300 National Life and Character 



been proved that the European can live and propa- 

 gate permanently in the hot regions of India and 

 Africa, and Mr. Pearson is right in anticipating for 

 the whites who have conquered these tropical and 

 sub-tropical regions of the Old World the same fate 

 which befell the Greek kingdoms in Bactria and the 

 Chersonese. The Greek rulers of Bactria were ulti- 

 mately absorbed and vanished, as probably the En- 

 glish rulers of India will some day in the future 

 for the good of mankind, we sincerely hope and 

 believe the very remote future themselves be ab- 

 sorbed and vanish. In Africa south of the Zam- 

 besi (and possibly here and there on high plateaus 

 north of it), there may remain white States, al- 

 though even these States will surely contain a large 

 colored population, always threatening to swamp 

 the whites; but in tropical Africa generally, it does 

 not seem possible that any white State can ever be 

 built up. Doubtless for many centuries European 

 adventurers and Arab raiders will rule over huge 

 territories in the country south of the Soudan and 

 north of the Tropic of Capricorn, and the whole 

 structure, not only social, but physical, of the negro 

 and the negroid peoples will be profoundly changed 

 by their influence and by the influence of the half- 

 caste descendants of these European and Asiatic 

 soldiers of fortune and industry. But it is hardly 

 possible to conceive that the peoples of Africa, how- 

 ever ultimately changed, will be anything but negroid 

 in type of body and mind. It is probable that the 

 change will be in the direction of turning them into 



