XIV PREFACE. 



Of the sympathies of Exeter Hall enthusiasts I 

 hardly hope to be a recipient: for they are 

 generally as cocksure of the infallibility of their 

 own fads as if their community consisted wholly 

 of Popes, and I have my doubts as to the validity 

 of their claims. Anyhow, I hear that my editor 

 has excised many of my remarks on missionary 

 enterprise in South Africa. I endorse his action, 

 without, however, altering my private opinions 

 which do not count 



I am no enemy to Missions qua Missions, and 

 these remarks mostly applied to a past period, when 

 the chief occupation of the reverend functionaries 

 seemed directed towards accentuating the normal 

 antipathies between the white and coloured races. 

 Undoubtedly too many missionaries of former days 

 used their alleged converts as tools to obstruct 

 trade, a good deal of which they for a time 

 monopolised by these means. At present such 

 practices are no longer in vogue, and the personnel 

 of the missionary enterprise are most respectable 

 men. However, the consensus of South African 

 opinion seems to be that but little beneficial 

 impression has been made on the pure African 

 negro race, whatever may be said on the subject 

 in regard to benefits conferred on and accepted 

 by the " off-coloured " Colonial population. 



