A PLEA FOR THE NATIVE 409 



they have not yet done as much. No words can exaggerate 

 the good work accomplished by the C. M. S. medical mis- 

 sions in Uganda. No hospital anywhere in the European 

 protectorates controlled by England, France, Italy, Ger- 

 many, or Portugal, compares with that established by the 

 two brothers, Doctors Cook and Mengo, so far as help to the 

 native is concerned. Doctors and nurses, belonging to our 

 own African Inland Mission, are pushing their way among 

 quite unreached, unmissionized tribes, and are, wherever 

 they go, a light in a dark place. 



But, putting on one side medical missionary work, the 

 importance of industrial teaching has not yet been recog- 

 nized. To teach large numbers of the East and Central 

 Africans to read and write seems to me, to-day, to be of far 

 less immediate value than to so educate them that they shall 

 take a greater interest in the land they till, and the cattle 

 they tend. I have spoken of native capacity for mechan- 

 ical and industrial work elsewhere and need not now enlarge 

 on it, but surely these industrial qualities must be roused up 

 and educated if he is to hold his own. The yoke of his 

 kings was a cruel yoke, but under it the Waganda had to 

 toil. The coast Arabs drew their supply of slaves from the 

 lands between the sea level country and the great lakes. 

 Their discipline was at times cruel, but it gave the East 

 African a master, for whom he had to work. 



There is danger to-day of his becoming a masterless 

 man, for no mastership could be so hurtful to him as his own. 

 To save him he must be taught, not to read or write, such 

 knowledge usually only makes him conceited and worth- 

 less. He must be taught to work. 



Uganda is everywhere spoken of as the garden spot of 

 missions. There the missionaries have immense influency 

 as they well deserve to have. There is an important school 

 in the hands of the C. M. S. at Mengo, the capital of Uganda. 

 In it more than one hundred of the sons of the leading men 



