PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS. 617 
respect their prejudices, or to regard seriously what they hold to be sacred, 
or to keep his countenance while practices are being described which to him 
may be disgusting or ridiculous—if indeed he fails in any way in communicating 
to his informants, who are often super-sensitively suspicious in such matters, 
the fact that his sympathy is not feigned—he will also fail in obtaining the 
anthropological knowledge he is seeking. In the words of the ‘Notes and 
Queries’ on this point, ‘ Nothing is easier than to do anthropological work of 
a certain sort, but to get to the bottom of native customs and modes of thought, 
and to record the results of inquiry in such a manner that they carry conviction, 
is work which can be only carried out properly by careful attention.’ 
The foregoing considerations explain the scope of our studies and the require- 
ments of the preliminary inquiries necessary to give those studies value. The 
further question is the use to which the results can be put. The point that at 
once arises here for the immediate purpose is that of the conditions under which 
the British Empire is administered. We are here met together to talk 
scientifically, that is, as precisely as we can: and so it is necessary to give a 
definition to the expression ‘Imperial Administration,’ especially as it is 
constantly used for the government of an empire, whereas in reality it is the 
government that directs the administration. In this address I use the term 
“administration ’ as the disinterested management of the details of public affairs. 
This excludes politics from our purview, defining that term as the conduct of the 
government of a country according to the opinions or in the interests of a 
particular group or party. 
Now in this matter of administration the position of the inhabitants of the 
British Isles is unique. It falls to their lot to govern, directly or indirectly, 
the lives of members of nearly every variety of the human race. Themselves 
Europeans by descent and intimate connection, they have a large direct interest 
in every other general geographical division of the world and its inhabitants. 
lt is worth while to pause here for a moment to think, and to try and realise, 
however dimly, something of the task before the people of this country in the 
government and control of what are known as the subject races. 
For this purpose it is necessary to throw our glance over the physical extent 
of the British Empire. In the first place, there are the ten self-governing com- 
ponents of the Dominion of Canada and that of Newfoundland in North 
America, the six Colonial States in the Commonwealth of Australia, with the 
Dominion of New Zealand in Australasia, and the four divisions of the Union 
of South Africa. All these may be looked upon as indirectly administered 
portions of the British Kmpire. Then there is the mediatised government of 
Kgypt, with its appanage, the directly British administered Sudan, which alone 
covers about a million square miles of territory in thirteen provinces, in 
Northern Africa. ‘lhese two areas occupy, as it were, a position between the 
self-governing and the directly-governed areas. Of these, there are in Europe 
Malta and Gibraltar, Cyprus being officially included in Asia. In Asia itself 
is the mighty Indian Empire, which includes Aden and the Arabian Coast on 
the West and Burma on the East, and many islands in the intervening seas, 
with its fifteen provinces and some twenty categories of Native States ‘in 
subordinate alliance,’ that is, under general Imperial control. To these are 
added Ceylon, the Straits Settlements, and the Malay States, federated or 
other, North Borneo and Sarawak, and in the China Seas Hongkong and 
Wei-hai-wei. In South Africa we find Basutoland, Bechuanaland, and 
Rhodesia; in British West Africa, Gambia, the Gold Coast, Sierra Leone, and 
Nigeria; in Hastern and Central Africa, Somaliland, the East Africa Protec- 
torate, Uganda, Zanzibar, and Nyassaland; while attached to Africa are the 
Mauritius, Seychelles, Ascension and St. Helena. In Central and South America 
are Honduras and British Guiana, and attached to that continent the Falkland 
Tslands, and also Bermuda and the six colonies of British West Indies. In the 
Pacific Ocean are Fiji, Papua and many of the Pacific Islands. 
I am afraid that once more during the course of this exposition I have been 
obliged to resort to a concentration of statement that is almost bewildering. 
But let that be. If one is to grapple successfully with a large and complex 
subject, it is necessary to try and keep before the mind, so far as possible, not 
only its magnitude, but the extent of its complexity. This is the reason for 
bringing before you, however briefly and generally, the main geographical 
