaves imported is not known. Dunbar estimates that +nearly 900,000 came to America in the sixteenth century, 2,750,000 in the +seventeenth, 7,000,000 in the eighteenth, and over 4,000,000 in the +nineteenth, perhaps 15,000,000 in all. Certainly it seems that at least +10,000,000 Negroes were expatriated. Probably every slave imported +represented on the average five corpses in Africa or on the high seas. The +American slave trade, therefore, meant the elimination of at least +60,000,000 Negroes from their fatherland. The Mohammedan slave trade meant +the expatriation or forcible migration in Africa of nearly as many more. +It would be conservative, then, to say that the slave trade cost Negro +Africa 100,000,000 souls. And yet people ask to-day the cause of the +stagnation of culture in that land since 1600! + +Such a large number of slaves could be supplied only by organized slave +raiding in every corner of Africa. The African continent gradually became +revolutionized. Whole regions were depopulated, whole tribes disappeared; +villages were built in caves and on hills or in forest fastnesses; the +character of peoples like those of Benin developed their worst excesses of +cruelty instead of the already flourishing arts of peace. The dark, +irresistible grasp of fetish took firmer hold on men's minds. + +Further advances toward civilization became impossible. Not only was there +the immense demand for slaves which had its outlet on the west coast, but +the slave caravans were streaming up through the desert to the +Mediterranean coast and down the valley of the Nile to the centers of +Mohammedanism. It was a rape of a continent to an extent never paralleled +in ancient or modern times. + +In the American trade there was not only the horrors of the slave raid, +which lined the winding paths of the African jungles with bleached bones, +but there was also the horrors of what was called the "middle passage," +that is, the voyage across the Atlantic. As Sir William Dolben said, "The +Negroes were chained to each other hand and foot, and stowed so close that +they were not allowed above a foot and a half for each in breadth. Thus +crammed together like herrings in a barrel, they contracted putrid and +fatal disorders; so that they who came to inspect them in a morning had +occasionally to pick dead slaves out of their rows, and to unchain their +carcases from the bodies of their wretched fellow-sufferers to whom they +had been fastened[75]." + +It was estimated that out of every one hundred lot shipped from Africa +only about fifty lived to be effective laborers across the sea, and among +the whites more seamen died in that trade in one year than in the whole +remaining trade of England in two. The full realization of the horrors of +the slave trade was slow in reaching the ears and conscience of the modern +world, just as to-day the treatment of dark natives in European colonies +is brought to publicity with the greatest difficulty. The first move +against the slave trade in England came in Parliament in 1776, but it was +not until thirty-one years later, in 1807, that the trade was banned +through the arduous labors of Clarkson, Wilberforce, Sharpe, and others. + +Denmark had already abolished the trade, and the United States attempted +to do so the following year. Portugal and Spain were induced to abolish +the trade between 1815 and 1830. Notwithstanding these laws, the +contraband trade went on until the beginning of the Civil War in America. +The reasons for this were the enormous profit of the trade and the +continued demand of the American slave barons, who had no sympathy with +the efforts to stop their source of cheap labor supply. + +However, philanthropy was not working alone to overthrow Negro slavery and +the slave trade. It was seen, first in England and later in other +countries, that slavery as an industrial system could not be made to work +satisfactorily in modern times. Its cost was too great, and one of the +causes of this cost was the slave insurrections from the very beginning, +when the slaves rose on the plantation of Diego Columbus down to the Civil +War in America. Actual and potential slave insurrection in the West +Indies, in North and South America, kept the slave owners in apprehension +and turmoil, or called for a police system difficult to maintain. In North +America revolt finally took the form of organized running away to the +North, and this, with the growing scarcity of suitable land and the moral +revolt, led to the Civil War and the disappearance of the American slave +trade. + +There was still, however, the Mohammedan slave trade to deal with, and +this has been the work of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. In +the last quarter of the nineteenth century ten thousand slaves annually +were being distributed on the southern and eastern coast of the +Mediterranean and at the great slave market in Bornu. + +On the east coast of Africa in 1862 nineteen thousand slaves were passed +into Zanzibar and thence into Arabia and Persia. As late as 1880, three +thousand annually were being thus transplanted, but now the trade is about +stopped. To-day the only centers of actual slave trading may be said to be +the cocoa plantations of the Portuguese Islands on the west coast of +Africa, and the Congo Free State. + +Such is the story of the Rape of Ethiopia--a sordid, pitiful, cruel tale. +Raphael painted, Luther preached, Corneille wrote, and Milton sung; and +through it all, for four hundred years, the dark captives wound to the sea +amid the bleaching bones of the dead; for four hundred years the sharks +followed the scurrying ships; for four hundred years America was strewn +with the living and dying millions of a transplanted race; for four +hundred years Ethiopia stretched forth her hands unto God. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[70] Cf. Helps: _Spanish Conquest_, IV, 401. + +[71] Helps, _op. cit._, I, 219-220. + +[72] Helps, _op. cit._, II, 18-19. + +[73] Helps, _op. cit._, III, 211-212. + +[74] Theal: _History and Ethnography of South Africa before 1795_, I, 476. + +[75] Ingram: _History of Slavery_, p. 152. + + + + +X THE WEST INDIES AND LATIN AMERICA + + +That was a wonderful century, the fifteenth, when men realized that beyond +the scowling waste of western waters were dreams come true. Curious and +yet crassly human it is that, with all this poetry and romance, arose at +once the filthiest institution of the modern world and the costliest. For +on Negro slavery in America was built, not simply the abortive cotton +kingdom, but the foundations of that modern imperialism which is based on +the despising of backward men. + +According to some accounts Alonzo, "the Negro," piloted one of the ships +of Columbus, and certainly there was Negro blood among his sailors. As +early as 1528 there were nearly ten thousand Negroes in the new world. We +hear of them in all parts. In Honduras, for instance, a Negro is sent to +burn a native village; in 1555 the town council of Santiago de Chile voted +to allow an enfranchised Negro possession of land in the town, and +evidently treated him just as white applicants were treated. D'Allyon, who +explored the coast of Virginia in the first quarter of the sixteenth +century, used Negro slaves (who afterward revolted) to build his ships and +help in exploration; Balboa had with him thirty Negroes, who, in 1513, +helped to build the first ships on the Pacific coast; Cortez had three +hundred Negro porters in 1522. + +Before 1530 there were enough Negroes in Mexico to lead to an +insurrection, where the Negroes fought desperately, but were overcome and +their ringleaders executed. Later the followers of another Negro +insurgent, Bayano, were captured and sent back to Spain. Negroes founded +the town of Santiago del Principe in 1570, and in 1540 a Negro slave of +Hernandez de Alarcon was the only one of the party to carry a message +across the country to the Zunis of New Mexico. A Negro, Stephen Dorantes, +discovered New Mexico. This Stephen or "Estevanico" was sent ahead by +certain Spanish friars to the "Seven Cities of Cibola." "As soon as +Stephen had left said friars, he determined to earn all the reputation and +honor for himself, and that the boldness and daring of having alone +discovered those villages of high stories so much spoken of throughout +that country should be attributed to him; and carrying along with him the +people who followed him, he endeavored to cross the wilderness which is +between Cibola and the country he had gone through, and he was so far +ahead of the friars that when they arrived at Chichilticalli, which is on +the edge of the wilderness, he was already at Cibola, which is eighty +leagues of wilderness beyond." But the Indians of the new and strange +country took alarm and concluded that Stephen "must be a spy or guide for +some nations who intended to come and conquer them, because it seemed to +them unreasonable for him to say that the people were white in the country +from which he came, being black himself and being sent by them."[76] + +Slaves imported under the Asiento treaties went to all parts of the +Americas. Spanish America had by the close of the eighteenth century ten +thousand in Santo Domingo, eighty-four thousand in Cuba, fifty thousand in +Porto Rico, sixty thousand in Louisiana and Florida, and sixty thousand in +Central and South America. + +The history of the Negro in Spanish America centered in Cuba, Venezuela, +and Central America. In the sixteenth century slaves began to arrive in +Cuba and Negroes joined many of the exploring expeditions from there to +various parts of America. The slave trade greatly increased in the latter +part of the eighteenth century, and after the revolution in Hayti large +numbers of French emigrants from that island settled in Cuba. This and +Spanish greed increased the harshness of slavery and eventually led to +revolt among the Negroes. In 1844 Governor O'Donnell began a cruel +persecution of the blacks on account of a plot discovered among them. +Finally in 1866 the Ten Years' War broke out in which Negro and white +rebels joined. They demanded the abolition of slavery and equal political +rights for natives and foreigners, whites and blacks. The war was cruel +and bloody but ended in 1878 with the abolition of slavery, while a +further uprising the following year secured civil rights for Negroes. +Spanish economic oppression continued, however, and the leading chiefs of +the Ten Years' War including such leaders as the mulatto, Antonio Maceo, +with large numbers of Negro soldiers, took the field again in 1895. The +result was the freeing of Cuba by the intervention of the United States. +Negro regiments from the United States played here a leading role. A +number of leaders in Cuba in political, industrial, and literary lines +have been men of Negro descent. + +Slavery was abolished by Guatemala in 1824 and by Mexico in 1829. +Argentine, Peru, Bolivia, Chile, and Paraguay ceased to recognize it about +1825. Between 1840 and 1845 it came to an end in Colombia, Venezuela, and +Ecquador. Bolivar, Paez, Sucre, and other South American leaders used +Negro soldiers in fighting for freedom (1814-16), and Hayti twice at +critical times rendered assistance and received Bolivar twice as a +refugee. + +Brazil was the center of Portuguese slavery, but slaves were not +introduced in large numbers until about 1720, when diamonds were +discovered in the territory above Rio Janeiro. Gradually the seaboard from +Pernambuco to Rio Janeiro and beyond became filled with Negroes, and +although the slave trade north of the equator was theoretically abolished +by Portugal in 1815 and south of the equator in 1830, and by Brazil in +these regions in 1826 and 1830, nevertheless between 1825 and 1850 over a +million and a quarter of Negroes were introduced. Not until Brazil +abolished slavery in 1888 did the importation wholly cease. Brazilian +slavery allowed the slave to purchase his freedom, and the color line was +not strict. Even in the eighteenth century there were black clergy and +bishops; indeed the Negro clergy seem to have been on a higher moral level +than the whites. + +Insurrection was often attempted, especially among the Mohammedan Negroes +around Bahia. In 1695 a tribe of revolted slaves held out for a long time. +In 1719 a widespread conspiracy failed, but many of the leaders fled to +the forest. In 1828 a thousand rose in revolt at Bahia, and again in 1830. +From 1831 to 1837 revolt was in the air, and in 1835 came the great revolt +of the Mohammedans, who attempted to enthrone a queen. The Negroes fought +with furious bravery, but were finally defeated. + +By 1872 the number of free Negroes had very greatly increased, so that +emancipation did not come as a shock. While Mohammedan Negroes still gave +trouble and were in some cases sent back to Africa, yet on the whole +emancipation was peaceful, and whites, Negroes, and Indians are to-day +amalgamating into a new race. "At the present moment there is scarcely a +lowly or a highly placed federal or provincial official at the head of or +within any of the great departments of state that has not more or less +Negro or Amer-Indian blood in his veins."[77] + +Lord Bryce says, "It is hardly too much to say that along the coast from +Rio to Bahia and Pernambuco, as well as in parts of the interior behind +these two cities, the black population predominates.... The Brazilian +lower class intermarries freely with the black people; the Brazilian +middle class intermarries with mulattoes and Quadroons. Brazil is the one +country in the world, besides the Portuguese colonies on the east and west +coasts of Africa, in which a fusion of the European and African races is +proceeding unchecked by law or custom. The doctrines of human equality and +human solidarity have here their perfect work. The result is so far +satisfactory that there is little or no class friction. The white man does +not lynch or maltreat the Negro; indeed I have never heard of a lynching +anywhere in South America except occasionally as part of a political +convulsion. The Negro is not accused of insolence and does not seem to +develop any more criminality than naturally belongs to any ignorant +population with loose notions of morality and property. + +"What ultimate effect the intermixture of blood will have on the European +element in Brazil I will not venture to predict. If one may judge from a +few remarkable cases, it will not necessarily reduce the intellectual +standard. One of the ablest and most refined Brazilians I have known had +some color; and other such cases have been mentioned to me. Assumptions +and preconceptions must be eschewed, however plausible they may +seem."[78] + +A Brazilian writer said at the First Races Congress: "The cooperation of +the _metis_[79] in the advance of Brazil is notorious and far from +inconsiderable. They played the chief part during many years in Brazil in +the campaign for the abolition of slavery. I could quote celebrated names +of more than one of these _metis_ who put themselves at the head of the +literary movement. They fought with firmness and intrepidity in the press +and on the platform. They faced with courage the gravest perils to which +they were exposed in their struggle against the powerful slave owners, who +had the protection of a conservative government. They gave evidence of +sentiments of patriotism, self-denial, and appreciation during the long +campaign in Paraguay, fighting heroically at the boarding of the ships in +the naval battle of Riachuelo and in the attacks on the Brazilian army, on +numerous occasions in the course of this long South American war. It was +owing to their support that the republic was erected on the ruins of the +empire."[80] + +The Dutch brought the first slaves to the North American continent. John +Rolfe relates that the last of August, 1619, there came to Virginia "a +Dutch man of warre that sold us twenty Negars."