BOOKS•

RHODESIA AND ITS GOVERNMENT.*

WE do not hesitate to say that, however fully a man may think himself informed on South African affairs, he will do well to study Mr. Thomson's book. Its width of view, its reasonableness, its moderation, and its common- sense give a high claim upon the attention of all those who have to deal with the South African problem. We may say at the outset that the general effect of the book is to produce an extremely unfavourable impression as to Mr. Rhodes and the Chartered Company and the political methods adopted by them. But in a heated controversy of this kind no man's bare opinion is worth much. To make an opinion valuable in such a case it must proceed from a mind which is not "warped by passion" or "awed by rumour." It must be the outcome of a brain that is not inflamed by prejudice or made capricious by a rooted hate. Mr. Thomson's mental attitude is eminently judicial, and his views are expressed with great moderation. Again, he is in no sense a " crank " or a "faddist" He is not a Little Englander, and so inclined to think any one who expands the Empire is in the wrong. He is not a " negro- philist "—it thick-and-thin advocate of the native, who imagines that because a man has a black skin he is neces- sarily an embodiment of all the virtues—a creature who is always gentle, humane, and high-minded by nature, and has no evil in him unless it ie put there by a wicked white man. Again, he is not one of those who think that the black, who, be it remembered, always holds his land by right of con- quest, must never be dispossessed by a white conquest. Lastly, Mr. Thomson has not made an idol of Mr. Kruger and the Transvaal Boers. He fully realises that they are by no means free from blame in their native policy, that they are attempting to maintain an absurd system of government based on the notion that the will of the minority shall prevail, and that their administration is both corrupt and inefficient. Mr. Thomson, in a word, has faced the South African problem like a reasonable, moderate-minded Englishman. The fact that with each a mental attitude he should have come to the conclusion that Mr. Rhodes exercises an evil influence in South Africa, and that the Chartered Company ought to be deprived of all its functions of government, is, therefore, a matter of no little significance. In theory and considered on

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Bhoduia and its Government. By H. 0. Thomson. With Illustrations. London Smith, Elder, and C. Ws. 6d.]

abstract grounds, government by chartered company stands condemned. Mr. Thomson shows that if the action of the South African Chartered Company is observed on the spot, and if it is tried by concrete tests, it is equally liable to cen- sure. Government by chartered company is, in this case at any rate, as bad in practice as in theory.

It is difficult to know what part of Mr. Thomson's book to choose for quotation and comment in detail. We will begin by extracting from his introduction the following remarkable general passage, for it strikes the key-note of the book. After very properly pointing out that it would be most unfair to attack the inhabitants of Rhodesia generally because a few of them have been guilty of cruelty to the natives, and after expressing his belief that Rhodesia is on the whole a promising country, Mr. Thomson goes on :—

" But though the settlers deserve generous treatment, the Chartered Company itself, as a government, has no claim what- ever to indulgence. It has caused terrible bloodshed ; it has brought unrest into the whole of South Africa (for the Bechuana- land rising seems to have derived its stimulus from the rising in Rhodesia) ; it has given cause for just suspicion to the Boers, to the Portuguese, and to the neighbouring native states ; and it has cruelly wronged and oppressed those natives who have been placed under its control. It is due to ourselves as a governing nation that it should be deprived of its powers, and that we should take over charge of the territories and peoples it has mis- governed, just as we took over charge of India. For whatever allowance we may feel disposed to make for the Rhodesian settlers, our duty to the native tribes is clear. Ne one has asserted this more plainly than Mr. Chamberlain. But the British Empire is not confined to the self-governing colonies and the United Kingdom. It includes a much greater area, a much more numerous population in tropical climes, where no consider- able European settlement is possible, and where the native popu- lation must always vastly outnumber the white inhabitants ; and in these cases also the same change has come over the Imperial idea. `Here also the sense of possession has given place to a different sentiment—the sense of obligation. We feel now that our rule over these territories can only be justified if we can show that it adds to the happiness and prosperity of the people, and I maintain that our rule does, and has, brought security and peace and comparative prosperity to countries that never knew these blessings before. "

Mr. Thomson proceeds to point out that owing to the neglect of the British Government to restrain those to whom it has delegated the function of government, the natives of Rhodesia have not had the benefits which ought to have, and in other parts of the world have, followed British rule. Up till now British rule has brought them "neither security, nor peace, nor even comparative prosperity, but only intensified misery, rebellion, and death." He goes on to point out that "for these things Mr. Rhodes is directly responsible " :— " It was he who destroyed Lobengula ; it was he who evolved the idea of a charter, and induced the British Government to grant it ; and it was he who, as managing director of the Com- pany he had created, neglected to prevent or to punish the oppression which has brought such discredit upon the English name. He has laid down the doctrine of equal rights for every white man south of the Zambesi, but he has purposely omitted all mention of the blacks. Rhodesia has shown what his role of them is like, and a heavy responsibility will rest upon Mr. Chamberlain if be assists him back into power, as he seems inclined to do. Fine sentiments weigh nothing in the scale against committed deeds. Mr. Rhodes' record in Rhodesia has been written in blood, and cannot be obliterated by the assertion, however emphatic, of his adherents and himself that his motives have been dis- interested and patriotic. I have gone with some detail into the nature of the influence exercised by Mr. Rhodes in South Africa, because the coming struggle there will be one, not, as so many people in England believe, between the English and the Dutch, but between Mr. Rhodes, as the representative of monopoly and capital, and his opponents, as representing in- dividual effort ; between violence and legality—between company serfage and freedom. It will be a bitter struggle, and on its outcome depends the direction in which South Africa will develop."

