BRITISH CENTRAL AFRICA 
190 
The enumeration of the Missionary Societies at work in the whole of British 
Central Africa might be completed by citing the Jesuits on the Central Zambezi, 
and the French Evangelical Mission which has been so long and successfully at 
work in the Barutse country on the Upper Zambezi. 
A Missionary Society originally founded by F. S. Arnot (Plymouth Brethren) 
has been for some years past established in Katanga, in the south part of the 
Congo Free State. This mission, I believe, contemplates founding stations on 
Lake Mweru within British territory, and I believe it has three stations on or 
near the River Ivafue in Eastern Barutseland. 
The past history of the more important and longest established Missions has 
been touched on in the general review of the history of British Central Africa. 
Further details concerning the number of their stations, the attendances at their 
schools and churches and other technical information is given in my report to 
the Foreign Office, “Africa No. 5, 1896,” and it would be tedious to repeat the 
statistics here. I will confine myself in the present chapter to treating all 
missionary work in this part of Central Africa in a more generalised manner, 
giving my impressions as the opinions of any ordinary, fair-minded individual 
who wishes to arrive at true conclusions uninfluenced by sentiment or 
prejudice. 
No person who desires to make a truthful statement would deny the great 
good effected by missionary enterprise in Central Africa. Yet why is it that in 
some quarters missionaries are heartily disliked, and the benefit of their work 
is denied or depreciated, even occasionally by clerics who, from a religious point 
of view, should be their natural supporters? If, on the one hand, the impartial 
observer must pronounce a verdict regarding the value of missionary work in 
Central Africa which is almost wholly in its favour, on the other hand he is 
compelled to ackowledge the existence of the prejudice and dislike with which 
missionaries are regarded by other white men not following the same career. 
The causes of this feeling in my opinion are two—(1) The Cant which by 
some unaccountable fatality seems to be inseparably connected with missionary 
work, and (2) the arrogant demeanour often assumed by missionaries towards 
men who are not of their manner of thought and practice, though not necessarily 
men of evil life. 
I think these two causes exist still, and were so prominent in past times that 
they are quite sufficient to account for what is really a long continued and 
unreasonable aspersion of the value of missionary work. It will be seen from 
the tenour of my remarks that I am striving to write on this difficult question 
from the point of view of an absolutely impartial outsider—let us say, for 
a moment, from the point of view of one who might be of any religion, or none 
at all. I take up this position because I honestly believe that much of the work 
done by European missionaries in Africa is of a kind which can be appreciated 
and praised without reserve by any fair-minded Muslim, Hindu, or Agnostic. 
Any thoughtful cultured man of no matter what religion, who is alive to 
the interests of humanity in general, must after careful examination of their 
work accord this meed of praise to the results which have followed the attempts 
to evangelise Central Africa. 
Let us take into consideration the first count of the indictment against 
missionaries : Cant. Although matters have much improved under this heading 
since the “ forties,” when Cant reached an appalling pitch, and accounts weie 
written of missionary work which are almost too repulsive for modern 
taste on that account (driving even sincere Christians into ribaldry and 
