314 Report S.A.A. Advancement of Science. 



but these in the hands of teachers unfamiliar witli the subject are 

 hardly Hkely to do much real good. In some town scliools, for 

 example, in the Cape Peninsula, health is taught along with domestic 

 science. If, however, the principle is sound that a thorough course for 

 teachers is the essential condition of successful health teaching in 

 schools, then it is only in the two new colonies that this condition is 

 being fulfilled. In the Cape Colony, where the great majority of 

 natise teachers are trained, there is no health teaching whatever in 

 the Normal schools. 



This brings nie back to the point from which I started. In South 

 Africa the great danger to public health lies with the natives. It is 

 they who are likely to spread infectious or contagious diseases. It 

 is their unhygienic habits and their ignorance that require to be 

 remedied. However perfect the system of health teaching in European 

 schools may be, let us say in the Orange River Colony, it is only 

 reaching half the inhabitants. It is out of the question to say that 

 natives will not respond to health teaching. The experience in West 

 Africa has been that they respond very readily. And in South Africa 

 the Medical Officer of Health of the Cape Colony in his Report for 

 1906 urges that natives should be instructed how to prevent the 

 spread of tuberculosis, and says the native is "quick to recognise the 

 vahie of preventive measures against disease when these are explained 

 to him by those in whom he trusts, and once having recognised he 

 rarely neglects to carry the measures out." 



The great difficulty in teaching health to natives is the under- 

 lying stratum of superstitious ideas that is present in all their 

 minds. The education they are at present receiving hardly disturbs 

 that stratum. Certificated native teacliers are often as firm believers 

 in witchcraft as their heathen neighbours. I would suggest that it 

 would be well to follow the Japanese method of dealing with this 

 difficulty, and give native teachers some practical knowledge of botany 

 and other scientific subjects as well as of hygiene with a view to 

 cultivating in them the scientific or truth-searching in place of the 

 superstitious or credulous habit of mind. 



The ravages of tuberculosis and other preventible diseases and the 

 proneness of many natives to alcoholic intemperance are also reasons 

 why health and temperance should be taught in native schools. 



The teaching sliould be adapted to the special needs of the native 

 people, the experience of other countries being made use of as may be 

 found flesirable. I would urge, further, that in order to save health 

 teaching from stiffening into a mere dead subject in a code, the course 

 in each Normal College should be framed, as is done in Englanrl and 

 America, by those who are responsil)le for tlie teaching. 



In conclusion, I must express my indebtedness to the many 

 superintendents of education, heads of colleges and others who have 

 given the most courteous and often painstaking attention to my 

 inquiries. 



