Provisional Act to Regulate the Relations between the Proprietors of Landed Estates and the Rural Population of Free LaborersI, Peter Hansen, Knight Commander of the Order Dannebrog, the King's Commissioner for, and officiating Governor-General of the Danish West India Islands, Make known: That, whereas the ordinance dated 29th July, 1848, by which yearly contracts for labor on landed estates were introduced, has not been duly acted upon: whereas the interest of the proprietors of estates, as well as of the laborers, requires that their mutual obligations should be defined: and whereas on inquiry into the practice of the Island, and into the printed contracts and agreements hitherto made, it appears expedient to establish uniform rules throughout the Island, for the guidance of all parties concerned, it is enacted and ordained:1st. All engagements of laborers now domiciled on landed estates and receiving wages in money, or in kind, for cultivating and working such estates, are to be continued as directed by the ordinance of 29th July, 1848, until the first day of October of the present year: and all similar engagements shall, in future, be made, or shall be considered as having been made, for a term of twelve months, viz: from the first of October till the first of October, year after year. Engagements made by heads of families are to include their children between five and fifteen years of age, and other relatives depending on them and staying with them.2nd. No laborer engaged as aforesaid, in the cultivation of soil, shall be discharged or dismissed from, or shall be permitted to dissolve,his or her engagement before the expiration of the same on the first of October of the present, or of any following year, except in the instances hereafter enumerated.A. By mutual agreement of master and laborer, before a magistrate.B. By order of a magistrate on just and equitable cause being shown by the parties interested.Legal marriage, and the natural tie between mothers and their children, shall be deemed by the magistrate just and legal cause of removal from one estate to another. The husband shall have a right to be removed to his wife, the wife to her husband, and children under fifteen years of age to their mother, provided no objection to employing such individuals shall be made by the owner of the estate to which the removal is to take place.3rd. No engagement of a laborer shall be lawful in future, unless made in the presence of witnesses, and entered in the day-book of the estate.4th. Notice to quit service shall be given by the employer, as well as by the laborer, at no other period but once a year, in the month of August, not before the first, nor after the last day of the said month; an entry thereof shall be made in the day-book, and an acknowledgement in writing shall be given to the laborer.The laborer shall have given, or received, legal notice of removal from the estate where he serves, before any one can engage his services; otherwise the new contract to be void, and the party engaging in tampering with a laborer employed by others, will be dealt with according to law.In case any owner or manager of an estate should dismiss a laborer during the year without sufficient cause, or should refuse to receive him at the time stipulated, or refuse to grant him a passport when due notice of removal has been given, the owner or manager is to pay full damages to the laborer, and to be sentenced to a fine not exceeding $20.5th. Laborers employed or rated as first, second, or third class laborers, shall perform all the work in the field, or about the works, or otherwise concerning the estate, which it hitherto has been customary for such laborers to perform, according to the season. They shall attend faithfully to their work, and willingly obey the directions given by the employer, or the person appointed by him. No laborer shall presume to dictate what work he or she is to do, or refuse the work he may be ordered to perform, unless expresslyengaged for some particular work only. If a laborer thinks himself aggrieved, he shall not therefore leave the work, but in due time apply for redress to the owner of the estate, or to the magistrate. It is the duty of all laborers on all occasions, and at all times, to protect the property of his employer, to prevent mischief to the estate, to apprehend evil-doers, and not to give countenance to, or conceal, unlawful practices.6th. The working days to be as usual only five days in the week, and the same days as hitherto. The ordinary work of estates is to commence at sunrise, and to be finished at sunset, every day, leaving one hour for breakfast, and two hours at noon from twelve to two o'clock.Planters who prefer to begin the work at seven o'clock in the morning, making no separate breakfast time, are at liberty to adopt this plan, either during the year, or when out of crop.The laborers shall be present in due time at the place where they are to work. The list to be called and answered regularly. Whoever does not answer the list when called, is too late.7th. No throwing of grass, or of wood, shall be exacted during extra hours, all former agreements to the contrary notwithstanding; but during crop the laborers are expected to bring home a bundle of long tops from the field where they are at