INTRODUCTION. 21 



a tenement or hovel. And then comes in 

 the great question whether man should give 

 up his individuality and put the State before 

 everything. We seem to be drifting into a 

 kind of socialism that may hamper us at 

 every turn. An individual will possibly 

 cease to be a man, and become only one of 

 the community. This would tend to hamper 

 genius, and to put inventive superiority in 

 the background. Man may be born equal, 

 but individuals, even among the natives of 

 Guiana, are by no means on the same plane 

 when they grow up. A good struggle brings 

 out character, we say that it shows what the 

 man is worth. Eliminate that struggle and 

 he becomes tame ; we all know what tame- 

 ness means. Even our wars are tame. 

 They are horrible, shocking, disgraceful to 

 every one concerned, but at the same time 

 there is no advantage to the stronger and 

 braver. No one can possibly say nowadays 

 that one man is better than another when 