[81] This was probably one +of the ships of the numerous private Dutch trading companies which early +entered into the developed and the lucrative African slave trade. Although +the Dutch thus commenced the continental slave trade they did not actually +furnish a very large number of slaves to the English colonies outside the +West Indies. A small trade had by 1698 brought a few thousand to New York +and still fewer to New Jersey. + +The Dutch found better scope for slaves in Guiana, which they settled in +1616. Sugar cane became the staple crop, but the Negroes early began to +revolt and the Dutch brought in East Indian coolies. The slaves were badly +treated and the runaways joined the revolted Bush Negroes in the interior. +From 1715 to 1775 there was continuous fighting with the Bush Negroes or +insurrections, until at last in 1749 a formal treaty between sixteen +hundred Negroes and the Dutch was made. Immediately a new group revolted +under a Mohammedan, Arabi, and they obtained land and liberty. In 1763 the +coast Negroes revolted. They were checked, but made terms and settled in +the interior. The Bush Negroes fought against both French and English to +save Guiana to the Dutch, but Guiana was eventually divided between the +three. The Bush Negroes still maintain their independence and vigor. + +The French encouraged settlements in the West Indies in the seventeenth +century, but at last, finding that French immigrants would not come, they +began about 1642 to import Negroes. Owing to wars with England, slaves +were supplied by the Dutch and Portuguese, although the Royal Senegal +Company held the coveted Asiento from 1701 to 1713. + +It was in the island of Hayti, however, that French slavery centered. +Pirates from many nations, but chiefly French, began to frequent the +island, and in 1663 the French annexed the eastern part, thus dividing the +island between France and Spain. By 1680 there were so many slaves and +mulattoes that Louis XIV issued his celebrated Code Noir, which was +notable in compelling bachelor masters, fathers of slave children, to +marry their concubines. Children followed the condition of the mother as +to slavery or freedom; they could have no property; harsh punishments were +provided for, but families could not be separated by sale except in the +case of grown children; emancipation with full civil rights was made +possible for any slave twenty years of age or more. When Louisiana was +settled and the Alabama coast, slaves were introduced there. Louisiana was +transferred to Spain in 1762, against the resistance of both settlers and +slaves, but Spain took possession in 1769 and introduced more Negroes. + +Later, in Hayti, a more liberal policy encouraged trade; war was over and +capital and slaves poured in. Sugar, coffee, chocolate, indigo, dyes, and +spices were raised. There were large numbers of mulattoes, many of whom +were educated in France, and many masters married Negro women who had +inherited large properties, just as in the United States to-day white men +are marrying eagerly the landed Indian women in the West. When white +immigration increased in 1749, however, prejudice arose against these +mulattoes and severe laws were passed depriving them of civil rights, +entrance into the professions, and the right to hold office; severe edicts +were enforced as to clothing, names, and social intercourse. Finally, +after 1777, mulattoes were forbidden to come to France. + +When the French Revolution broke out, the Haytians managed to send two +delegates to Paris. Nevertheless the planters maintained the upper hand, +and one of the colored delegates, Oge, on returning, started a small +rebellion. He and his companions were killed with great brutality. This +led the French government to grant full civil rights to free Negroes, +Immediately planters and free Negroes flew to arms against each other and +then, suddenly, August 22, 1791, the black slaves, of whom there were four +hundred and fifty-two thousand, arose in revolt to help the free Negroes. + +For many years runaway slaves had hidden in the mountains under their own +chiefs. One of the earliest of these chiefs was Polydor, in 1724, who was +succeeded by Macandal. The great chief of these runaways or "Maroons" at +the time of the slave revolt was Jean Francois, who was soon succeeded by +Biassou. + +Pierre Dominic Toussaint, known as Toussaint L'Ouverture, joined these +Maroon bands, where he was called "the doctor of the armies of the king," +and soon became chief aid to Jean Francois and Biassou. Upon their deaths +Toussaint rose to the chief command. He acquired complete control over the +blacks, not only in military matters, but in politics and social +organization; "the soldiers regarded him as a superior being, and the +farmers prostrated themselves before him. All his generals trembled before +him (Dessalines did not dare to look in his face), and all the world +trembled before his generals."[82] + +The revolt once started, blacks and mulattoes murdered whites without +mercy and the whites retaliated. Commissioners were sent from France, who +asked simply civil rights for freedmen, and not emancipation. Indeed that +was all that Toussaint himself had as yet demanded. The planters intrigued +with the British and this, together with the beheading of the king (an +impious act in the eyes of Negroes), induced Toussaint to join the +Spaniards. In 1793 British troops were landed and the French commissioners +in desperation declared the slaves emancipated. This at once won back +Toussaint from the Spaniards. He became supreme in the north, while +Rigaud, leader of the mulattoes, held the south and the west. By 1798 the +British, having lost most of their forces by yellow fever, surrendered +Mole St. Nicholas to Toussaint and departed. Rigaud finally left for +France, and Toussaint in 1800 was master of Hayti. He promulgated a +constitution under which Hayti was to be a self-governing colony; all men +were equal before the law, and trade was practically free. Toussaint was +to be president for life, with the power to name his successor. + +Napoleon Bonaparte, master of France, had at this time dreams of a great +American empire, and replied to Toussaint's new government by sending +twenty-five thousand men under his brother-in-law to subdue the +presumptuous Negroes, as a preliminary step to his occupation and +development of the Mississippi valley. Fierce fighting and yellow fever +decimated the French, but matters went hard with the Negroes too, and +Toussaint finally offered to yield. He was courteously received with +military honors and then, as soon as possible, treacherously seized, +bound, and sent to France. He was imprisoned at Fort Joux and died, +perhaps of poison, after studied humiliations, April 7, 1803. + +Thus perished the greatest of American Negroes and one of the great men of +all time, at the age of fifty-six. A French planter said, "God in his +terrestrial globe did not commune with a purer spirit."[83] Wendell +Phillips said, "Some doubt the courage of the Negro. Go to Hayti and stand +on those fifty thousand graves of the best soldiers France ever had and +ask them what they think of the Negro's sword. I would call him Napoleon, +but Napoleon made his way to empire over broken oaths and through a sea of +blood. This man never broke his word. I would call him Cromwell, but +Cromwell was only a soldier, and the state he founded went down with him +into his grave. I would call him Washington, but the great Virginian held +slaves. This man risked his empire rather than permit the slave trade in +the humblest village of his dominions. You think me a fanatic, for you +read history, not with your eyes, but with your prejudices. But fifty +years hence, when Truth gets a hearing, the Muse of history will put +Phocion for the Greek, Brutus for the Roman, Hampden for the English, La +Fayette for France, choose Washington as the bright, consummate flower of +our earlier civilization, then, dipping her pen in the sunlight, will +write in the clear blue, above them all, the name of the soldier, the +statesman, the martyr, Toussaint L'Ouverture." + +The treacherous killing of Toussaint did not conquer Hayti. In 1802 and +1803 some forty thousand French soldiers died of war and fever. A new +colored leader, Dessalines, arose and all the eight thousand remaining +French surrendered to the blockading British fleet. + +The effect of all this was far-reaching. Napoleon gave up his dream of +American empire and sold Louisiana for a song. "Thus, all of Indian +Territory, all of Kansas and Nebraska and Iowa and Wyoming and Montana and +the Dakotas, and most of Colorado and Minnesota, and all of Washington and +Oregon states, came to us as the indirect work of a despised Negro. +Praise, if you will, the work of a Robert Livingstone or a Jefferson, but +to-day let us not forget our debt to Toussaint L'Ouverture, who was +indirectly the means of America's expansion by the Louisiana Purchase of +1803."[84] + +With the freedom of Hayti in 1801 came a century of struggle to fit the +people for the freedom they had won. They were yet slaves, crushed by a +cruel servitude, without education or religious instruction. The Haytian +leaders united upon Dessalines to maintain the independence of the +republic. Dessalines, like Toussaint and his lieutenant Christophe, was +noted in slavery days for his severity toward his fellows and the +discipline which he insisted on. He had other characteristics of African +chieftains. "There were seasons when he broke through his natural +sullenness and showed himself open, affable, and even generous. His vanity +was excessive and manifested itself in singular perversities."[85] He was +a man of great personal bravery and succeeded in maintaining the +independence of Hayti, which had already cost the Frenchmen fifty thousand +lives. + +On January 1, 1804, at the place whence Toussaint had been treacherously +seized and sent to France, the independence of Hayti was declared by the +military leaders. Dessalines was made governor-general for life and +afterward proclaimed himself emperor. This was not an act of +grandiloquence and mimicry. "It is truer to say that in it both Dessalines +and later Christophe were actuated by a clear insight into the social +history and peculiarities of their people. There was nothing in the +constitution which did not have its companion in Africa, where the +organization of society was despotic, with elective hereditary chiefs, +royal families, polygamic marriages, councils, and regencies."[86] + +The population was divided into soldiers and laborers. The territory was +parceled out to chiefs, and the laborers were bound to the soil and worked +under rigorous inspection; part of the products were reserved for their +support, and the rest went to the chiefs, the king, the general +government, and the army. The army was under stern discipline and +military service was compulsory. Women did much of the agricultural labor. +Under Toussaint the administration of this system was committed to +Dessalines, who carried it out with rigor; it was afterward followed by +Christophe. The latter even imported four thousand Negroes from Africa, +from whom he formed a national guard for patrolling the land. These +regulations brought back for a time a large part of the former prosperity +of the island. + +The severity with which Dessalines enforced the laws soon began to turn +many against him. The educated mulattoes especially objected to submission +to the savage African _mores_. Dessalines started to suppress their +revolt, but was killed in ambush in October, 1806. + +Great Britain now began to intrigue for a protectorate over the island and +the Spanish end of the island threatened attack. These difficulties were +overcome, but at a cost of great internal strain. After the death of +Dessalines it seemed that Hayti was about to dissolve into a number of +petty subdivisions. At one time Christophe was ruling as king in the +north, Petion as president at Port au Prince, Rigaud in the south, and a +semi-brigand, Goman, in the extreme southwest. Very soon, however, the +rivalry narrowed down to Petion and Christophe. Petion was a man of +considerable ability and did much, not simply for Hayti, but for South +America. Already as early as 1779, before the revolution in Hayti, the +Haytian Negroes had helped the United States. The British had captured +Savannah in 1778. The French fleet appeared on the coast of Georgia late +that year and was ordered to recruit men in Hayti. Eight hundred young +freedmen, blacks and mulattoes, offered to take part in the expedition, +and they fought valiantly in the siege and covered themselves with glory. +It was this legion that made the charge on the British and saved the +retreating American army. Among the men who fought there was Christophe. + +When Simon Bolivar, Commodore Aury, and many Venezuelan families were +driven from their country in 1815, they and their ships took temporary +refuge in Hayti. Notwithstanding the embarrassed condition of the +republic, Petion received them and gave them four thousand rifles with +ammunition, provisions, and last and best a printing press. He also +settled some international quarrels among members of the groups, and +Bolivar expressed himself afterward as being "overwhelmed with magnanimous +favors."[87] + +Petion died in 1818 and was succeeded by his friend Boyer. Christophe +committed suicide the following year and Boyer became not simply ruler of +western Hayti, but also, by arrangement with the eastern end of the +island, gained the mastery there, where they were afraid of Spanish +aggression. Thus from 1822 to 1843 Boyer, a man of much ability, ruled the +whole of the island and gained the recognition of Haytian independence +from France and other nations. + +France, under Charles X, demanded an indemnity of thirty million dollars +to reimburse the planters for confiscated lands and property. This Hayti +tried to pay, but the annual installment was a tremendous burden to the +impoverished country. Further negotiations were entered into. Finally in +1838 France recognized the independence of the republic and the indemnity +was reduced to twelve million dollars. Even this was a large burden for +Hayti, and the payment of it for years crippled the island. + +The United States and Great Britain in 1825-26 recognized the independence +of Hayti. A concordat was arranged with the Pope for governing the church +in Hayti, and finally in 1860 the church placed under the French +hierarchy. Thus Boyer did unusually well; but his necessary concessions to +France weakened his influence at home, and finally an earthquake, which +destroyed several towns in 1842, raised the superstitious of the populace +against him. He resigned in 1843, leaving the treasury well filled; but +with his withdrawal the Spanish portion of the island was lost to Hayti. + +The subsequent history of Hayti since 1843 has been the struggle of a +small divided country to maintain political independence. The rich +resources of the country called for foreign capital, but outside capital +meant political influence from abroad, which the little nation rightly +feared. Within, the old antagonism between the freedman and the slave +settled into a color line between the mulatto and the black, which for a +time meant the difference between educated liberalism and reactionary +ignorance. This difference has largely disappeared, but some vestiges of +the color line remain. The result has been reaction and savagery under +Soulouque, Dominique, and Nord Alexis, and decided advance under +presidents like Nissage-Saget, Solomon, Legitime, and Hyppolite. + +In political life Hayti is still in the sixteenth century; but in +economic life she has succeeded in placing on their own little farms the +happiest and most contented peasantry in the world, after raising them +from a veritable hell of slavery. If modern capitalistic greed can be +restrained from interference until the best elements of Hayti secure +permanent political leadership the triumph of the revolution will be +complete. + +In other parts of the French-American dominion the slaves achieved freedom +also by insurrection. In Guadeloupe they helped the French drive out the +British, and thus gained emancipation. In Martinique it took three revolts +and a civil war to bring freedom. + +The English slave empire in America centered in the Bermudas, Barbadoes, +Jamaica and the lesser islands, and in the United States. Barbadoes +developed a savage slave code, and the result was attempted slave +insurrections in 1674, 1692, and 1702. These were not successful, but a +rising in 1816 destroyed much property under the leadership of a mulatto, +Washington Franklin, and the repeal of bad laws and eventual +enfranchisement of the colored people followed. One Barbadian mulatto, Sir +Conrad Reeves, has held the position of chief justice in the island and +was knighted. A Negro insurrection in Dominica under Farcel greatly +exercised England in 1791 and 1794 and delayed slave trade abolition; in +1844 and 1847 further uprisings took place, and these continued from 1853 +to 1893. + +The chief island domain of English slavery was Jamaica. It was Oliver +Cromwell who, in his zeal for God and the slave trade, sent an expedition +to seize Hayti. His fleet, driven off there, took Jamaica in 1655. The +English found the mountains already infested with runaway slaves known as +"Maroons," and more Negroes joined them when the English arrived. In 1663 +the freedom of the Maroons was acknowledged, land was given them, and +their leader, Juan de Bolas, was made a colonel in the militia. He was +killed, however, in the following year, and from 1664 to 1738 the three +thousand or more black Maroons fought the British Empire in guerrilla +warfare. Soldiers, Indians, and dogs were sent against them, and finally +in 1738 Captain Cudjo and other chiefs made a formal treaty of peace with +Governor Trelawney. They were granted twenty-five hundred acres and their +freedom was recognized. + +The peace lasted until 1795, when they rebelled again and gave the +British a severe drubbing, besides murdering planters. Bloodhounds again +were imported. The Maroons offered to surrender on the express condition +that none of their number should be deported from the island, as the +legislature wished. General Walpole hesitated, but could get peace on no +other terms and gave his word. The Maroons surrendered their arms, and +immediately the whites seized six hundred of the ringleaders and +transported them to the snows of Nova Scotia! The legislature then voted a +sword worth twenty-five hundred dollars to General Walpole, which he +indignantly refused to accept. Eventually these exiled Maroons found their +way to Sierra Leone, West Africa, in time to save that colony to the +British crown.