AN INSOLUBLE PROBLEM.
[To THE EDITOR OF TIM " SPECTATOR.")
am much interested in your article in the Spectator of January 9th, entitled "An Insoluble Problem," since it is fully in accord with views formed by myself during a tour through South Africa last year. In most of the up-country towns in Natal which I visited I found Indians underselling the English in almost every line of trade, and when in conver- sation with business men on the future prospects of the Colony, I was constantly met with the rejoinder, "This will soon be a black man's country ; it is no place for white men." There is no doubt that Natal offers an excellent field for immigration for the surplus population of India, partly owing to the easy means of access between the two countries, and partly because the climate is favourable for the Hindoo. I was given to understand that colonists originally encouraged coolie immigration to take the place of the indigenous natives, who were useless for labour on account of their lazy habits. If this is a fact, emigrants cannot be blamed for pouring into a country to which they were invited, and where a means of livelihood is so easily obtainable. You hold out a hope that the colonists will eventually "recover their sense of fairplay among her Majesty's subjects," but from all appearances the entrance of an unlimited number of Indians into Natal would result in the exit of a large portion of the English population. The majority of the colonists are not capitalists but work for their living, and were their means of livelihood taken from them, they have no alternative but to leave the country to coloured races. The expedient suggested by you may defer the crisis, but until some means is discovered for stopping the rush of Hindoo labourers to Natal, we cannot hope for any modification of the strong feeling now existing in the Colony.—I am, Sir, &c.,
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