work.Cartmen and crook-people, when breaking off, shall attend properly to their stock as hitherto usual.8th. During crop, the mill gang, crook gang, boilermen, firemen, still men, and any other person employed about the mill and the boiling house, shall continue their work during breakfast and noon hours, as hitherto usual; and the boilermen, firemen, megass carriers, etc., also, during evening hours after sunset, when required, but all workmen employed as aforesaid, shall be paid an extra remuneration for the work done by them in extra hours.The boiling house is to be cleared, the mill to be washed down, and the megass to be swept up, before the laborers leave the work as hitherto usual.The mill is not to turn after six o'clock in the evening, and the boiling not to be continued after ten o'clock, except by special permission of the Governor-General, who then will determine, if any, what extra remuneration shall be paid to the laborers.9th. The laborers are to receive, until otherwise ordered, the following remuneration:A. The use of a house, or dwelling-rooms for themselves andtheir children, to be built and repaired by the estate, but to be kept in proper order by the laborers.B. The use of a piece of provision ground, thirty feet square, as usual, for every first and second class laborer, or if it be standing ground, up to fifty feet in square. Third class laborers are not entitled to, but may be allowed, some provision ground.C. Weekly wages at the rate of fifteen cents to every first class laborer, of ten cents to every second class laborer, and of five cents to every third class laborer, for every working day. When the usual allowance of meal and herrings has been agreed on in part of wages, full weekly allowance shall be taken for five cents a day, or twenty-five cents a week.Nurses losing two hours every working day, shall be paid at the rate of four full working days in the week. The wages of minors to be paid as usual to their parents, or to the person in charge of them.Laborers not calling at pay time personally, or by another authorized, to wait till next pay day, unless they were prevented by working for the estate.No attachment of wages for private debts to be allowed, nor more than two thirds to be deducted for debts to the estate, unless otherwise ordered by the magistrate.Extra provisions occasionally given during the ordinary working hours are not to be claimed as a right, nor to be bargained for.10th. Work in extra hours during crop, is to be paid as follows: To the mill gang, and to the crook gang, for working through the breakfast hour, one stiver, and for working through noon, two stivers per day. Extra provision is not to be given, except at the option of the laborers in place of the money, or in part of it.The boilermen, firemen, the megass carriers, are to receive for all days when the boiling is carried on until late hours, a maximum pay of twenty (20) cents per day. No bargaining for extra pay by the hour, is permitted.Laborers working such extra hours only by turns, are not to have additional payment.11th. Tradesmen on estates are considered as engaged to perform the same work as hitherto usual, assisting in the field, carting, potting sugar, &c. They shall be rated as first, second, and third class laborers, according to their proficiency; where no definite terms have been agreed on previously, the wages of first class tradesmen, having full work in their trade, are to be twenty (20)cents per day. Any existing contract with tradesmen is to continue until October next.No tradesman is allowed to keep apprentices without the consent of the owner of the estate, such apprentices to be bound for no less a period than three years, and not to be removed without the permission of the magistrate.12th. No laborer is obliged to work for others on Saturday; but if they choose to work for hire, it is proper that they should give their own estate the preference. For a full day's work on Saturday, there shall not be asked for nor given more than twenty (20) cents to a first class laborer, thirteen (13) cents to a second class laborer, seven (7) cents to a third class laborer.Work on Saturday may, however, be ordered by the magistrate as a punishment to the laborer, for having absented himself from work during the week for one whole day or more, and for having been idle during the week, and then the laborer shall not receive more than his usual pay for a common day's work.13th. All the male laborers, tradesmen included, above eighteen years of age, working on an estate, are bound to take the usual night watch by turns, but only once in ten days, notice to be given before noon to break off from work in the afternoon with the nurses, and to come to work next day at eight o'clock. The watch to be delivered in the usual manner by nightfall and by sunrise.The above rule shall not be compulsory, except where voluntary watchmen cannot be obtained at a hire the planters may be willing to give, to save the time lost by employing their ordinary laborers as watchmen.Likewise the male laborers are bound once a month, on Sundays and holydays, to take the day watch about the yard, and to act as pasturemen, on receiving their usual pay for a week day's work; this rule applies also to the crook-boys.All orders about the watches