[88] + +The pressing desire for peace with the Maroons on the part of the white +planters arose from the new sugar culture introduced in 1673. A greatly +increased demand for slaves followed, and between 1700 and 1786 six +hundred and ten thousand slaves were imported; nevertheless, so severely +were they driven, that there were only three hundred thousand Negroes in +Jamaica in the latter year. + +Despite the Moravian missions and other efforts late in the eighteenth +century, unrest among the Jamaica slaves and freedmen grew and was +increased by the anti-slavery agitation in England and the revolt in +Hayti. There was an insurrection in 1796; and in 1831 again the Negroes of +northwest Jamaica, impatient because of the slow progress of the +emancipation, arose in revolt and destroyed nearly three and a half +million dollars' worth of property, well-nigh ruining the planters there. +The next year two hundred and fifty-five thousand slaves were set free, +for which the planters were paid nearly thirty million dollars. There +ensued a discouraging condition of industry. The white officials sent out +in these days were arbitrary and corrupt. Little was done for the mass of +the people and there was outrageous over-taxation. Nevertheless the +backwardness of the colony was attributed to the Negro. Governor Eyre +complained in 1865 that the young and strong were good for nothing and +were filling the jails; but a simultaneous report by a missionary told the +truth concerning the officials. This aroused the colored people, and a +mulatto, George William Gordon, called a meeting. Other meetings were +afterward held, and finally the Negro peasantry began a riot in 1861, in +which eighteen people were killed, only a few of whom were white. + +The result was that Governor Eyre tried and executed by court-martial 354 +persons, and in addition to this killed without trial 85, a total of 439. +One thousand Negro homes were burned to the ground and thousands of +Negroes flogged or mutilated. Children had their brains dashed out, +pregnant women were murdered, and Gordon was tried by court-martial and +hanged. In fact the punishment was, as the royal commissioners said, +"reckless and positively barbarous."[89] + +This high-handed act aroused England. Eyre was not punished, but the +island was made a crown colony in 1866, and given representation in the +legislature in 1886. + +In the island of St. Vincent, Indians first sought to enslave the fugitive +Negroes wrecked there, but the Negroes took the Carib women and then drove +the Indian men away. These "black Caribs" fought with Indians, English, +and others for three quarters of a century, until the Indians were +exterminated. The British took possession in 1763. The black Caribs +resisted, and after hard fighting signed a treaty in 1773, receiving +one-third of the island as their property. They afterward helped the +French against the British, and were finally deported to the island of +Ruatan, off Honduras. In Trinidad and British Guiana there have been +mutinies and rioting of slaves and a curious mingling of races. + +Other parts of South America must be dismissed briefly, because of +insufficient data. Colombia and Venezuela, with perhaps eight million +people, have at least one-third of their population of Negro and Indian +descent. Here Simon Bolivar with his Negro, mulatto, and Indian forces +began the war that liberated South America. Central America has a smaller +proportion of Negroids, perhaps one hundred thousand in all. Bolivia and +Peru have small amounts of Negro blood, while Argentine and Uruguay have +very little. The Negro population in these lands is everywhere in process +of rapid amalgamation with whites and Indians. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[76] H.O. Flipper's translation of Castaneda de Nafera's narrative. + +[77] Johnston: _Negro in the New World_, p. 109. + +[78] Bryce: _South America_, pp. 479-480. + +[79] I.e., mulattoes. + +[80] _Inter-Racial Problems_, p. 381. + +[81] Smith: _General History of Virginia_. + +[82] La Croix: _Memoires sur la Revolution_, I, 253, 408. + +[83] Marquis d'Hermonas. Cf. Johnston: _Negro in the New World_, p. 158. + +[84] DeWitt Talmage, in Christian Herald, November 28, 1906. + +[85] Aimes: _African Institutions in America_ (reprinted from _Journal of +American Folk Lore_), p. 25. + +[86] Brown: _History of San Domingo_, II, 158-159. + +[87] See Leger: _Hayti_, Chap. XI. + +[88] Cf. Chapter V, p. 69. + +[89] Johnston: _Negro in the New World_. + + + + +XI THE NEGRO IN THE UNITED STATES + + +There were half a million slaves in the confines of the United States when +the Declaration of Independence declared "that all men are created equal; +that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; +that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." The +land that thus magniloquently heralded its advent into the family of +nations had supported the institution of human slavery for one hundred and +fifty-seven years and was destined to cling to it eighty-seven years +longer. + +The greatest experiment in Negro slavery as a modern industrial system was +made on the mainland of North America and in the confines of the present +United States. And this experiment was on such a scale and so +long-continued that it is profitable for study and reflection. There were +in the United States in its dependencies, in 1910, 9,828,294 persons of +acknowledged Negro descent, not including the considerable infiltration of +Negro blood which is not acknowledged and often not known. To-day the +number of persons called Negroes is probably about ten and a quarter +million. These persons are almost entirely descendants of African slaves, +brought to America in the sixteenth, seventeenth, eighteenth, and +nineteenth centuries. + +The importation of Negroes to the mainland of North America was small +until the British got the coveted privilege of the Asiento in 1713. Before +that Northern States like New York had received some slaves from the +Dutch, and New England had early developed a trade by which she imported a +number of house servants. Ships went out to the African coast with rum, +sold the rum, and brought the slaves to the West Indies; there they +exchanged the slaves for sugar and molasses and brought the molasses back +to New England, to be made into rum for further exploits. After the +Asiento treaty the Negro population increased in the eighteenth century +from about 50,000 in 1710 to 220,000 in 1750 and to 462,000 in 1770. When +the colonies became independent, the foreign slave trade was soon made +illegal; but illicit trade, annexation of territory and natural increase +enlarged the Negro population from a little over a million at the +beginning of the nineteenth century to four and a half millions at the +outbreak of the Civil War and to about ten and a quarter millions in 1914. + +The present so-called Negro population of the United States is: + +1. A mixture of the various African populations, Bantu, Sudanese, +west-coast Negroes, some dwarfs, and some traces of Arab, Berber, and +Semitic blood. + +2. A mixture of these strains with the blood of white Americans through a +system of concubinage of colored women in slavery days, together with some +legal intermarriage. + +The figures as to mulattoes[90] have been from time to time officially +acknowledged to be understatements. Probably one-third of the Negroes of +the United States have distinct traces of white blood. This blending of +the races has led to interesting human types, but racial prejudice has +hitherto prevented any scientific study of the matter. In general the +Negro population in the United States is brown in color, darkening to +almost black and shading off in the other direction to yellow and white, +and is indistinguishable in some cases from the white population. + +Much has been written of the black man in America, but most of this has +been from the point of view of the whites, so that we know of the effect +of Negro slavery on the whites, the strife among the whites for and +against abolition, and the consequent problem of the Negro so far as the +white population is concerned. + +This chapter, however, is dealing with the matter more from the point of +view of the Negro group itself, and seeking to show what slavery meant to +them, how they reacted against it, what they did to secure their freedom, +and what they are doing with their partial freedom to-day. + +The slaves landing from 1619 onward were received by the colonies at first +as laborers, on the same plane as other laborers. For a long time there +was in law no distinction between the indented white servant from England +and the black servant from Africa, except in the term of their service. +Even here the distinction was not always observed, some of the whites +being kept beyond term of their service and Negroes now and then securing +their freedom. Gradually the planters realized the advantage of laborers +held for life, but they were met by certain moral difficulties. The +opposition to slavery had from the first been largely stilled when it was +stated that this was a method of converting the heathen to Christianity. +The corollary was that when a slave was converted he became free. Up to +1660 or thereabouts it seemed accepted in most colonies and in the English +West Indies that baptism into a Christian church would free a Negro slave. +Masters therefore, were reluctant in the seventeenth century to have their +slaves receive Christian instruction. Massachusetts first apparently +legislated on this matter by enacting in 1641 that slavery should be +confined to captives in just wars "and such strangers as willingly sell +themselves or are sold to us,"[91] meaning by "strangers" apparently +heathen, but saying nothing as to the effect of conversion. Connecticut +adopted similar legislation in 1650, and Virginia declared in 1661 that +Negroes "are incapable of making satisfaction" for time lost in running +away by lengthening their time of services, thus implying that they were +slaves for life. Maryland declared in 1663 that Negro slaves should serve +_durante vita_, but it was not until 1667 that Virginia finally plucked up +courage to attack the issue squarely and declared by law: "Baptism doth +not alter the condition of the person as to his bondage or freedom, in +order that diverse masters freed from this doubt may more carefully +endeavor the propagation of Christianity."[92] + +The transplanting of the Negro from his African clan life to the West +Indian plantation was a social revolution. Marriage became geographical +and transient, while women and girls were without protection. + +The private home as a self-protective, independent unit did not exist. +That powerful institution, the polygamous African home, was almost +completely destroyed, and in its place in America arose sexual +promiscuity, a weak community life, with common dwelling, meals, and child +nurseries. The internal slave trade tended further to weaken natural ties. +A small number of favored house servants and artisans were raised above +this--had their private homes, came in contact with the culture of the +master class, and assimilated much of American civilization. This was, +however, exceptional; broadly speaking, the greatest social effect of +American slavery was to substitute for the polygamous Negro home a new +polygamy less guarded, less effective, and less civilized. + +At first sight it would seem that slavery completely destroyed every +vestige of spontaneous movement among the Negroes. This is not strictly +true. The vast power of the priest in the African state is well known; his +realm alone--the province of religion and medicine--remained largely +unaffected by the plantation system. The Negro priest, therefore, early +became an important figure on the plantation and found his function as the +interpreter of the supernatural, the comforter of the sorrowing, and as +the one who expressed, rudely but picturesquely, the longing and +disappointment and resentment of a stolen people. From such beginnings +arose and spread with marvelous rapidity the Negro church, the first +distinctively Negro American social institution. It was not at first by +any means a Christian church, but a mere adaptation of those rites of +fetish which in America is termed obe worship, or "voodooism."[93] +Association and missionary effort soon gave these rites a veneer of +Christianity and gradually, after two centuries, the church became +Christian, with a simple Calvinistic creed, but with many of the old +customs still clinging to the services. It is this historic fact, that the +Negro church of to-day bases itself upon the sole surviving social +institution of the African fatherland, that accounts for its extraordinary +growth and vitality. + +The slave codes at first were really labor codes based on an attempt to +reestablish in America the waning feudalism of Europe. The laborers were +mainly black and were held for life. Above them came the artisans, free +whites with a few blacks, and above them the master class. The feudalism +called for the plantation system, and the plantation system as developed +in America, and particularly in Virginia, was at first a feudal domain. On +these plantations the master was practically supreme. The slave codes in +early days were but moderately harsh, allowing punishment by the master, +but restraining him in extreme cases and providing for care of the slaves +and of the aged. With the power, however, solely in the hands of the +master class, and with the master supreme on his own plantation, his power +over the slave was practically what he wished it to be. In some cases the +cruelty was as great as on the worst West Indian plantations. In other +cases the rule was mild and paternal. + +Up through this American feudalism the Negro began to rise. He learned in +the eighteenth century the English language, he began to be identified +with the Christian church, he mingled his blood to a considerable extent +with the master class. The house servants particularly were favored, in +some cases receiving education, and the number of free Negroes gradually +increased. + +Present-day students are often puzzled at the apparent contradictions of +Southern slavery. One hears, on the one hand, of the staid and gentle +patriarchy, the wide and sleepy plantations with lord and retainers, ease +and happiness; on the other hand one hears of barbarous cruelty and +unbridled power and wide oppression of men. Which is the true picture? The +answer is simple: both are true. They are not opposite sides of the same +shield; they are different shields. They are pictures, on the one hand, of +house service in the great country seats and in the towns, and on the +other hand of the field laborers who raised the great tobacco, rice, and +cotton crops. We have thus not only carelessly mixed pictures of what were +really different kinds of slavery, but of that which represented different +degrees in the development of the economic system. House service was the +older feudal idea of personal retainership, developed in Virginia and +Carolina in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. It had all the +advantages and disadvantages of such a system; the advantage of the strong +personal tie and disadvantage of unyielding caste distinctions, with the +resultant immoralities. At its worst, however, it was a matter primarily +of human relationships. + +Out of this older type of slavery in the northern South there developed, +during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, in the southern South the +type of slavery which corresponds to the modern factory system in its +worst conceivable form. It represented production of a staple product on a +large scale; between the owner and laborer were interposed the overseer +and the drivers. The slaves were whipped and driven to a mechanical task +system. Wide territory was needed, so that at last absentee landlordship +was common. It was this latter type of slavery that marked the cotton +kingdom, and the extension of the area of this system southward and +westward marked the aggressive world-conquering visions of the slave +barons. On the other hand it was the milder and far different Virginia +house service and the personal retainership of town life in which most +white children grew up; it was this that impressed their imaginations and +which they have so vividly portrayed. The Negroes, however, knew the other +side, for it was under the harsher, heartless driving of the fields that +fully nine-tenths of them lived. + +There early began to be some internal development and growth of +self-consciousness among the Negroes: for instance, in New England towns +Negro "governors" were elected. This was partly an African custom +transplanted and partly an endeavor to put the regulation of the slaves +into their own hands. Negroes voted in those days: for instance, in North +Carolina until 1835 the Constitution extended the franchise to every +freeman, and when Negroes were disfranchised in 1835, several hundred +colored men were deprived of the vote. In fact, as Albert Bushnell Hart +says, "In the colonies freed Negroes, like freed indentured white +servants, acquired property, founded families, and came into the political +community if they had the energy, thrift, and fortune to get the necessary +property."