Report of the Commission appointed to Inquire into the Decrease of the Native Population, with appendices.
- Fiji. Commission appointed to Inquire into the Decrease of the Native Population.
- Date:
- 1896
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Report of the Commission appointed to Inquire into the Decrease of the Native Population, with appendices. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service. The original may be consulted at London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service.
298/442 (page 20)
![iinremoved indolence and general improvidence of the regular supplies of nutritous food provided for him by his master's care—the greater because it was entirely selfish, and to that master's interests—his instincts, still stronger than his reason, will cause the resumption of near breeding in small stationary groups or communities. A very short time will then turn his, at present to us alarming, increase into a, as alarming to him, decrease. The white race, a rover by nature and inclination, ever crossed by immigration, and thus tied down to sound breeding, will infallibly run him down and sink him for ever. Having now got rid of much prefatory matter, which has run to an unexpected but not, I think, unnecessary length, let me take up the special inquiry to which I addressed myself. I have satisfied myself, and I hope my reader also, that universal and long-continued near breeding among the people was the principal, if not the sole, cause of their decrease,—the rate of that decrease depending on the jDeriod of time the system has been followed, and the length to which it has been pushed,— that, cateris paribus, it is greatest in those groups whose inhabitants claim to be indigenous, and least when the remembrance of their (possibly only last; migration is most vivid;—Hawaii belonging to the first class; New Zealand, and especially the Gilbert, to the second. I have come to the conclusion therefore, that every one of the Oceanic races and breeds had passed its crisis, and that all were slowly deteriorating before the white man made his appearance in either the North or the South Pacific. That the slow deterioration they were spontaneously undergoing was in some places materially hastened by the advent of a formidable rival for existence seems pretty clear. But that the rival happened to be white I take to be of no importance, for I find the Gilbert Islanders swept the inhabitants off the north half of the Ellice Group in exactly the same way (on a smaller scale) the Anglo-Saxon is removing the Maori from New Zealand, while the Maori himself brought about, on the very same ground from which his own disappearance is deplored, the annihilation of an indigenous feeble breed of negro or negrito inhabitants—and that by the most expeditous of all possible means, since the way he ate them up was actual, and not merely figurative. It matters little then, to my way of thinking, to ascertain from whence any race derived their origin, but much to ascertain how long they have passed their crisis. For never was the familiar quotation— Facilis descensus Averni sed revocare gradum hie labor, hoc opus est more pertinent. JRevoeare gradum is impossible to tribes deficient in the glorious power of the Anglo-Saxon race to govern itself. Such must be forced to work out their redemjjtion as men under authority, like the Roman centurion of the Gospel. The remedy for their sickness unto death is no doubt nauseous. All real remedies are so. I tliink, therefore, it is not sufiicient that the physician hold it to their lips. He must have ample power to cram it down their throats if they are, clothed and in their right mind, to take once again their place among the dominant races of men. [ The Glasgow WeeTcly Herald^' July 25, 1891.] A Eepublican Anomaly. An American paper contains on one page the report of a racy and eloquent speech, delivered by an ex-Senator—ex-Senator Ingalls, if the reader chance to know him—' on the platform of the immense amphitheatre of the National Chautauqua,' in which, after referring in glowing terms to the unparalleled growth of the United States in population, wealth, and power, he winds up with the declaration that ' the American Government is based upon the New Testament, upon the teachings of Jesus Christ, who declared that all men were equal before the law, and that the fatherhood of God resulted in the brotherhood of man.' It need not be said that this peroration was indorsed by a round of applause. On the next page of the same paper an incident is related which forms a strange commentary on this text. The Missouri State Training School is now, or was then, in session. This is an institution which has been organised for the purpose of training, examining, and licensing the higher class of teachers for important educational positions in the State, such as college professors, headmasters of academies, high school teachers, &c. Some 300 eminent, and it is to be presumed intelligent and enlightened members of the teaching profession had entered, and everything promised a harmonious and successful session, when an apple—a black apple—of discord was suddenly thrown in amongst the assembled pedagogues. A coloured gentleman holding a high position in the profession sent in his name to be placed on the roll as a candidate for certification. This was a Mr. Crockfield, President of the Coloured Schools of the State. The 300 white dominies were at once in a ferment. No doubt President Crockfield was under the impression that he belonged to those made brothers through the common fatherhood of God, and over whom the American Constitution throws its aegis so ostentatiously, and that he had as good a right as any of his white brethren to come forward for examination and license. He found himself mistaken, however. At a secret meeting of the Executive Committee an ' eminent educator,' a ' late candidate,' we are told, ' before the Democratic Convention for the State Superintendentship of Public Schools,' but whose name is not given, declared that ' the school could choose between him and the negro—one of them had to go.' There was some discussion on the matter—to the credit of the teaching profession it appeared there were some dissentient voices—but the result was that President Crockfield was requested to make himself scarce, and had ' to go.' What does ex-Senator Ingalls or Mr. Andrew Carnegie think of this ? Sucli occurrences are almost as incongruous with the professed free principles on which the State is founded, and society ostensibly constituted in the great Western Republic, as was slavery itself. Is there no likelihood that this virulent antipathy of white to black will in time be modified ? What we are continually hearing of deadly struggles between the races—in which the whites always seem to be the aggressors—and of the social ostracism of what are called ' coloured' men and women, seems to show that but little progress has been made as yet in that direction. It must come, however. Eiglit millions of blacks, becoming richer, better educated, and more intelligent every year, cannot go on living as a sort of social outcasts. They must either be tolerated or ' absorbed.' Some time ago an American ' scientist' or statesman—we forget which—put forward ' absorption,' seriously, as the only possible solution of the race problem. The Government was to promote mixed marriages, and in course of time the difference would disappear. The resultant was neither to be so white as the whites nor so black as the blacks, nor to possess tlie mental characteristics of either, but to be an improvement on both. He was to unite Yankee acuteness and activity with negro fervour and good-humour. This philosopher calcidated that the race wliich woidd emerge from ' absorption' would very much resemble tlie Ancient Egyptians, who have certainly left records to show they were of a type not to be sneezed at. to absorb 8,000,000 of negroes would be a big job, even for 56,000,000 of whites, and many wry faces would certainly be made over it; but it may be really the only way of ridding the Republic of a social anomaly, which W. D. Howells, in his new story just begun in Sarper, pronounces ' one of the most j^reposterous and monstrous things in the world.' [^Enclosure](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b24399401_0298.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