to be duly entered in the day book of the estate.Should a laborer, having been duly warned to take the watch, not attend, another laborer is to be hired in the place of the absentee, and at his expense, not, however, to exceed fifteen cents. The person who wilfully leaves the watch, or neglects it, is to be reported to the magistrate and punished as the case merits.14th. Laborers wilfully abstaining from work on a working day, are to forfeit their wages for the day, and will have to pay over and above the forfeit, a fine which can be lawfully deducted in their wages, of seven (7) cents for a first class laborer, five (5)cents for a second class laborer, and two (2) cents for a third class laborer. In crop or grinding days, when employed about the works, in cutting canes, or in crook, an additional punishment will be awarded for wilful absence and neglect by the magistrate, on complaint being made. Laborers abstaining from work for half a day, or breaking off from work before being dismissed, to forfeit their wages for one day.Laborers not coming to work in due time to forfeit half a day's wages.Parents keeping their children from work, shall be fined instead of the children.No charge of house rent is to be made in future, on account of absence from work, or for the Saturday.15th. Laborers wilfully abstaining from work for two or more days during the week, or habitually absenting themselves, or working badly and lazily shall be punished as the case merits, on complaint to the magistrate.16th. Laborers assaulting any person in authority on the estate, or planning and conspiring to retard, or to stop the work of the estate, or uniting to abstain from work, or to break their engagements, shall be punished according to law, on investigation before a magistrate.17th. Until measures can be adopted for securing medical attendance to the laborers, and for regulating the treatment of the sick and the infirm, it is ordered:That infirm persons unfit for any work, shall, as hitherto, be maintained on the estates where they are domiciled, and to be attended to by their next relations.That parents or children of such infirm persons shall not remove from the estate, leaving them behind, without making provision for them to the satisfaction of the owner, or of the magistrate.That laborers unable to attend to work on account of illness, or on account of having sick children, shall make a report to the manager, or any other person in authority on the estate, who, if the case appears dangerous, and the sick person destitute, shall cause medical assistance to be given.That all sick laborers willing to remain in the hospital during their illness, shall there be attended to, at the cost of the estate.18th. If a laborer reported sick, shall be at any time found absent from the estate without leave, or is trespassing about the estate, or found occupied with work requiring health, he shall be considered skulking and wilfully absent from work.When a laborer pretends illness, and is not apparently sick, it shall be his duty to prove his illness by medical certificate.19th. Pregnant women shall be at liberty to work with the small gang as customary, and when confined, not to be called on to work for seven weeks after their confinement.Young children shall be fed and attended to during the hours of work at some proper place, at the cost of the estate.Nobody is allowed to stay from work on pretence of attending a sick person, except the wife and the mother in dangerous cases of illness.20th. It is the duty of the managers to report to the police any contagious or suspicious cases of illness and death; especially when gross neglect is believed to have taken place, as when children have been neglected by their mothers, in order that the guilty person may be punished according to law.21st. The driver or foreman on the estate, is to receive in wages four and a half dollars monthly, if no other terms have been agreed upon. The driver may be dismissed at any time during the year with the consent of the magistrate. It is the duty of the driver to see the work duly performed, to maintain order and peace on the estate during the work, and at other times, and to prevent and report all offences committed. Should any laborer insult, or use insulting language towards him during, or on account of the performance of his duties, such person is to be punished according to law.22nd. No laborer is allowed, without the especial permission of the owner or manager, to appropriate wood, grass, vegetables, fruits, and the like, belonging to the estate, nor to appropriate such produce from other estates, nor to cut canes, or to burn charcoal. Persons making themselves guilty of such offences, shall be punished according to law, with fines or imprisonment with hard labor; and the possession of such articles not satisfactorily accounted for, shall be sufficient evidence of unlawful acquisition.23d. All agreements contrary to the above rules, are to be null and void, and owners and managers of estates convicted of any practice tending wilfully to counteract or avoid these rules by direct or indirect means, shall be subject to a fine not exceeding $200.(Signed,)P. Hansen.Government House, St. Croix, 26th January, 1849.—Knox,An Historical Account of St. Thomas, West Indies, pp. 248-255.