[94] + +The humanitarian movement of the eighteenth century was active toward +Negroes, because of the part which they played in the Revolutionary War. +Negro regiments and companies were raised in Connecticut and Rhode Island, +and a large number of Negroes were members of the continental armies +elsewhere. Individual Negroes distinguished themselves. It is estimated +that five thousand Negroes fought in the American armies. + +The mass of the Americans considered at the time of the adoption of the +Constitution that Negro slavery was doomed. There soon came a series of +laws emancipating slaves in the North: Vermont began in 1779, followed by +judicial decision in Massachusetts in 1780 and gradual emancipation in +Pennsylvania beginning the same year; emancipation was accomplished in New +Hampshire in 1783, and in Connecticut and Rhode Island in 1784. The +momentous exclusion of slavery in the Northwest Territory took place in +1787, and gradual emancipation began in New York and New Jersey in 1799 +and 1804. + +Beneficial and insurance societies began to appear among colored people. +Nearly every town of any size in Virginia in the early eighteenth century +had Negro organizations for caring for the sick and burying the dead. As +the number of free Negroes increased, particularly in the North, these +financial societies began to be openly formed. One of the earliest was the +Free African Society of Philadelphia. This eventually became the present +African Methodist Church, which has to-day half a million members and over +eleven million dollars' worth of property. + +Negroes began to be received into the white church bodies in separate +congregations, and before 1807 there is the record of the formation of +eight such Negro churches. This brought forth leaders who were usually +preachers in these churches. Richard Allen, the founder of the African +Methodist Church, was one; Lot Carey, one of the founders of Liberia, was +another. In the South there was John Chavis, who passed through a regular +course of studies at what is now Washington and Lee University. He started +a school for young white men in North Carolina and had among his pupils a +United States senator, sons of a chief justice of North Carolina, a +governor of the state, and many others. He was a full-blooded Negro, but a +Southern writer says that "all accounts agree that John Chavis was a +gentleman. He was received socially among the best whites and asked to +table."[95] + +In the war of 1812 thirty-three hundred Negroes helped Jackson win the +battle of New Orleans, and numbers fought in New York State and in the +navy under Perry, Channing, and others. Phyllis Wheatley, a Negro girl, +wrote poetry, and the mulatto, Benjamin Banneker, published one of the +first American series of almanacs. + +In fine, it seemed in the early years of the nineteenth century that +slavery in the United States would gradually disappear and that the Negro +would have, in time, a man's chance. A change came, however, between 1820 +and 1830, and it is directly traceable to the industrial revolution of the +nineteenth century. + +Between 1738 and 1830 there had come a remarkable series of inventions +which revolutionized the methods of making cloth. This series included the +invention of the fly shuttle, the carding machine, the steam engine, and +the power loom. The world began to look about for a cheaper and larger +supply of fiber for weaving. It was found in the cotton plant, and the +southern United States was especially adapted to its culture. The +invention of the cotton gin removed the last difficulties. The South now +had a crop which could be attended to by unskilled labor and for which +there was practically unlimited demand. There was land, and rich land, in +plenty. The result was that the cotton crop in the United States increased +from 8,000 bales in 1790 to 650,000 bales in 1820, to 2,500,000 bales in +1850, and to 4,000,000 bales in 1860. + +In this growth one sees the economic foundation of the new slavery in the +United States, which rose in the second decade of the nineteenth century. +Manifestly the fatal procrastination in dealing with slavery in the +eighteenth century received in the nineteenth century its terrible reward. +The change in the attitude toward slavery was manifest in various ways. +The South no longer excused slavery, but began to defend it as an economic +system. The enforcement of the slave trade laws became notoriously lax +and there was a tendency to make slave codes harsher. + +This led to retaliation on the part of the Negroes. There had not been in +the United States before this many attempts at insurrection. The slaves +were distributed over a wide territory, and before they became intelligent +enough to cooperate the chance of emancipation was held before them. +Several small insurrections are alluded to in South Carolina early in the +eighteenth century, and one by Cato at Stono in 1740 caused widespread +alarm. The Negro plot in New York in 1712 put the city into hysterics. +There was no further plotting on any scale until the Haytian revolt, when +Gabriel in Virginia made an abortive attempt. In 1822 a free Negro, +Denmark Vesey, in South Carolina, failed in a well-laid plot, and ten +years after that, in 1831, Nat Turner led his insurrection in Virginia and +killed fifty-one persons. The result of this insurrection was to +crystallize tendencies toward harshness which the economic revolution was +making advisable. + +A wave of legislation passed over the South, prohibiting the slaves from +learning to read and write, forbidding Negroes to preach, and interfering +with Negro religious meetings. Virginia declared in 1831 that neither +slaves nor free Negroes might preach, nor could they attend religious +service at night without permission. In North Carolina slaves and free +Negroes were forbidden to preach, exhort, or teach "in any prayer meeting +or other association for worship where slaves of different families are +collected together" on penalty of not more than thirty-nine lashes. +Maryland and Georgia and other states had similar laws. + +The real effective revolt of the Negro against slavery was not, however, +by fighting, but by running away, usually to the North, which had been +recently freed from slavery. From the beginning of the nineteenth century +slaves began to escape in considerable numbers. Four geographical paths +were chiefly followed: one, leading southward, was the line of swamps +along the coast from Norfolk, Virginia, to the northern border of Florida. +This gave rise to the Negro element among the Indians in Florida and led +to the two Seminole wars of 1817 and 1835. These wars were really slave +raids to make the Indians give up the Negro and half-breed slaves +domiciled among them. The wars cost the United States ten million dollars +and two thousand lives. + +The great Appalachian range, with its abutting mountains, was the safest +path northward. Through Tennessee and Kentucky and the heart of the +Cumberland Mountains, using the limestone caverns, was the third route, +and the valley of the Mississippi was the western tunnel. + +These runaways and the freedmen of the North soon began to form a group of +people who sought to consider the problem of slavery and the destiny of +the Negro in America. They passed through many psychological changes of +attitude in the years from 1700 to 1850. At first, in the early part of +the eighteenth century, there was but one thought: revolt and revenge. The +development of the latter half of the century brought an attitude of hope +and adjustment and emphasized the differences between the slave and the +free Negro. The first part of the nineteenth century brought two +movements: among the free Negroes an effort at self-development and +protection through organization; among slaves and recent fugitives a +distinct reversion to the older idea of revolt. + +As the new industrial slavery, following the rise of the cotton kingdom, +began to press harder, a period of storm and stress ensued in the black +world, and in 1829 came the first full-voiced, almost hysterical protest +of a Negro against slavery and the color line in David Walker's Appeal, +which aroused Southern legislatures to action. + +The decade 1830-40 was a severe period of trial. Not only were the chains +of slavery tighter in the South, but in the North the free Negro was +beginning to feel the ostracism and competition of white workingmen, +native and foreign. In Philadelphia, between 1829 and 1849, six mobs of +hoodlums and foreigners murdered and maltreated Negroes. In the Middle +West harsh black laws which had been enacted in earlier days were hauled +from their hiding places and put into effect. No Negro was allowed to +settle in Ohio unless he gave bond within twenty days to the amount of +five thousand dollars to guarantee his good behavior and support. +Harboring or concealing fugitives was heavily fined, and no Negro could +give evidence in any case where a white man was party. These laws began to +be enforced in 1829 and for three days riots went on in Cincinnati and +Negroes were shot and killed. Aroused, the Negroes sent a deputation to +Canada where they were offered asylum. Fully two thousand migrated from +Ohio. Later large numbers from other parts of the United States joined +them. + +In 1830-31 the first Negro conventions were called in Philadelphia to +consider the desperate condition of the Negro population, and in 1833 the +convention met again and local societies were formed. The first Negro +paper was issued in New York in 1827, while later emancipation in the +British West Indies brought some cheer in the darkness. + +A system of separate Negro schools was established and the little band of +abolitionists led by Garrison and others appeared. In spite of all the +untoward circumstances, therefore, the internal development of the free +Negro in the North went on. The Negro population increased twenty-three +per cent between 1830 and 1840; Philadelphia had, in 1838, one hundred +small beneficial societies, while Ohio Negroes had ten thousand acres of +land. The slave mutiny on the Creole, the establishment of the Negro Odd +Fellows, and the growth of the Negro churches all indicated advancement. + +Between 1830 and 1850 the concerted cooperation to assist fugitives came +to be known as the Underground Railroad. It was an organization not simply +of white philanthropists, but the cooperation of Negroes in the most +difficult part of the work made it possible. Hundreds of Negroes visited +the slave states to entice the slaves away, and the list of Underground +Railroad operators given by Siebert contains one hundred and twenty-eight +names of Negroes. In Canada and in the northern United States there was a +secret society, known as the League of Freedom, which especially worked to +help slaves run away. Harriet Tubman was one of the most energetic of +these slave conductors and brought away several thousand slaves. William +Lambert, a colored man, was reputed between 1829 and 1862 to have aided in +the escape of thirty thousand. + +The decade 1840-50 was a period of hope and uplift for the Negro group, +with clear evidences of distinct self-assertion and advance. A few +well-trained lawyers and physicians appeared, and colored men took their +place among the abolition orators. The catering business in Philadelphia +and other cities fell largely into their hands, and some small merchants +arose here and there. Above all, Frederick Douglass made his first speech +in 1841 and thereafter became one of the most prominent figures in the +abolition crusade. A new series of national conventions began to assemble +late in the forties, and the delegates were drawn from the artisans and +higher servants, showing a great increase of efficiency in the rank and +file of the free Negroes. + +By 1850 the Negroes had increased to three and a half million. Those in +Canada were being organized in settlements and were accumulating property. +The escape of fugitive slaves was systematized and some of the most +representative conventions met. One particularly, in 1854, grappled +frankly with the problem of emigration. It looked as though it was going +to be impossible for Negroes to remain in the United States and be free. +As early as 1788 a Negro union of Newport, Rhode Island, had proposed a +general exodus to Africa. John and Paul Cuffe, after petitioning for the +right to vote in 1780, started in 1815 for Africa, organizing an +expedition at their own expense which cost four thousand dollars. Lot +Carey organized the African Mission Society in 1813, and the first Negro +college graduate went to Liberia in 1829 and became superintendent of +public schools. The Colonization Society encouraged this migration, and +the Negroes themselves had organized the Canadian exodus. + +The Rochester Negro convention in 1853 pronounced against migration, but +nevertheless emissaries were sent in various directions to see what +inducements could be offered. One went to the Niger valley, one to Central +America, and one to Hayti. The Haytian trip was successful and about two +thousand black emigrants eventually settled in Hayti. + +Delaney, who went to Africa, concluded a treaty with eight kings offering +inducements to Negroes, but nothing came of it. In 1853 Negroes like +Purvis and Barbadoes helped in the formation of the American Anti-slavery +society, and for a while colored men cooperated with John Brown and +probably would have given him considerable help if they had thoroughly +known his plans. As it was, six or seven of his twenty-two followers were +Negroes. + +Meantime the slave power was impelled by the high price of slaves and the +exhaustion of cotton land to make increased demands. Slavery was forced +north of Mason and Dixon's line in 1820; a new slave empire with thousands +of slaves was annexed in 1850, and a fugitive slave law was passed which +endangered the liberty of every free Negro; finally a determined attempt +was made to force slavery into the Northwest in competition with free +white labor, and less effective but powerful movements arose to annex more +slave territory to the south and to reopen the African slave trade. + +It looked like a triumphal march for the slave barons, but each step cost +more than the last. Missouri gave rise to the early abolitionist movement. +Mexico and the fugitive slave law aroused deep opposition in the North, +and Kansas developed an attack upon the free labor system, not simply of +the North, but of the civilized world. The result was war; but the war was +not against slavery. It was fought to protect free white laborers against +the competition of slaves, and it was thought possible to do this by +segregating slavery. + +The first thing that vexed the Northern armies on Southern soil during the +war was the question of the disposition of the fugitive slaves, who +immediately began to arrive in increasing numbers. Butler confiscated +them, Fremont freed them, and Halleck caught and returned them; but their +numbers swelled to such large proportions that the mere economic problem +of their presence overshadowed everything else, especially after the +Emancipation Proclamation. Lincoln was glad to have them come after once +he realized their strength to the Confederacy. + +The Emancipation Proclamation was forced, not simply by the necessity of +paralyzing industry in the South, but also by the necessity of employing +Negro soldiers. During the first two years of the war no one wanted Negro +soldiers. It was declared to be a "white man's war." General Hunter tried +to raise a regiment in South Carolina, but the War Department disavowed +the act. In Louisiana the Negroes were anxious to enlist, but were held +off. In the meantime the war did not go as well as the North had hoped, +and on the twenty-sixth of January, 1863, the Secretary of War authorized +the Governor of Massachusetts to raise two regiments of Negro troops. +Frederick Douglass and others began the work with enthusiasm, and in the +end one hundred and eighty-seven thousand Negroes enlisted in the Northern +armies, of whom seventy thousand were killed and wounded. The conduct of +these troops was exemplary. They were indispensable in camp duties and +brave on the field, where they fought in two hundred and thirteen battles. +General Banks wrote, "Their conduct was heroic. No troops could be more +determined or more daring."[96] + +The assault on Fort Wagner, led by a thousand black soldiers under the +white Colonel Shaw, is one of the greatest deeds of desperate bravery on +record. On the other hand the treatment of Negro soldiers when captured by +the Confederates was barbarous. At Fort Pillow, after the surrender of the +federal troops, the colored regiment was indiscriminately butchered and +some of them were buried alive. + +Abraham Lincoln said, "The slightest knowledge of arithmetic will prove to +any man that the rebel armies cannot be destroyed with Democratic +strategy. It would sacrifice all the white men of the North to do it. +There are now in the service of the United States near two hundred +thousand able-bodied colored men, most of them under arms, defending and +acquiring Union territory.... Abandon all the posts now garrisoned by +black men; take two hundred thousand men from our side and put them in the +battlefield or cornfield against us, and we would be compelled to abandon +the war in three weeks."