AFRICA AND THE AFRICANS. 



387 



anomalous character in the African. Modern trav- 

 elers affect a tone of moral superiority that is nau- 

 seous." 



And in his works he frequently warns the 

 reader against accepting without qualification the 

 statements of some African travelers about the 

 natives. Dr. Johnson says, " Every man is a ras- 

 cal as soon as he is sick." 



While, therefore, we duly appreciate the geo- 

 graphical or material results of the labors of 

 modern explorers of Africa; while we cannot but 

 admire their gigantic physical and moral courage, 

 the inextinguishable faith in themselves and their 

 destiny which sustained them in their perilous 

 labors, we cannot admit that the philosophical 

 results of their efforts have been satisfactory. 

 When they attempt to transcend the physical or 

 material, there are contradiction and confusion. 

 There is want of clearness in the pictures they 

 draw ; and the most skillful and accurate delinea- 

 tor has succeeded in producing but clumsy da- 

 guerreotypes or distorted photographs of the su- 

 perficial life of the people. The European world 

 is yet only in the infancy of its studies in African 

 psychology. No European statesman or philan- 

 thropist has yet even attempted to grapple with 

 it. Far more difficult of settlement than the 

 sources of the Nile, the intellectual character and 

 susceptibility of the negro will probably for ages 

 yet elude the grasp and comprehension of the 

 most sagacious European. Livingstone was the 

 first of modern Europeans to approach the source 

 of the Nile and indicate its locality; so, likewise, 

 he has come nearer than any other European to 

 understanding the man of Africa. And like all 

 true philosophers, he never dogmatizes as to the 

 results of his investigations in that direction. He 

 of all travelers made the man an object of his 

 study, and the benefit of the man the ultimate 

 aim of his labors. " When one travels," be Said, 

 " with the specific object in view of ameliorating 

 the condition of the natives, every act becomes 

 ennobled." 1 



In his letter to James Gordon Bennett, under 

 date of November, 1871, he says : " If my disclos- 

 ures regarding the terrible Ujijian slavery should 

 lead to the suppression of the East Coast slave- 

 trade, I shall regard that as a greater matter by 

 far than the discovery of all the Nile sources to- 

 gether." 



The African is now judged by the specimens 

 in exile and along a coast more spoiled and de- 

 bauched than benefited by foreign intercourse, 

 just as the physical character of the interior was 

 i " Last Journals," vol. i., p. 13. 



inferred in former times from the lowlands and 

 swamps seen along the margin of the continent. 

 No Roderick Murchison has arisen yet in the in- 

 tellectual world to lay down with any definiteness 

 the character of the mental landscape of the 

 negro. No Prof. Hall has yet descried the re- 

 mote satellite of his genius. Livingstone has 

 come the nearest to fulfilling the office of such a 

 philosopher. He had the first and most impor- 

 tant prerequisite to proficiency in that branch 

 of study, viz., sympathy with his subject. He 

 not only loved Africa, but the African. He had 

 an instinctive appreciation of the peculiarities 

 and varieties of African character, and so remark- 

 able a power of blending his observations into an 

 harmonious whole, that he was able, in no little 

 degree, to emancipate himself, notwithstanding 

 his physical sufferings, from the trammels of his 

 race-prejudices, and, with that insight and dis- 

 crimination which a correct sympathy gives, to 

 select the materials for his delineation of African 

 character — dealing with Africans not only in their 

 abnormal and degraded forms, upon which most 

 travelers love to dwell, but studying the deeper 

 aspects and finer capacities of the people. He 

 has thus become the popular and most trust- 

 worthy teacher of the best portion of the Chris- 

 tian world with regard to the African. 



Nearly all other modern travelers have re- 

 garded the man of Africa with contempt in com- 

 parison with the natural features — the physical 

 grandeur and material resources — of the country. 

 Solum melius populo. Mr. Herbert Spencer, with 

 the aid of his friends, has prepared a basis for 

 a work on African sociology, in the shape of a 

 classified compilation of materials taken from the 

 works of writers on Africa. But as his facts 

 have been drawn so largely from second-hand 

 sources, and from the writings of travelers whose 

 observations were confined to very small locali- 

 ties and made under the disturbing influence of 

 disease, we cannot expect that the work, when 

 completed, though it will be one of considerable 

 merit and a monument of industry, will be a trust- 

 worthy guide. The author will have relied to a 

 very large extent upon isolated cases and ez-parte 

 statements. 



It has been to us a source of surprise and 

 regret to notice that the Westminster Review, usu- 

 ally so fair and candid in dealing with the negro, 

 should have allowed itself, chiefly under the guid- 

 ance of Sir Samuel Baker, to carry on a discus- 

 sion on Africa and the African in the spirit and 

 temper manifested in its article on " Slavery in 

 Africa" (April, 1877). The Reviewer indorses 