We must deal next with Mr. Thomson's very wise and candid remarks on the oppressions endured by the Outlanders in the Transvaal. After quoting the monstrous naturalisa-

tion law of the Transvaal, he goes on

" Besides these laws yet another precaution was taken to keep all the power in the hands of the Boers. The various towns which had formerly been entitled to representation in Parliament were deprived of this right, and have remained disfranchised ever since. Is it to be wondered at that Advocate Papenfus, in the striking letter which he addressed lately to President Steyn, should say ' I can safely assert that I have failed to discover, during my residence here, how this State can justify its claim to be called a Republic. Leaving on one side, for the present, any mention of the thousands of industrious citizens from over sea, who for years have made it their home, how very few burghers of the Free State (and those only for reasons which will be

apparent later on), and how very few others, comparatively speaking, of South African birth, who have been peaceful and law-abiding citizens, of long and honourable residence, have been politically enfranchised. I hold it to be the just right of every law-abiding individual, who has been resident for a reasonable number of years in any country which lays claim to be considered a civilised State, and who has a vested interest in that country, and who will swear allegiance to the government of that country, to claim and demand political enfranchisement. This is, in my humble opinion, the creed of true Republicanism, and this also is the basis of government and enfranchisement in the Orange Free State. But this is no Republic. Not only are thousands of law-abiding citizens at present without political privileges, but they are for ever debarred from obtaining them, and the barbarous spectacle is presented of a State claiming to be recog- nised and respected by the civilised world as a free people, and laying claim to a Republican form of government, excluding children horn of the soil from citizenship.' That is a state of things which cannot continue. We must do right ourselves, not to conciliate the Boers, but because it is right; but they must understand clearly that we shall expect them to do what is right also, and that if they fail to do it we shall stand by the IIitlanders in the struggle that must come sooner or later. In all probability, if they see that we are in earnest, they will be only too willing to meet us half-way ; for most of their mistakes have arisen through fear : a fear that it must be our first duty to allay. To use Mr. Chamberlain's words, But as a Dutch Government ourselves, as well as an English Government, it ought to be our object, in endeavouring to secure the redress of these grievances, to carry with us our Dutch fellow sub- jects.'"

Unquestionably the treatment of the Outlanders by the Boers is a monstrous injustice, and we hold, and have always held, that as the Paramount Power in South Africa we have the right to say at the fitting season that the Boers must put their house in order and give equal rights to the resident Outlanders. The reason why we have not been able, np till now, to find a fitting time is due solely to the misdeeds of Mr.

Rhodes and the Chartered Company. Had the Raid not taken place, had the Chartered Company not oppressed and despoiled the natives under its rule, and had it not itself set up a system which is as arbitrary and offensive as that of the Transvaal, we might long ago have protested against Boer misrule with a weight of moral as well as physical power behind us which would have been irresistible. Mr. Rhodes has put us hopelessly in the wrong, and has paralysed the Imperial arm. If the Raid had never taken place, Mr.

Chamberlain could have demanded that Mr. Kruger should do the Outlanders right, and in a way which mast have prevailed.

To make that demand now with effect the British Government should first revoke the Charter and withdraw all countenance and support from Mr. Rhodes. Having thus put them- selves in the right, they might reasonably insist that the Transvaal should abandon the methods of a Venetian oligarchy, and do justice to the people who live within its borders. How can a man put down a scandal in a neigh- bour's house when there is as bad a scandal in his own What Mr. Thomson has to say on the De Beers Company should be carefully studied by all who desire to realise what is the nature of that corporation. He points out that Mr. Rhodes has about £10,000 a year to spend on secret service connected with the Company, and another £10,000 on public objects in Kimberley,—no account being rendered of the first sum, nor, as far as we can gather, of the second. That this money is all spent by Mr. Rhodes cannot, of course, be doubted for a moment, for no one has over accused Mr. Rhodes of personal corruption. Consider, however, what a power Mr. Rhodes possesses by having the right to dispose of such an annual sum in a poor and small community such as that of the Cape. Another matter to which we would direct the attention of our readers is the proof furnished that the Chartered Company did actually introduce a system of forced labour, and in the very worst form. While Lord Cromer was abolishing forced labour at one end of Africa, Mr. Rhodes was introducing it in a far worse form at the other end.

We will end our notice of this intensely interesting book by setting forth what we believe should be our ideal object in regard to South Africa. What we should aim at is to make another Canadian Dominion. Canada should as far as pos- sible be our model. We had there the problem of French and English, in some ways a worse problem than that of Dutch and English, for it was complicated by the religions question. We had also the difficulty of a number of States with internal jealousies. Yet we surmounted them. We might have done the same already in

South Africa but for Mr. Rhodes. Truly, his influence from the Imperial and British point of view—the point of view from which we must always regard these problems—has been a disastrous ene. He has blown the race antagonism, which seemed dying out, to white heat. He has made the native question far more difficult to deal with than before, He lowered the Imperial prestige by fastening upon us—most absurdly and unfairly we admit, but none the less effectively —the military disgrace of the Raid. He has demoralised Cape politics and Cape public life through the influence of his great monopolist corporations. He has held up to odium, wherever it has suited his purpose, the influence of the British Government in "Downing Street," and so prejudiced all action by the Imperial Authority. He gave financial support to a disloyal faction here when our Government was hard pressed, and when, remember, no member of the regular Opposition would have dreamt of supplying Mr. Parnell with a large sum of ready money. Lastly, except in the matter of money making, where, it must be admitted, he is an expert, Mr. Rhodes is the prince of blunderers. In the political field and in the public service he has not scored a single real success. To regard Mr. Rhodes as a benefactor to the Empire is one of the strangest delusions that has ever obscured the minds of the British people.