[97] Emancipation thus came as a war measure to +break the power of the Confederacy, preserve the Union, and gain the +sympathy of the civilized world. + +However, two hundred and forty-four years of slavery could not be stopped +by edict. There were legal difficulties, the whole slow problem of +economic readjustment, and the subtle and far-reaching questions of future +race relations. + +The peculiar circumstances of emancipation forced the legal and political +difficulties to the front, and these were so striking that they have since +obscured the others in the eyes of students. Quite unexpectedly and +without forethought the nation had emancipated four million slaves. Once +the deed was done, the majority of the nation was glad and recognized that +this was, after all, the only result of a fearful four years' war which in +any degree justified it. But how was the result to be secured for all +time? There were three possibilities: (1) to declare the slave free and +leave him at the mercy of his former masters; (2) to establish a careful +government guardianship designed to guide the slave from legal to real +economic freedom; (3) to give the Negro the political power to guard +himself as well as he could during this development. It is very easy to +forget that the United States government tried each one of these in +succession and was literally forced to adopt the third, because the first +had utterly failed and the second was thought too "paternal" and +especially too costly. To leave the Negroes helpless after a paper edict +of emancipation was manifestly impossible. It would have meant that the +war had been fought in vain. + +Carl Schurz, who traversed the South just after the war, said, "A +veritable reign of terror prevailed in many parts of the South. The Negro +found scant justice in the local courts against the white man. He could +look for protection only to the military forces of the United States still +garrisoning the states lately in rebellion and to the Freedmen's +Bureau."[98] This Freedmen's Bureau was proposed by Charles Sumner. If it +had been presented to-day instead of fifty years ago, it would have been +regarded as a proposal far less revolutionary than the state insurance of +England and Germany. A half century ago, however, and in a country which +gave the _laisser faire_ economics their extremest trial, the Freedmen's +Bureau struck the whole nation as unthinkable, save as a very temporary +expedient and to relieve the more pointed forms of distress following war. +Yet the proposals of the Bureau were both simple and sensible: + +1. To oversee the making and enforcement of wage contracts for freedmen. + +2. To appear in the courts as the freedmen's best friend. + +3. To furnish the freedmen with a minimum of land and of capital. + +4. To establish schools. + +5. To furnish such institutions of relief as hospitals, outdoor relief +stations, etc. + +How a sensible people could expect really to conduct a slave into freedom +with less than this it is hard to see. Even with such tutelage extending +over a period of two or three decades, the ultimate end had to be +enfranchisement and political and social freedom for those freedmen who +attained a certain set standard. Otherwise the whole training had neither +object nor guarantee. Precisely on this account the former masters opposed +the Freedmen's Bureau with all their influence. They did not want the +Negro trained or really freed, and they criticized mercilessly the many +mistakes of the new Bureau. + +The North at first thought to pay for the main cost of the Freedmen's +Bureau by confiscating the property of former slave owners; but finding +this not in accordance with law, they realized that they were embarking on +an enterprise which bade fair to add many millions to the already +staggering cost of the war. When, therefore, they saw that the abolition +of slavery could not be left to the white South and could not be done by +the North without time and money, they determined to put the +responsibility on the Negro himself. This was without a doubt a tremendous +experiment, but with all its manifest mistakes it succeeded to an +astonishing degree. It made the immediate reestablishment of the old +slavery impossible, and it was probably the only quick method of doing +this. It gave the freedmen's sons a chance to begin their education. It +diverted the energy of the white South slavery to the recovery of +political power, and in this interval, small as it was, the Negro took his +first steps toward economic freedom. + +The difficulties that stared reconstruction politicians in the face were +these: (1) They must act quickly. (2) Emancipation had increased the +political power of the South by one-sixth. Could this increased political +power be put in the hands of those who, in defense of slavery, had +disrupted the Union? (3) How was the abolition of slavery to be made +effective? (4) What was to be the political position of the freedmen? + +The Freedmen's Bureau in its short life accomplished a great task. Carl +Schurz, in 1865, felt warranted in saying that "not half of the labor that +has been done in the South this year, or will be done there next year, +would have been or would be done but for the exertions of the Freedmen's +Bureau.... No other agency except one placed there by the national +government could have wielded that moral power whose interposition was so +necessary to prevent Southern society from falling at once into the chaos +of a general collision between its different elements."[99] +Notwithstanding this the Bureau was temporary, was regarded as a +makeshift, and soon abandoned. + +Meantime partial Negro suffrage seemed not only just, but almost +inevitable. Lincoln, in 1864, "cautiously" suggested to Louisiana's +private consideration "whether some of the colored people may not be let +in as, for instance, the very intelligent, and especially those who fought +gallantly in our ranks. They would probably help in some trying time to +come, to keep the jewel of liberty in the family of freedom." Indeed, the +"family of freedom" in Louisiana being somewhat small just then, who else +was to be intrusted with the "jewel"? Later and for different reasons +Johnson, in 1865, wrote to Mississippi, "If you could extend the elective +franchise to all persons of color who can read the Constitution of the +United States in English and write their name, and to all persons of color +who own real estate valued at not less than two hundred and fifty dollars, +and pay taxes thereon, you would completely disarm the adversary and set +an example the other states will follow. This you can do with perfect +safety, and you thus place the Southern States, in reference to free +persons of color, upon the same basis with the free states. I hope and +trust your convention will do this." + +The Negroes themselves began to ask for the suffrage. The Georgia +convention in Augusta (1866) advocated "a proposition to give those who +could write and read well and possessed a certain property qualification +the right of suffrage." The reply of the South to these suggestions was +decisive. In Tennessee alone was any action attempted that even suggested +possible Negro suffrage in the future, and that failed. In all other +states the "Black Codes" adopted were certainly not reassuring to the +friends of freedom. To be sure, it was not a time to look for calm, cool, +thoughtful action on the part of the white South. Their economic condition +was pitiable, their fear of Negro freedom genuine. Yet it was reasonable +to expect from them something less than repression and utter reaction +toward slavery. To some extent this expectation was fulfilled. The +abolition of slavery was recognized on the statute book, and the civil +rights of owning property and appearing as a witness in cases in which he +was a party were generally granted the Negro; yet with these in many cases +went harsh and unbearable regulations which largely neutralized the +concessions and certainly gave ground for an assumption that, once free, +the South would virtually reenslave the Negro. The colored people +themselves naturally feared this, protesting, as in Mississippi, "against +the reactionary policy prevailing and expressing the fear that the +legislature will pass such prescriptive laws as will drive the freedmen +from the state, or practically reenslave them." + +The codes spoke for themselves. As Burgess says, "Almost every act, word, +or gesture of the Negro, not consonant with good taste and good manners as +well as good morals, was made a crime or misdemeanor for which he could +first be fined by the magistrates and then be consigned to a condition of +almost slavery for an indefinite time, if he could not pay the bill."[100] + +All things considered, it seems probable that, if the South had been +permitted to have its way in 1865, the harshness of Negro slavery would +have been mitigated so as to make slave trading difficult, and so as to +make it possible for a Negro to hold property and appear in some cases in +court; but that in most other respects the blacks would have remained in +slavery. + +What could prevent this? A Freedmen's Bureau established for ten, twenty, +or forty years, with a careful distribution of land and capital and a +system of education for the children, might have prevented such an +extension of slavery. But the country would not listen to such a +comprehensive plan. A restricted grant of the suffrage voluntarily made by +the states would have been a reassuring proof of a desire to treat the +freedmen fairly and would have balanced in part, at least, the increased +political power of the South. There was no such disposition evident. + +In Louisiana, for instance, under the proposed reconstruction "not one +Negro was allowed to vote, though at that very time the wealthy +intelligent free colored people of the state paid taxes on property +assessed at fifteen million dollars and many of them were well known for +their patriotic zeal and love for the Union."[101] + +Thus the arguments for universal Negro suffrage from the start were strong +and are still strong, and no one would question their strength were it not +for the assumption that the experiment failed. Frederick Douglass said to +President Johnson, "Your noble and humane predecessor placed in our hands +the sword to assist in saving the nation, and we do hope that you, his +able successor, will favorably regard the placing in our hands the ballot +with which to save ourselves."[102] + +Carl Schurz wrote, "It is idle to say that it will be time to speak of +Negro suffrage when the whole colored race will be educated, for the +ballot may be necessary to him to secure his education."[103] + +The granting of full Negro suffrage meant one of two alternatives to the +South: (1) The uplift of the Negro for sheer self-preservation. This is +what Schurz and the saner North expected. As one Southern school +superintendent said, "The elevation of this class is a matter of prime +importance, since a ballot in the hands of a black citizen is quite as +potent as in the hands of a white one." Or (2) Negro suffrage meant a +determined concentration of Southern effort by actual force to deprive the +Negro of the ballot or nullify its use. This last is what really happened. +But even in this case, so much energy was taken in keeping the Negro from +voting that the plan for keeping him in virtual slavery and denying him +education partially failed. It took ten years to nullify Negro suffrage in +part and twenty years to escape the fear of federal intervention. In these +twenty years a vast number of Negroes had arisen so far as to escape +slavery forever. Debt peonage could be fastened on part of the rural South +and was; but even here the new Negro landholder appeared. Thus despite +everything the Fifteenth Amendment, and that alone, struck the death knell +of slavery. + +The steps toward the Fifteenth Amendment were taken slowly. First Negroes +were allowed to take part in reconstructing the state governments. This +was inevitable if loyal governments were to be obtained. Next the restored +state governments were directed to enfranchise all citizens, black or +white, or have their representation in Congress cut down proportionately. +Finally the United States said the last word of simple justice: the states +may regulate the suffrage, but no state may deprive a person of the right +to vote simply because he is a Negro or has been a slave. + +For such reasons the Negro was enfranchised. What was the result? No +language has been spared to describe these results as the worst +imaginable. This is not true. There were bad results, and bad results +arising from Negro suffrage; but those results were not so bad as usually +painted, nor was Negro suffrage the prime cause of many of them. Let us +not forget that the white South believed it to be of vital interest to its +welfare that the experiment of Negro suffrage should fail ignominiously +and that almost to a man the whites were willing to insure this failure +either by active force or passive acquiescence; that besides this there +were, as might be expected, men, black and white, Northern and Southern, +only too eager to take advantage of such a situation for feathering their +own nests. Much evil must result in such case; but to charge the evil to +Negro suffrage is unfair. It may be charged to anger, poverty, venality, +and ignorance, but the anger and poverty were the almost inevitable +aftermath of war; the venality was much greater among whites than Negroes +both North and South, and while ignorance was the curse of Negroes, the +fault was not theirs and they took the initiative to correct it. + +The chief charges against the Negro governments are extravagance, theft, +and incompetency of officials. There is no serious charge that these +governments threatened civilization or the foundations of social order. +The charge is that they threatened property and that they were +inefficient. These charges are in part undoubtedly true, but they are +often exaggerated. The South had been terribly impoverished and saddled +with new social burdens. In other words, states with smaller resources +were asked not only to do a work of restoration, but a larger social +work. The property holders were aghast. They not only demurred, but, +predicting ruin and revolution, they appealed to secret societies, to +intimidation, force, and murder. They refused to believe that these +novices in government and their friends were aught but scamps and fools. +Under the circumstances occurring directly after the war, the wisest +statesman would have been compelled to resort to increased taxation and +would have, in turn, been execrated as extravagant, dishonest, and +incompetent. It is easy, therefore, to see what flaming and incredible +stories of Reconstruction governments could gain wide currency and belief. +In fact the extravagance, although great, was not universal, and much of +it was due to the extravagant spirit pervading the whole country in a day +of inflated currency and speculation. + +That the Negroes led by the astute thieves, became at first tools and +received some small share of the spoils is true. But two considerations +must be added: much of the legislation which resulted in fraud was +represented to the Negroes as good legislation, and thus their votes were +secured by deliberate misrepresentation. Take, for instance, the land +frauds of South Carolina. A wise Negro leader of that state, advocating +the state purchase of farm lands, said, "One of the greatest of slavery +bulwarks was the infernal plantation system, one man owning his thousand, +another his twenty, another fifty thousand acres of land. This is the only +way by which we will break up that system, and I maintain that our freedom +will be of no effect if we allow it to continue. What is the main cause of +the prosperity of the North? It is because every man has his own farm and +is free and independent. Let the lands of the South be similarly +divided."[104] + +From such arguments the Negroes were induced to aid a scheme to buy land +and distribute it. Yet a large part of eight hundred thousand dollars +appropriated was wasted and went to the white landholders' pockets. + +The most inexcusable cheating of the Negroes took place through the +Freedmen's Bank. This bank was incorporated by Congress in 1865 and had in +its list of incorporators some of the greatest names in America including +Peter Cooper, William Cullen Bryan and John Jay. Yet the bank was allowed +to fail in 1874 owing the freedmen their first savings of over three +millions of dollars. They have never been reimbursed. + +Many Negroes were undoubtedly venal, but more were ignorant and deceived. +The question is: Did they show any signs of a disposition to learn to +better things? The theory of democratic government is not that the will of +the people is always right, but rather that normal human beings of average +intelligence will, if given a chance, learn the right and best course by +bitter experience. This is precisely what the Negro voters showed +indubitable signs of doing. First they strove for schools to abolish +ignorance, and second, a large and growing number of them revolted against +the extravagance and stealing that marred the beginning of Reconstruction, +and joined with the best elements to institute reform. The greatest stigma +on the white South is not that it opposed Negro suffrage and resented +theft and incompetence, but that, when it saw the reform movements growing +and even in some cases triumphing, and a larger and larger number of black +voters learning to vote for honesty and ability, it still preferred a +Reign of Terror to a campaign of education and disfranchised Negroes +instead of punishing rascals. + +No one has expressed this more convincingly than a Negro who was himself a +member of the Reconstruction legislature of South Carolina, and who spoke +at the convention which disfranchised him against one of the onslaughts of +Tillman. "We were eight years in power. We had built school houses, +established charitable institutions, built and maintained the penitentiary +system, provided for the education of the deaf and dumb, rebuilt the jails +and court houses, rebuilt the bridges, and reestablished the ferries. In +short, we had reconstructed the state and placed it upon the road to +prosperity, and at the same time, by our acts of financial reform, +transmitted to the Hampton government an indebtedness not greater by more +than two and a half million dollars than was the bonded debt of the state +in 1868, before the Republican Negroes and their white allies came into +power."