president's address^section f. 165 



in insisting that administration should rest upon some solid 

 basis of principle, not only in theory, but also in practice, and 

 that in the^ case of British administration this principle is to be 

 found in the unity of the human race. 



Now, if w€i have a real, practical belief in this unity, we shall 

 look on native races in an entirely different way ; we shall no 

 longer see in them a bundle of inexplicable eccentricities and 

 contradictions, and we shall noi longer be prepared tO' dismiss 

 them off-hand as "half devil and half child." We shall look 

 upon them as men like ourselves, with similar passions, and 

 probably with less self-restraint ; with the same feelings of love 

 and hate, and often the same respect for justice and contempt 

 for injustice. I have read that, of the many wrongs which 

 the natives of South-West Africa had suffex'ed from the Germans, 

 those' which they resented most arose from the fact that the 

 same justice was not meted out to white and black alike, but 

 that what in the white man was a mere peccadillo, became in 

 the black man a most heinous crime. It must, I fear, be 

 admitted that, as a matter of administration, it is practically 

 impossible toi treat the' white man and the native alike even in 

 a court of justice, for local public opinion, or prejudice, or 

 whatever you likel to call it. will not permit such equality ; 

 but an administrator who has a practical belief in the equality 

 I have' mentioned — who, in a word, is a good anthropologist — 

 will, at any rate, insist upon as much practical justice as he can 

 get. He will not make the< German mistake of denying it 

 altogether. 



Widesyread Idea tJiat the Native is not Really a Man. 

 The idea that a black or brown man is not really a man like 

 ourselves is probably more widespread than is generally believed, 

 and it is probably responsible for many of the worst outrages 

 which have been committed not only by white men upon black, 

 but also by black upon white — and especially upon white women. 

 Ir: its most harmless form it is found disguised, in the shape 

 of a theory that the native is a child and must be treated as a 

 child. Of course, there is an analogy between a native and a 

 child, but there are many false analogies, and, though this 

 particular analogy does not lead to any very dreadful conclusions 

 (since one does not, for instance, starve or torture a child), 

 still it appears to me to be, logically, as false as any of them. 

 When I have come across this analogy it has generally been used 

 ai: a justification for corporal punishment ; the native is a child, 

 it is argued, and when he offends he should be punished as a 

 child — which, in effect, means that the native should be punished 

 by a flogging administered without trial and at the caprice of 

 the man against whom the offence, real or imaginary, was com- 

 mitted. On the other hand, if the native does something wrong, 

 and asks to be forgiven as a child is forgiven, the analogy would 



