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NA TURE 



[October 14, 1922 



Isles have had their origin in the successive waves of 

 conquest which these islands have suffered. Individuals 

 have freely passed from one class to another, but though 

 the individuals have changed the classes have remained. 

 Owing to the constant interchange in blood the physical 

 characters of the different classes are much alike, as are 

 their fundamental mental traits, but in material cul- 

 ture, language, social organisation, and to some extent 

 religious beliefs, they differ widely. Here then again, 

 in our own country, there is work for the anthropologist 

 who never leaves these shores. 



Turning now to the aims of anthropology and to the 

 means whereby it may become of service to the State 

 and to mankind in general, we see that it is of the utmost 

 importance that those who are sent to govern or ad- 

 minister areas and districts mainly occupied by back- 

 ward peoples should have received sufficient training in 

 the science to enable them, in the shortest possible space 

 of time, and consequently with the fewest possible initial 

 mistakes, to govern a people whose customs, traditions, 

 and beliefs are very different from their own, without 

 offending the susceptibilities of their subjects. 



We are an Imperial people, and during the last few 

 centuries we have taken upon ourselves a lion's share of 

 the white man's self-imposed burden, and the lives and 

 well-being of millions of our backward brethren have 

 been entrusted to our charge. Recent events have, 

 by means of mandates, added largely to our responsi- 

 bilities in this respect. We, of all nations, cannot 

 disregard this fundamental duty of despatching our 

 proconsuls fitted to undertake these great responsi- 

 bilities. 



But the burden we have undertaken extends not only 

 to backward peoples ; we have been called upon to 

 govern or to advise the governments of peoples who 

 have a civilisation little, if at all, inferior to our own, 

 and to whom at one time we have been indebted for 

 much of the culture that we now enjoy. The civilisa- 

 tions of these regions are infinitely more complex, and 

 the people are not homogeneous, but are divided into 

 numerous sections, differing in language, religion, and 

 social customs. In these regions we meet with anthro- 

 pological problems of infinite difficulty and complexity, 

 on the solution of which depend the peace and well- 

 being of the population. Yet our representatives go to 

 take up their duties in these lands with little or no 

 previous training, and it is only a marvel that errors of 

 tact, due to ignorance, are not more common. 



In these civilised regions race consciousness has been 

 growing fast during the last half-century, and errors of 

 tact and manners, which were submitted to in former 

 times, though not with a good grace, are now actively 

 resented, and the old methods of government are dis- 

 credited. It may not yet be too late to remedy this 

 evil, if no time is lost in giving a full anthropological 

 training to those who are sent to administer these 

 regions. 



But we arc not only an Imperial people, governing 

 and administering regions with alien populations ; we 

 are also a wandering and adventurous people. The 

 nomadic spirit of our ancestors is still alive within us ; 

 our ships, like those of the Vikings of old, are to be seen 

 in every sea. So it comes that our people will be found 

 in all lands and all climates from the Arctic circle to the 

 Equator. 



NO. 2763, VOL. I IO] 



All these wandering Britons come in contact with the 

 inhabitants of the lands they visit, creating various 

 impressions, sometimes good, more often bad. Had 

 they a fuller knowledge of the customs and opinions of 

 the people they visit, or even a truer appreciation of the 

 fact that diverse customs and opinions exist and should 

 be respected, we should not have to record the creation 

 of so many bad impressions. Luckily our people, as a 

 rule, have much common sense, and often a desire to 

 please, so this trouble is thus to some extent mitigated ; 

 but the difficulties that have arisen from ignorance of 

 the ways of others, from too insular an outlook, in fact, 

 from a lack of appreciation of the anthropological stand- 

 point, are making us and our government heartily 

 disliked in nearly every quarter of the globe. It is to 

 remedy these difficulties, and the danger to the peace of 

 the world which is threatened thereby, that I would 

 advocate an increased study of anthropology by all 

 sections of the community. Herein lies one of the chief 

 means by which our science may become of service to 

 mankind. 



It is not my business to draft a scheme for the 

 furtherance of anthropological studies. Two of our 

 universities offer degrees in this subject, and others a 

 diploma ; courses of instruction on some sections of the 

 subject are given there and elsewhere. Many teachers 

 of geography are introducing much anthropological 

 matter into their curricula, and there are signs that 

 some historical teachers may follow suit, so that the 

 subject-matter, if not the name, is not unknown in some 

 of our schools. But we have much lost time to make 

 up and the matter is urgent. 



We cannot, of course, expect all our people to be 

 trained anthropologists and to understand fully all the 

 ways of the people they may chance to meet in their 

 wanderings. What matters far more is that they 

 should appreciate the fact that different peoples have 

 had different pasts and so act differently in response to 

 the same stimuli. Further, that all this diversity has 

 its value ; that we cannot be sure that one culture is in 

 all respects superior to another, still less that ours is the 

 best and the only one which is of consequence. It is 

 not so much the facts that matter as the spirit of anthro- 

 pology ; we need not so much that our people should 

 have anthropological knowledge as that they should 

 learn to think anthropologically. 



It is needless for me to remind you that the world is 

 in a state of very unstable equilibrium — that the crust 

 is, so to speak, cracked in many places, and that the 

 fissures are becoming wider and deeper, and that fresh 

 fissures are constantly appearing, not only in distant 

 lands but nearer home. Again, this crust, if I may 

 continue the geological metaphor, is stratified, and there 

 are horizontal as well as vertical cleavages, which are 

 daily becoming more marked. It is to the interest of 

 humanity that these breaches should be healed and the 

 cracks stopped, or we may find the civilisation of the 

 world, which has grown up through long millennia at 

 the cost of enormous struggles, break up into a thousand 

 fragments. Such a break in the culture of the European 

 Region followed the dissolution of the Roman Empire, 

 and more than a thousand years were needed to heal it ; 

 nay, some of the cracks then made have never yet been 

 closed. 



Anything that may help to avert such a disaster is 