[105] + +So, too, in Louisiana in 1872, and in Mississippi later, the better +element of the Republicans triumphed at the polls and, joining with the +Democrats, instituted reforms, repudiated the worst extravagance, and +started toward better things. Unfortunately there was one thing that the +white South feared more than Negro dishonesty, ignorance, and +incompetency, and that was Negro honesty, knowledge, and efficiency. + +In the midst of all these difficulties the Negro governments in the South +accomplished much of positive good. We may recognize three things which +Negro rule gave to the South: (1) democratic government, (2) free public +schools, (3) new social legislation. + +In general, the words of Judge Albion W. Tourgee, a white "carpet bagger," +are true when he says of the Negro governments, "They obeyed the +Constitution of the United States and annulled the bonds of states, +counties, and cities which had been issued to carry on the War of +Rebellion and maintain armies in the field against the Union. They +instituted a public school system in a realm where public schools had been +unknown. They opened the ballot box and the jury box to thousands of white +men who had been debarred from them by a lack of earthly possessions. They +introduced home rule into the South. They abolished the whipping post, the +branding iron, the stocks, and other barbarous forms of punishment which +had up to that time prevailed. They reduced capital felonies from about +twenty to two or three. In an age of extravagance they were extravagant in +the sums appropriated for public works. In all of that time no man's +rights of persons were invaded under the forms of law. Every Democrat's +life, home, fireside, and business were safe. No man obstructed any white +man's way to the ballot box, interfered with his freedom of speech, or +boycotted him on account of his political faith."[106] + +A thorough study of the legislation accompanying these constitutions and +its changes since shows the comparatively small amount of change in law +and government which the overthrow of Negro rule brought about. There were +sharp and often hurtful economies introduced, marking the return of +property to power; there was a sweeping change of officials, but the main +body of Reconstruction legislation stood. The Reconstruction democracy +brought forth new leaders and definitely overthrew the old Southern +aristocracy. Among these new men were Negroes of worth and ability. John +R. Lynch, when Speaker of the Mississippi House of Representatives, was +given a public testimonial by Republicans and Democrats, and the leading +white paper said, "His bearing in office had been so proper, and his +rulings in such marked contrasts to the partisan conduct of the ignoble +whites of his party who have aspired to be leaders of the blacks, that the +conservatives cheerfully joined in the testimonial."[107] + +Of the colored treasurer of South Carolina the white Governor Chamberlain +said, "I have never heard one word or seen one act of Mr. Cardoza's which +did not confirm my confidence in his personal integrity and his political +honor and zeal for the honest administration of the state government. On +every occasion, and under all circumstances, he has been against fraud and +robbery and in favor of good measures and good men."[108] + +Jonathan C. Gibbs, a colored man and the first state superintendent of +instruction in Florida, was a graduate of Dartmouth. He established the +system and brought it to success, dying in harness in 1874. Such men--and +there were others--ought not to be forgotten or confounded with other +types of colored and white Reconstruction leaders. + +There is no doubt that the thirst of the black man for knowledge, a thirst +which has been too persistent and durable to be mere curiosity or whim, +gave birth to the public school system of the South. It was the question +upon which black voters and legislators insisted more than anything else, +and while it is possible to find some vestiges of free schools in some of +the Southern States before the war, yet a universal, well-established +system dates from the day that the black man got political power. + +Finally, in legislation covering property, the wider functions of the +state, the punishment of crime and the like, it is sufficient to say that +the laws on these points established by Reconstruction legislatures were +not only different from and even revolutionary to the laws in the older +South, but they were so wise and so well suited to the needs of the new +South that, in spite of a retrogressive movement following the overthrow +of the Negro governments, the mass of this legislation, with elaborations +and development, still stands on the statute books of the South.[109] + +The triumph of reaction in the South inaugurated a new era in which we may +distinguish three phases: the renewed attempt to reduce the Negroes to +serfdom, the rise of the Negro metayer, and the economic disfranchisement +of the Southern working class. + +The attempt to replace individual slavery had been frustrated by the +Freedmen's Bureau and the Fifteenth Amendment. The disfranchisement of +1876 was followed by the widespread rise of "crime" peonage. Stringent +laws on vagrancy, guardianship, and labor contracts were enacted and large +discretion given judge and jury in cases of petty crime. As a result +Negroes were systematically arrested on the slightest pretext and the +labor of convicts leased to private parties. This "convict lease system" +was almost universal in the South until about 1890, when its outrageous +abuses and cruelties aroused the whole country. It still survives over +wide areas, and is not only responsible for the impression that the Negro +is a natural criminal, but also for the inability of the Southern courts +to perform their normal functions after so long a prostitution to ends far +removed from justice. + +In more normal economic lines the employers began with the labor contract +system. Before the war they owned labor, land, and subsistence. After the +war they still held the land and subsistence. The laborer was hired and +the subsistence "advanced" to him while the crop was growing. The fall of +the Freedmen's Bureau hindered the transmutation of this system into a +modern wage system, and allowed the laborers to be cheated by high +interest charges on the subsistence advanced and actual cheating often in +book accounts. + +The black laborers became deeply dissatisfied under this system and began +to migrate from the country to the cities, where there was an increasing +demand for labor. The employing farmers complained bitterly of the +scarcity of labor and of Negro "laziness," and secured the enactment of +harsher vagrancy and labor contract laws, and statutes against the +"enticement" of laborers. So severe were these laws that it was often +impossible for a laborer to stop work without committing a felony. +Nevertheless competition compelled the landholders to offer more +inducements to the farm hand. The result was the rise of the black share +tenant: the laborer securing better wages saved a little capital and began +to hire land in parcels of forty to eighty acres, furnishing his own tools +and seed and practically raising his own subsistence. In this way the +whole face of the labor contract in the South was, in the decade 1880-90, +in process of change from a nominal wage contract to a system of tenantry. +The great plantations were apparently broken up into forty and eighty acre +farms with black farmers. To many it seemed that emancipation was +accomplished, and the black folk were especially filled with joy and hope. + +It soon was evident, however, that the change was only partial. The +landlord still held the land in large parcels. He rented this in small +farms to tenants, but retained direct control. In theory the laborer was +furnishing capital, but in the majority of cases he was borrowing at +least a part of this capital from some merchant. + +The retail merchant in this way entered on the scene as middle man between +landlord and laborer. He guaranteed the landowner his rent and relieved +him of details by taking over the furnishing of supplies to the laborer. +He tempted the laborer by a larger stock of more attractive goods, made a +direct contract with him, and took a mortgage on the growing crop. Thus he +soon became the middle man to whom the profit of the transaction largely +flowed, and he began to get rich. + +If the new system benefited the merchant and the landlord, it also brought +some benefits to the black laborers. Numbers of these were still held in +peonage, and the mass were laborers working for scant board and clothes; +but above these began to rise a large number of independent tenants and +farm owners. + +In 1890, therefore, the South was faced by this question: Are we willing +to allow the Negro to advance as a free worker, peasant farmer, metayer, +and small capitalist, with only such handicaps as naturally impede the +poor and ignorant, or is it necessary to erect further artificial barriers +to restrain the advance of the Negroes? The answer was clear and +unmistakable. The advance of the freedmen had been too rapid and the South +feared it; every effort must be made to "keep the Negro in his place" as a +servile caste. + +To this end the South strove to make the disfranchisement of the Negroes +effective and final. Up to this time disfranchisement was illegal and +based on intimidation. The new laws passed between 1890 and 1910 sought on +their face to base the right to vote on property and education in such a +way as to exclude poor and illiterate Negroes and admit all whites. In +fact they could be administered so as to exclude nearly all Negroes. To +this was added a series of laws designed publicly to humiliate and +stigmatize Negro blood: as, for example, separate railway cars; separate +seats in street cars, and the like; these things were added to the +separation in schools and churches, and the denial of redress to seduced +colored women, which had long been the custom in the South. All these new +enactments meant not simply separation, but subordination, caste, +humiliation, and flagrant injustice. + +To all this was added a series of labor laws making the exploitation of +Negro labor more secure. All this legislation had to be accomplished in +the face of the labor movement throughout the world, and particularly in +the South, where it was beginning to enter among the white workers. This +was accomplished easily, however, by an appeal to race prejudice. No +method of inflaming the darkest passions of men was unused. The lynching +mob was given its glut of blood and egged on by purposely exaggerated and +often wholly invented tales of crime on the part of perhaps the most +peaceful and sweet-tempered race the world has ever known. Under the flame +of this outward noise went the more subtle and dangerous work. The +election laws passed in the states where three-fourths of the Negroes +live, were so ingeniously framed that a black university graduate could be +prevented from voting and the most ignorant white hoodlum could be +admitted to the polls. Labor laws were so arranged that imprisonment for +debt was possible and leaving an employer could be made a penitentiary +offense. Negro schools were cut off with small appropriations or wholly +neglected, and a determined effort was made with wide success to see that +no Negro had any voice either in the making or the administration of +local, state, or national law. + +The acquiescence of the white labor vote of the South was further insured +by throwing white and black laborers, so far as possible, into rival +competing groups and making each feel that the one was the cause of the +other's troubles. The neutrality of the white people of the North was +secured through their fear for the safety of large investments in the +South, and through the fatalistic attitude common both in America and +Europe toward the possibility of real advance on the part of the darker +nations. + +The reaction of the Negro Americans upon this wholesale and open attempt +to reduce them to serfdom has been interesting. Naturally they began to +organize and protest and in some cases to appeal to the courts. Then, to +their astonishment, there arose a colored leader, Mr. Booker T. +Washington, who advised them to yield to disfranchisement and caste and +wait for greater economic strength and general efficiency before demanding +full rights as American citizens. The white South naturally agreed with +Mr. Washington, and the white North thought they saw here a chance for +peace in the racial conflict and safety for their Southern investments. + +For a time the colored people hesitated. They respected Mr. Washington for +shrewdness and recognized the wisdom of his homely insistence on thrift +and hard work; but gradually they came to see more and more clearly that, +stripped of political power and emasculated by caste, they could never +gain sufficient economic strength to take their place as modern men. They +also realized that any lull in their protests would be taken advantage of +by Negro haters to push their caste program. They began, therefore, with +renewed persistence to fight for their fundamental rights as American +citizens. The struggle tended at first to bitter personal dissension +within the group. But wiser counsels and the advice of white friends +eventually prevailed and raised it to the broad level of a fight for the +fundamental principles of democracy. The launching of the "Niagara +Movement" by twenty-nine daring colored men in 1905, followed by the +formation of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored +People in 1910, marked an epoch in the advance of the Negro. This latter +organization, with its monthly organ, _The Crisis_, is now waging a +nation-wide fight for justice to Negroes. Other organizations, and a +number of strong Negro weekly papers are aiding in this fight. What has +been the net result of this struggle of half a century? + +In 1863 there were about five million persons of Negro descent in the +United States. Of these, four million and more were just being released +from slavery. These slaves could be bought and sold, could move from place +to place only with permission, were forbidden to learn to read or write, +and legally could never hold property or marry. Ninety per cent were +totally illiterate, and only one adult in six was a nominal Christian. + +Fifty years later, in 1913, there were in the United States ten and a +quarter million persons of Negro descent, an increase of one hundred and +five per cent. Legal slavery has been abolished leaving, however, vestiges +in debt slavery, peonage, and the convict lease system. The mass of the +freedmen and their sons have + +1. Earned a living as free and partially free laborers. + +2. Shared the responsibilities of government. + +3. Developed the internal organization of their race. + +4. Aspired to spiritual self-expression. + +The Negro was freed as a penniless, landless, naked, ignorant laborer. +There were a few free Negroes who owned property in the South, and a +larger number who owned property in the North; but ninety-nine per cent of +the race in the South were penniless field hands and servants. + +To-day there are two and a half million laborers, the majority of whom are +efficient wage earners. Above these are more than a million servants and +tenant farmers; skilled and semi-skilled workers make another million and +at the top of the economic column are 600,000 owners and managers of farms +and businesses, cash tenants, officials, and professional men. This makes +a total of 5,192,535 colored breadwinners in 1910. + +More specifically these breadwinners include 218,972 farm owners and +319,346 cash farm tenants and managers. There were in all 62,755 miners, +288,141 in the building and hand trades; 28,515 workers in clay, glass, +and stone; 41,739 iron and steel workers; 134,102 employees on railways; +62,822 draymen, cab drivers, and liverymen; 133,245 in wholesale and +retail trade; 32,170 in the public service; and 69,471 in professional +service, including 29,750 teachers, 17,495 clergymen, and 4,546 +physicians, dentists, trained nurses, etc. Finally, we must not forget +2,175,000 Negro homes, with their housewives, and 1,620,000 children in +school. + +Fifty years ago the overwhelming mass of these people were not only +penniless, but were themselves assessed as real estate. By 1875 the +Negroes probably had gotten hold of something between 2,000,000 and +4,000,000 acres of land through their bounties as soldiers and the low +price of land after the war. By 1880 this was increased to about 6,000,000 +acres; in 1890 to about 8,000,000 acres; in 1900 to over 12,000,000 acres. +In 1910 this land had increased to nearly 20,000,000 acres, a realm as +large as Ireland. + +The 120,738 farms owned by Negroes in 1890 increased to 218,972 in 1910, +or eighty-one per cent. The value of these farms increased from +$179,796,639 in 1900 to $440,992,439 in 1910; Negroes owned in 1910 about +500,000 homes out of a total of 2,175,000. Their total property in 1900 +was estimated at $300,000,000 by the American Economic Association. On the +same basis of calculation it would be worth to-day not less than +$800,000,000. + +Despite the disfranchisement of three-fourths of his voting population, +the Negro to-day is a recognized part of the American government. He holds +7,500 offices in the executive service of the nation, besides furnishing +four regiments in the army and a large number of sailors. In the state and +municipal service he holds nearly 20,000 other offices, and he furnishes +500,000 of the votes which rule the Union. + +In these same years the Negro has relearned the lost art of organization. +Slavery was the almost absolute denial of initiative and responsibility. +To-day Negroes have nearly 40,000 churches, with edifices worth at least +$75,000,000 and controlling nearly 4,000,000 members. They raise +themselves $7,500,000 a year for these churches. + +There are 200 private schools and colleges managed and almost entirely +supported by Negroes, and these and other public and private Negro schools +have received in 40 years $45,000,000 of Negro money in taxes and +donations. Five millions a year are raised by Negro secret and beneficial +societies which hold at least $6,000,000 in real estate. Negroes support +wholly or in part over 100 old folks' homes and orphanages, 30 hospitals, +and 500 cemeteries. Their organized commercial life is extending rapidly +and includes over 22,000 small retail businesses and 40 banks. + +Above and beyond this material growth has gone the spiritual uplift of a +great human race. From contempt and amusement they have passed to the +pity, perplexity, and fear on the part of their neighbors, while within +their own souls they have arisen from apathy and timid complaint to open +protest and more and more manly self-assertion. Where nine-tenths of them +could not read or write in 1860, to-day over two-thirds can; they have 300 +papers and periodicals, and their voice and expression are compelling +attention. Already in poetry, literature, music, and painting the work of +Americans of Negro descent has gained notable recognition. Instead of +being led and defended by others, as in the past, American Negroes are +gaining their own leaders, their own voices, their own ideals. +Self-realization is thus coming slowly but surely to another of the +world's great races, and they are to-day girding themselves to fight in +the van of progress, not simply for their own rights as men, but for the +ideals of the greater world in which they live: the emancipation of women, +universal peace, democratic government, the socialization of wealth, and +human brotherhood. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[90] + +The figures given by the census are as follows: +1850, mulattoes formed 11.2 per cent of the total Negro population. +1860, mulattoes formed 13.2 per cent of the total Negro population. +1870, mulattoes formed 12 per cent of the total Negro population. +1890, mulattoes formed 15.2 per cent of the total Negro population. +1910, mulattoes formed 20.9 per cent of the total Negro population. + +Or in actual numbers: +1850, 405,751 mulattoes. +1860, 588,352 mulattoes. +1870, 585,601 mulattoes. +1890, 1,132,060 mulattoes. +1910, 2,050,686 mulattoes. + +[91] Cf. "The Spanish Jurist Solorzaris," quoted in Helps: _Spanish +Conquest_, IV, 381. + +[92] Hurd: _Law of Freedom and Bondage_. + +[93] "Obi (Obeah, Obiah, or Obia) is the adjective; Obe or Obi, the noun. +It is of African origin, probably connected with Egyptian Ob, Aub, or +Obron, meaning 'serpent.' Moses forbids Israelites ever to consult the +demon Ob, i.e., 'Charmer, Wizard.' The Witch of Endor is called Oub or Ob. +Oubaois is the name of the Baselisk or Royal Serpent, emblem of the Sun, +and, according to Horus Appollo, 'the Ancient Deity of Africa.'"--Edwards: +_West Indies_, ed. 1819, II. 106-119. Cf. Johnston: _Negro in the New +World_, pp. 65-66; _also Atlanta University Publications_, No. 8, pp. 5-6. + +[94] _Boston Transcript_, March 24, 1906. + +[95] Bassett: _North Carolina_, pp. 73-76. + +[96] Cf. Wilson: _The Black Phalanx_. + +[97] Wilson: _The Black Phalanx_, p. 108. + +[98] _American Historical Review_, Vol. XV. + +[99] Report to President Johnson. + +[100] _Reconstruction and the Constitution._ + +[101] Brewster: _Sketches_, etc. + +[102] McPherson: _Reconstruction_, p. 52. + +[103] Report to the President, 1865. + +[104] _American Historical Review_, Vol. XV, No. 4. + +[105] _Occasional Papers_, American Negro Academy, No. 6. + +[106] _Occasional Papers_, American Negro Academy, No. 6. + +[107] _Jackson (Miss.) Clarion_, April 24, 1873. + +[108] Allen: _Governor Chamberlain's Administration_, p. 82. + +[109] Reconstruction Constitutions, practically unaltered, were kept in +Florida, 1868-85, seventeen years; Virginia, 1870-1902, thirty-two years; +South Carolina, 1868-95, twenty-seven years; Mississippi, 1868-90, +twenty-two years. + + + + +XII THE NEGRO PROBLEMS + + +It is impossible to separate the population of the world accurately by +race, since that is no scientific criterion by which to divide races. If +we divide the world, however, roughly into African Negroes and Negroids, +European whites, and Asiatic and American brown and yellow peoples, we +have approximately 150,000,000 Negroes, 500,000,000 whites, and +900,000,000 yellow and brown peoples. Of the 150,000,000 Negroes, +121,000,000 live in Africa, 27,000,000[110] in the new world, and +2,000,000 in Asia. + +What is to be the future relation of the Negro race to the rest of the +world? The visitor from Altruria might see here no peculiar problem. He +would expect the Negro race to develop along the lines of other human +races. In Africa his economic and political development would restore and +eventually outrun the ancient glories of Egypt, Ethiopia, and Yoruba; +overseas the West Indies would become a new and nobler Africa, built in +the very pathway of the new highway of commerce between East and West--the +real sea route to India; while in the United States a large part of its +citizenship (showing for perhaps centuries their dark descent, but +nevertheless equal sharers of and contributors to the civilization of the +West) would be the descendants of the wretched victims of the seventeenth, +eighteenth, and nineteenth century slave trade. + +This natural assumption of a stranger finds, however, lodging in the minds +of few present-day thinkers. On the contrary, such an outcome is usually +dismissed summarily. Most persons have accepted that tacit but clear +modern philosophy which assigns to the white race alone the hegemony of +the world and assumes that other races, and particularly the Negro race, +will either be content to serve the interests of the whites or die out +before their all-conquering march. This philosophy is the child of the +African slave trade and of the expansion of Europe during the nineteenth +century. + +The Negro slave trade was the first step in modern world commerce, +followed by the modern theory of colonial expansion. Slaves as an article +of commerce were shipped as long as the traffic paid. When the Americas +had enough black laborers for their immediate demand, the moral action of +the eighteenth century had a chance to make its faint voice heard. + +The moral repugnance was powerfully reenforced by the revolt of the slaves +in the West Indies and South America, and by the fact that North America +early began to regard itself as the seat of advanced ideas in politics, +religion, and humanity. + +Finally European capital began to find better investments than slave +shipping and flew to them. These better investments were the fruit of the +new industrial revolution of the nineteenth century, with its factory +system; they were also in part the result of the cheapened price of gold +and silver, brought about by slavery and the slave trade to the new world. +Commodities other than gold, and commodities capable of manufacture and +exploitation in Europe out of materials furnishable by America, became +enhanced in value; the bottom fell out of the commercial slave trade and +its suppression became possible. + +The middle of the nineteenth century saw the beginning of the rise of the +modern working class. By means of political power the laborers slowly but +surely began to demand a larger share in the profiting industry. In the +United States their demand bade fair to be halted by the competition of +slave labor. The labor vote, therefore, first confined slavery to limits +in which it could not live, and when the slave power sought to exceed +these territorial limits, it was suddenly and unintentionally abolished. + +As the emancipation of millions of dark workers took place in the West +Indies, North and South America, and parts of Africa at this time, it was +natural to assume that the uplift of this working class lay along the same +paths with that of European and American whites. This was the _first_ +suggested solution of the Negro problem. Consequently these Negroes +received partial enfranchisement, the beginnings of education, and some of +the elementary rights of wage earners and property holders, while the +independence of Liberia and Hayti was recognized. However, long before +they were strong enough to assert the rights thus granted or to gather +intelligence enough for proper group leadership, the new colonialism of +the later nineteenth and twentieth centuries began to dawn. The new +colonial theory transferred the reign of commercial privilege and +extraordinary profit from the exploitation of the European working class +to the exploitation of backward races under the political domination of +Europe. For the purpose of carrying out this idea the European and white +American working class was practically invited to share in this new +exploitation, and particularly were flattered by popular appeals to their +inherent superiority to "Dagoes," "Chinks," "Japs," and "Niggers." + +This tendency was strengthened by the fact that the new colonial expansion +centered in Africa. Thus in 1875 something less than one-tenth of Africa +was under nominal European control, but the Franco-Prussian War and the +exploration of the Congo led to new and fateful things. Germany desired +economic expansion and, being shut out from America by the Monroe +Doctrine, turned to Africa. France, humiliated in war, dreamed of an +African empire from the Atlantic to the Red Sea. Italy became ambitious +for Tripoli and Abyssinia. Great Britain began to take new interest in her +African realm, but found herself largely checkmated by the jealousy of all +Europe. Portugal sought to make good her ancient claim to the larger part +of the whole southern peninsula. It was Leopold of Belgium who started to +make the exploration and civilization of Africa an international movement. +This project failed, and the Congo Free State became in time simply a +Belgian colony. While the project was under discussion, the international +scramble for Africa began. As a result the Berlin Conference and +subsequent wars and treaties gave Great Britain control of 2,101,411 +square miles of African territory, in addition to Egypt and the Egyptian +Sudan with 1,600,000 square miles. This includes South Africa, +Bechuanaland and Rhodesia, East Africa, Uganda and Zanzibar, Nigeria, and +British West Africa. The French hold 4,106,950 square miles, including +nearly all North Africa (except Tripoli) west of the Niger valley and +Libyan Desert, and touching the Atlantic at four points. To this is added +the Island of Madagascar. The Germans have 910,150 square miles, +principally in Southeast and South-west Africa and the Kamerun. The +Portuguese retain 787,500 square miles in Southeast and Southwest Africa. +The Belgians have 900,000 square miles, while Liberia (43,000 square +miles) and Abyssinia (350,000 square miles) are independent. The Italians +have about 600,000 square miles and the Spanish less than 100,000 square +miles. + +This partition of Africa brought revision of the ideas of Negro uplift. +Why was it necessary, the European investors argued, to push a continent +of black workers along the paths of social uplift by education, +trades-unionism, property holding, and the electoral franchise when the +workers desired no change, and the rate of European profit would suffer? + +There quickly arose then the _second_ suggestion for settling the Negro +problem. It called for the virtual enslavement of natives in certain +industries, as rubber and ivory collecting in the Belgian Congo, cocoa +raising in Portuguese Angola, and diamond mining in South Africa. This new +slavery or "forced" labor was stoutly defended as a necessary foundation +for implanting modern industry in a barbarous land; but its likeness to +slavery was too clear and it has been modified, but not wholly abolished. + +The _third_ attempted solution of the Negro sought the result of the +_second_ by less direct methods. Negroes in Africa, the West Indies, and +America were to be forced to work by land monopoly, taxation, and little +or no education. In this way a docile industrial class working for low +wages, and not intelligent enough to unite in labor unions, was to be +developed. The peonage systems in parts of the United States and the labor +systems of many of the African colonies of Great Britain and Germany +illustrate this phase of solution.[111] It is also illustrated in many of +the West Indian islands where we have a predominant Negro population, and +this population freed from slavery and partially enfranchised. Land and +capital, however, have for the most part been so managed and monopolized +that the black peasantry have been reduced to straits to earn a living in +one of the richest parts of the world. The problem is now going to be +intensified when the world's commerce begins to sweep through the Panama +Canal. + +All these solutions and methods, however, run directly counter to modern +philanthropy, and have to be carried on with a certain concealment and +half-hypocrisy which is not only distasteful in itself, but always liable +to be discovered and exposed by some liberal or religious movement of the +masses of men and suddenly overthrown. These solutions are, therefore, +gradually merging into a _fourth_ solution, which is to-day very popular. +This solution says: Negroes differ from whites in their inherent genius +and stage of development. Their development must not, therefore, be sought +along European lines, but along their own native lines. Consequently the +effort is made to-day in British Nigeria, in the French Congo and Sudan, +in Uganda and Rhodesia to leave so far as possible the outward structure +of native life intact; the king or chief reigns, the popular assemblies +meet and act, the native courts adjudicate, and native social and family +life and religion prevail. All this, however, is subject to the veto and +command of a European magistracy supported by a native army with European +officers. The advantage of this method is that on its face it carries no +clue to its real working. Indeed it can always point to certain undoubted +advantages: the abolition of the slave trade, the suppression of war and +feud, the encouragement of peaceful industry. On the other hand, back of +practically all these experiments stands the economic motive--the +determination to use the organization, the land, and the people, not for +their own benefit, but for the benefit of white Europe. For this reason +education is seldom encouraged, modern religious ideas are carefully +limited, sound political development is sternly frowned upon, and industry +is degraded and changed to the demands of European markets. The most +ruthless class of white mercantile exploiters is allowed large liberty, if +not a free hand, and protected by a concerted attempt to deify white men +as such in the eyes of the native and in their own imagination.[112] + +White missionary societies are spending perhaps as much as five million +dollars a year in Africa and accomplishing much good, but at the same time +white merchants are sending at least twenty million dollars' worth of +European liquor into Africa each year, and the debauchery of the almost +unrestricted rum traffic goes far to neutralize missionary effort. + +[Illustration: Distribution of Negro Blood, Ancient and Modern] + +Under this last mentioned solution of the Negro problems we may put the +attempts at the segregation of Negroes and mulattoes in the United States +and to some extent in the West Indies. Ostensibly this is "separation" of +the races in society, civil rights, etc. In practice it is the +subordination of colored people of all grades under white tutelage, and +their separation as far as possible from contact with civilization in +dwelling place, in education, and in public life. + +On the other hand the economic significance of the Negro to-day is +tremendous. Black Africa to-day exports annually nearly two hundred +million dollars' worth of goods, and its economic development has scarcely +begun. The black West Indies export nearly one hundred million dollars' +worth of goods; to this must be added the labor value of Negroes in South +Africa, Egypt, the West Indies, North, Central, and South America, where +the result is blended in the common output of many races. The economic +foundation of the Negro problem can easily be seen to be a matter of many +hundreds of millions to-day, and ready to rise to the billions tomorrow. + +Such figures and facts give some slight idea of the economic meaning of +the Negro to-day as a worker and industrial factor. "Tropical Africa and +its peoples are being brought more irrevocably every year into the vortex +of the economic influences that sway the western world."[113] + +What do Negroes themselves think of these their problems and the attitude +of the world toward them? First and most significant, they are thinking. +There is as yet no great single centralizing of thought or unification of +opinion, but there are centers which are growing larger and larger and +touching edges. The most significant centers of this new thinking are, +perhaps naturally, outside Africa and in America: in the United States and +in the West Indies; this is followed by South Africa and West Africa and +then, more vaguely, by South America, with faint beginnings in East +Central Africa, Nigeria, and the Sudan. + +The Pan-African movement when it comes will not, however, be merely a +narrow racial propaganda. Already the more far-seeing Negroes sense the +coming unities: a unity of the working classes everywhere, a unity of the +colored races, a new unity of men. The proposed economic solution of the +Negro problem in Africa and America has turned the thoughts of Negroes +toward a realization of the fact that the modern white laborer of Europe +and America has the key to the serfdom of black folk, in his support of +militarism and colonial expansion. He is beginning to say to these +workingmen that, so long as black laborers are slaves, white laborers +cannot be free. Already there are signs in South Africa and the United +States of the beginning of understanding between the two classes. + +In a conscious sense of unity among colored races there is to-day only a +growing interest. There is slowly arising not only a curiously strong +brotherhood of Negro blood throughout the world, but the common cause of +the darker races against the intolerable assumptions and insults of +Europeans has already found expression. Most men in this world are +colored. A belief in humanity means a belief in colored men. The future +world will, in all reasonable probability, be what colored men make it. In +order for this colored world to come into its heritage, must the earth +again be drenched in the blood of fighting, snarling human beasts, or will +Reason and Good Will prevail? That such may be true, the character of the +Negro race is the best and greatest hope; for in its normal condition it +is at once the strongest and gentlest of the races of men: "Semper novi +quid ex Africa!" + +FOOTNOTES: + +[110] Sir Harry Johnston estimates 135,000,000 Negroes, of whom 24,591,000 +live in America. See _Inter-Racial Problems_, p. 335. + +[111] The South African natives, in an appeal to the English Parliament, +show in an astonishing way the confiscation of their land by the English. +They say that in the Union of South Africa 1,250,000 whites own +264,000,000 acres of land, while the 4,500,000 natives have only +21,000,000 acres. On top of this the Union Parliament has passed a law +making even the future purchase of land by Negroes illegal save in +restricted areas! + +[112] The traveler Glave writes in the _Century Magazine_ (LIII, 913): +"Formerly [in the Congo Free State] an ordinary white man was merely +called 'bwana' or 'Mzunga'; now the merest insect of a pale face earns the +title of 'bwana Mkubwa' [big master]." + +[113] E.D. Morel, in the _Nineteenth Century_. + + + + +SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER READING + + +There is no general history of the Negro race. Perhaps Sir Harry H. +Johnston, in his various works on Africa, has come as near covering the +subject as any one writer, but his valuable books have puzzling +inconsistencies and inaccuracies. Keane's _Africa_ is a helpful +compendium, despite the fact that whenever Keane discovers intelligence in +an African he immediately discovers that its possessor is no "Negro." The +articles in the latest edition of the _Encyclopaedia Britannica_ are of +some value, except the ridiculous article on the "Negro" by T.A. Joyce. +Frobenius' newly published _Voice of Africa_ is broad-minded and +informing, and Brown's _Story of Africa and its Explorers_ brings together +much material in readable form. The compendiums by Keltie and White, and +Johnston's _Opening up of Africa_ are the best among the shorter +treatises. + +None of these authors write from the point of view of the Negro as a man, +or with anything but incidental acknowledgment of the existence or value +of his history. We may, however, set down certain books under the various +subjects which the chapters have treated. These books will consist of (1) +standard works for wider reading and (2) special works on which the author +has relied for his statements or which amplify his point of view. _The +latter are starred_. + + +THE PHYSIOGRAPHY OF AFRICA + +A.S. White: _The Development of Africa_, 2d ed., 1892. + +Stanford's Compendium of Geography: _Africa_, by A.H. Keane, 2d ed., +1904-7. + +E. Reclus: _Universal Geography_, Vols. X-XIII. + + +RACIAL DIFFERENCES AND THE ORIGIN AND CHARACTERISTICS OF NEGROES + +J. Deniker: _The Races of Man_, etc., New York, 1904. + +*J. Finot: _Race Prejudice_ (tr. by Wade-Evans), New York, 1907. + +*W.Z. Ripley: _The Races of Europe_, etc., New York, 1899. + +*Jacques Loeb: in _The Crisis_, Vol. VIII, p. 84, Vol. IX, p. 92. + +*_Papers on Inter-Racial Problems Communicated to the First Universal +Races Congress_, etc. (ed. by G. Spiller), 1911. + +*G. Sergi: _The Mediterranean Race_, etc., London, 1901. + +*Franz Boas: _The Mind of Primitive Man_, New York, 1911. + +C.B. Davenport: _Heredity of Skin Color in Negro-White Crosses_, 1913. + + +EARLY MOVEMENTS OF THE NEGRO RACE + +*Sir Harry H. Johnston: _The Opening up of Africa_ (Home University +Library). + +---- _A History of the Colonization of Africa by Alien Races_, Cambridge, +1905. + +*G.W. Stowe: _The Native Races of South Africa_ (ed. by G.M. Theal), +London, 1910. + +(Consult also Johnston's other works on Africa, and his article in Vol. +XLIII of the _Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great +Britain and Ireland_; also _Inter-Racial Problems, and_ Deniker, noted +above.) + + +NEGRO IN ETHIOPIA AND EGYPT + +(The works of Breasted and Petrie, Maspero, Budge and Newberry and +Garstang are the standard books on Egypt. They mention the Negro, but +incidentally and often slightingly.) + +*A.F. Chamberlain: "The Contribution of the Negro to Human Civilization" +(_Journal of Race Development_, Vol. I, April, 1911). + +T.E.S. Scholes: _Glimpses of the Ages_, etc., London, 1905. + +W.H. Ferris: _The African Abroad_, etc., 2 vols., New Haven, 1913. + +E.A.W. Budge: _The Egyptian Sudan_, 2 vols., 1907. + +*_Archeological Survey of Nubia_. + +*A. Thompson and D. Randal McIver: _The Ancient Races of the Thebaid_, +1905. + + +ABYSSINIA + +Job Ludolphus: _A New History of Ethiopia_ (tr. by Gent), London, 1682. + +W.S. Harris: _Highlands of AEthiopia_, 3 vols., London, 1844. + +R.S. Whiteway: _The Portuguese Expedition to Abyssinia_ ... as narrated by +Castanhosa, etc., 1902. + + +THE NIGER RIVER AND ISLAM *F.L. Shaw (Lady Lugard): _A Tropical +Dependency_, etc., London, 1906. + +(The reader may dismiss as worthless Lady Lugard's definition of "Negro." +Otherwise her book is excellent.) + +*Es-Sa'di, Abderrahman Ben Abdallah, etc., translated into French by O. +Houdas, Paris, 1900. + +*F. DuBois: _Timbuktu the Mysterious_ (tr. by White), 1896. + +*W.D. Cooley: _The Negroland of the Arabs_, etc., 1841. + +*H. Barth: _Travels and Discoveries in North and Central Africa_, etc., 5 +vols., 1857-58. + +*Ibn Batuta: _Travels_, etc. (tr. by Lee), 1829. + +*Leo Africanus: _The History and Description of Africa_, etc. (tr. by +Pory, ed. by R. Brown), 3 vols., 1896. + +*E.W. Blyden: _Christianity, Islam, and the Negro Race_. + +*Leo Frobenius: _The Voice of Africa_ (tr. by Blind), 2 vols., 1913. + +Mungo Park: _Travels in the Interior Districts of Africa_, 1799. + + +THE NEGRO ON THE GUINEA COAST + +*Leo Frobenius (as above). + +Sir Harry H. Johnston: _Liberia_, 2 vols., New York, 1906. + +H.H. Foote: _Africa and the American Flag_, New York, 1859. + +T.H.T. McPherson: _A History of Liberia_, Baltimore, Johns Hopkins +Studies. + +T.J. Alldridge: _A Transformed Colony_ (Sierra Leone), London, 1910. + +E.D. Morel: _Affairs of West Africa_, 1902. + +H.L. Roth: _Great Benin and Its Customs_, 1903. + +*F. Starr: _Liberia_, 1913. + +W. Jay: _An Inquiry_, etc., 1835. + +*A.B. Ellis: _The Tshi-speaking Peoples of the Gold Coast_, 1887. + +---- _The Ewe-speaking Peoples of the Slave Coast_, 1890. + +---- _The Yoruba-speaking Peoples of the Slave Coast_, 1894. + +C.H. Read and O.M. Dalton: _Antiquities from the City of Benin_, etc., +1899. + +*M.H. Kingsley: _West African Studies_, 2d. ed., 1904. + +*G.W. Ellis: _Negro Culture in West Africa_ (Vai-speaking peoples), 1914. + + + +THE CONGO VALLEY + +*G. Schweinfurth: _The Heart of Africa_, Vol. II, 1873. + +*H.M. Stanley: _Through the Dark Continent_, 2 vols., 1878. + +---- _In Darkest Africa_, 2 vols., 1890. + +---- _The Congo_, etc., 2 vols., London, 1885. + +H. von Wissman: _My Second Journey through Equatorial Africa_, 1891. + +*H.R. Fox-Bourne: _Civilization in Congoland_, 1903. + +Sir Harry H. Johnston: _George Grenfell and the Congo_, 2 vols., London, +1908. + +*E.D. Morel: _Red Rubber_, London, 1906. + + +THE NEGRO IN THE REGION OF THE GREAT LAKES + +*Sir Harry H. Johnston: _The Uganda Protectorate_, 2d ed., 2 vols., 1904. + +---- _British Central Africa_, 1897. + +---- _The Nile Quest_, 1903. + +*D. Randal McIver: _Mediaeval Rhodesia_, 1906. + +*_The Last Journals of David Livingstone in Central Africa_ (ed. by H. +Waller), 1874. + +J. Dos Santos: _Ethiopia Oriental_ (Theal's _Records of South Africa_, +Vol. VII). + +C. Peters: "Ophir and Punt in South Africa" (_African Society Journal_, +Vol. I). + +De Barros: _De Asia_. + +R. Burton: _Lake Regions of Central Africa_, 1860. + +R.P. Ashe: _Chronicles of Uganda_, 1894. + +(See also Stanley's works, as above.) + + +THE NEGRO IN SOUTH AFRICA + +*G.M. Theal: _History and Ethnography of South Africa of the Zambesi to +1795_, 3 vols., 1907-10. + +---- _History of South Africa since September, 1795_, 5 vols., 1908. + +---- _Records of South Eastern Africa_, 9 vols., 1898-1903. + +*J. Bryce: _Impressions of South Africa_, 1897. + +D. Livingstone: _Missionary Travels in South Africa_, 1857. + +*South African Native Affairs Commission, 1903-5, _Reports_, etc., 5 +vols., Cape Town, 1904-5. + +G. Lagden: _The Basutos_, London, 1909. + +J. Stewart: _Lovedale_, 1884. + +(See also Stowe, as above.) + + +ON NEGRO CIVILIZATION + +J. Dowd: _The Negro Races_, 1907, 1914. + +*H. Gregoire: _An Inquiry concerning the Intellectual and Moral Faculties +and Literature of Negroes_, etc. (tr. by Warden), Brooklyn, 1810. + +C. Buecher: _Industrial Evolution_ (tr. by Wickett), New York, 1904. + +*Franz Boas: "The Real Race Problem" (_The Crisis_, December, 1910). + +---- _Commencement Address_ (Atlanta University Leaflet, No. 19). + +*F. Ratzel: _The History of Mankind_ (tr. by Butler), 3 vols., 1904. + +C. Hayford: _Gold Coast Institutions_, 1903. + +A.B. Camphor: _Missionary Sketches and Folk Lore from Africa_, 1909. + +R.H. Nassau: _Fetishism in West Africa_, 1907. + +*William Schneider: _Die Culturfaehigkeit des Negers_, Frankfort, 1885. + +*G. Schweinfurth: _Artes Africanae_, etc., 1875. + +Duke of Mecklenburg: _From the Congo to the Niger and the Nile_ (English +tr.), Philadelphia, 1914. + +D. Crawford: _Thinking Black_. + +R.N. Cust: _Sketch of Modern Language of Africa_, 2 vols., 1883. + +H. Chatelain: _The Folk Lore of Angola_. + +D. Kidd: _The Essential Kaffir_, 1904. + +---- _Savage Childhood_, 1906. + +---- _Kaffir Socialism and the Dawn of Individualism_, 1908. + +M.H. Tongue: _Bushman Paintings_, Oxford, 1909. + +(See also the works of A.B. Ellis, Miss Kingsley, Sir Harry H. Johnston, +Frobenius, Stowe, Theal, and Ibn Batuta; and particularly Chamberlain's +article in the _Journal of Race Development_.) + + +THE SLAVE TRADE + +T.K. Ingram: _History of Slavery and Serfdom_, London, 1895. (Same article +revised in Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th edition.) + +John R. Spears: The American Slave Trade, 1900. + +*T.F. Buxton: _The African Slave Trade and Its Remedy_, etc., 1896. + +T. Clarkson: _History ... of the Abolition of the African Slave Trade_, +etc., 2 vols., 1808. + +R. Drake: _Revelations of a Slave Smuggler_, New York, 1860. + +*_Report of the Lords of the Committee of Council_, etc., London, 1789. + +*B. Mayer: _Captain Canot or Twenty Years of an African Slaver_, etc., +1854. + +W.E.B. DuBois: _The suppression of the African Slave-Trade to the U.S.A._, +1896. + +(See also Bryan Edwards' _West Indies_.) + + +THE WEST INDIES AND SOUTH AMERICA + +Fletcher and Kidder: _Brazil and the Brazilians_, 1879. + +*Bryan Edwards: _History ... of the British West Indies_, 5 editions, +Vols. II-V, 1793-1819. + +*Sir Harry H. Johnston: _The Negro in the New World_, 1910. + +T.G. Steward: _The Haitian Revolution_, 1791-1804, 1914. + +J.N. Leger: _Haiti_, etc., 1907. + +J. Bryce: _South America_, etc., 1912. + +*J.B. de Lacerda: "The Metis or Half-Breeds of Brazil" (_Inter-Racial +Problems_, etc.) + +A.K. Fiske: _History of the West Indies_, 1899. + + +THE NEGRO IN THE UNITED STATES + +*_Walker's Appeal_, 1829. + +*G.W. Williams: _History of the Negro Race in America_, 1619-1880, 1882. + +B.G. Brawley: _A Short History of the American Negro_, 1913. + +B.T. Washington: _Up from Slavery_, 1901. + +---- _The Story of the Negro_, 2 vols., 1909. + +*_The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man_, 1912. + +*G.E. Stroud: _Sketch of the Laws relating to Slavery_, etc., 1827. + +_The Human Way_: Addresses on Race Problems at the Southern Sociological +Congress, Atlanta, 1913 (ed. by J.E. McCulloch). + +W.J. Simmons: _Men of Mark_, 1887. + +*J.R. Giddings: _The Exiles of Florida_, 1858. + +W.E. Nell: _The Colored Patriots of the American Revolution_, etc., 1855. + +C.W. Chesnutt: _The Marrow of Tradition_, 1901. + +P.L. Dunbar: _Lyrics of Lowly Life_, 1896. + +*_Life and Times of Frederick Douglass_, revised edition, 1892. + +*H.E. Kreihbel: _Afro-American Folk Songs_, etc., 1914. + +T.P. Fenner and others: _Cabin and Plantation Songs_, 3d ed., 1901. + +W.F. Allen and others: _Slave Songs of the United States_, 1867. + +W.E.B. DuBois: "The Negro Race in the United States of America" +(_Inter-Racial Problems_, etc.). + +---- "The Economics of Negro Emancipation" (_Sociological Review_, +October, 1911). + +---- _John Brown_. + +---- _The Philadelphia Negro_, 1899. + +W.E.B. DuBois: "Reconstruction and its Benefits" (_American Historical +Review_, Vol. XV, No. 4). + +---- _editor_, The Crisis: A Record of the Darker Races, monthly, 1910. + +---- _editor_, The Atlanta University Studies: + No. 1. _Mortality Among Negroes in Cities_, 1896. + No. 2. _Social and Physical Conditions of Negroes in Cities_, 1897. + No. 3. _Some Efforts of Negroes for Social Betterment_, 1898. + No. 4. _The Negro in Business_, 1899. + No. 5. _The College Bred Negro_, 1900. + No. 6. _The Negro Common School_, 1901. + No. 7. _The Negro Artisan_, 1902. + No. 8. _The Negro Church_, 1903. + No. 9. _Notes on Negro Crime_, 1904. + No. 10. _A Select Bibliography of the Negro American_, 1905. + No. 11. _Health and Physique of the Negro American_, 1906. + No. 12. _Economic Co-operation among Negro Americans_, 1907. + No. 13. _The Negro American Family_, 1908. + No. 14. _Efforts for Social Betterment among Negro Americans_, 1909. + No. 15. _The College Bred Negro American_, 1910. + No. 16. _The Common School and the Negro American_, 1911. + No. 17. _The Negro American Artisan_, 1912. + No. 18. _Morals and Manners among Negro Americans_, 1913. + +*G.W. Cable: _The Silent South_, etc., 1885. + +*J.R. Lynch: _The Facts of Reconstruction_, 1913. + +*J.T. Wilson: _The Black Phalanx_, 1897. + +William Goodell: _Slavery and Anti-Slavery_, 1852. + +G.S. Merriam: _The Negro and the Nation_, 1906. + +A.B. Hart: _The Southern South_, 1910. + +*G. Livermore: _An Historical Research respecting the Opinions of the +Founders of the Republic on Negroes_, etc., 1862. + +Hartshorn and Penniman: _An Era of Progress and Promise_, 1910 (profusely +illustrated). + +*James Brewster: _Sketches of Southern Mystery, Treason, and Murder_. + +Willcox and DuBois: _Negroes in the United States_ (United States Census +of 1900, Bulletin No. 8). + + +THE FUTURE OF THE NEGRO RACE + +*J.S. Keltie: _The Partition of Africa_, 2d ed., 1895. + +B.T. Washington: _The Future of the Negro_. + +W.E.B. DuBois: "The Future of the Negro Race in America" (_East and West_, +Vol. II, No. 5). + +---- _Souls of Black Folk_, 1913. + +---- _Quest of the Silver Fleece_. + +Alexander Crummell: _The Future of Africa_, 2d ed., 1862. + +*Casely Hayford: _Ethiopia Unbound_, 1911. + +Kelly Miller: _Out of the House of Bondage_, 1914. + +---- _Race Adjustment_, 1908. + +*J. Royce: _Race Questions_, etc., 1908. + +*R.S. Baker: _Following the Color Line_, 1908. + +N.S. Shaler: _The Neighbor_. + +E.D. Morel: "Free Labor in Tropical Africa" (_Nineteenth Century and +After_, 1914). + +(See also Finot, Boas, _Inter-Racial Problems_, and White's _Development +of Africa_.) + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Negro, by W.E.B. 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