Provisional Act to Regulate the Relations between the Proprietors of Landed Estates and the Rural Population of Free Laborers
I, Peter Hansen, Knight Commander of the Order Dannebrog, the King's Commissioner for, and officiating Governor-General of the Danish West India Islands, Make known: That, whereas the ordinance dated 29th July, 1848, by which yearly contracts for labor on landed estates were introduced, has not been duly acted upon: whereas the interest of the proprietors of estates, as well as of the laborers, requires that their mutual obligations should be defined: and whereas on inquiry into the practice of the Island, and into the printed contracts and agreements hitherto made, it appears expedient to establish uniform rules throughout the Island, for the guidance of all parties concerned, it is enacted and ordained:
1st. All engagements of laborers now domiciled on landed estates and receiving wages in money, or in kind, for cultivating and working such estates, are to be continued as directed by the ordinance of 29th July, 1848, until the first day of October of the present year: and all similar engagements shall, in future, be made, or shall be considered as having been made, for a term of twelve months, viz: from the first of October till the first of October, year after year. Engagements made by heads of families are to include their children between five and fifteen years of age, and other relatives depending on them and staying with them.
2nd. No laborer engaged as aforesaid, in the cultivation of soil, shall be discharged or dismissed from, or shall be permitted to dissolve,his or her engagement before the expiration of the same on the first of October of the present, or of any following year, except in the instances hereafter enumerated.
A. By mutual agreement of master and laborer, before a magistrate.
B. By order of a magistrate on just and equitable cause being shown by the parties interested.
Legal marriage, and the natural tie between mothers and their children, shall be deemed by the magistrate just and legal cause of removal from one estate to another. The husband shall have a right to be removed to his wife, the wife to her husband, and children under fifteen years of age to their mother, provided no objection to employing such individuals shall be made by the owner of the estate to which the removal is to take place.
3rd. No engagement of a laborer shall be lawful in future, unless made in the presence of witnesses, and entered in the day-book of the estate.
4th. Notice to quit service shall be given by the employer, as well as by the laborer, at no other period but once a year, in the month of August, not before the first, nor after the last day of the said month; an entry thereof shall be made in the day-book, and an acknowledgement in writing shall be given to the laborer.
The laborer shall have given, or received, legal notice of removal from the estate where he serves, before any one can engage his services; otherwise the new contract to be void, and the party engaging in tampering with a laborer employed by others, will be dealt with according to law.
In case any owner or manager of an estate should dismiss a laborer during the year without sufficient cause, or should refuse to receive him at the time stipulated, or refuse to grant him a passport when due notice of removal has been given, the owner or manager is to pay full damages to the laborer, and to be sentenced to a fine not exceeding $20.
5th. Laborers employed or rated as first, second, or third class laborers, shall perform all the work in the field, or about the works, or otherwise concerning the estate, which it hitherto has been customary for such laborers to perform, according to the season. They shall attend faithfully to their work, and willingly obey the directions given by the employer, or the person appointed by him. No laborer shall presume to dictate what work he or she is to do, or refuse the work he may be ordered to perform, unless expresslyengaged for some particular work only. If a laborer thinks himself aggrieved, he shall not therefore leave the work, but in due time apply for redress to the owner of the estate, or to the magistrate. It is the duty of all laborers on all occasions, and at all times, to protect the property of his employer, to prevent mischief to the estate, to apprehend evil-doers, and not to give countenance to, or conceal, unlawful practices.
6th. The working days to be as usual only five days in the week, and the same days as hitherto. The ordinary work of estates is to commence at sunrise, and to be finished at sunset, every day, leaving one hour for breakfast, and two hours at noon from twelve to two o'clock.
Planters who prefer to begin the work at seven o'clock in the morning, making no separate breakfast time, are at liberty to adopt this plan, either during the year, or when out of crop.
The laborers shall be present in due time at the place where they are to work. The list to be called and answered regularly. Whoever does not answer the list when called, is too late.
7th. No throwing of grass, or of wood, shall be exacted during extra hours, all former agreements to the contrary notwithstanding; but during crop the laborers are expected to bring home a bundle of long tops from the field where they are at work.
Cartmen and crook-people, when breaking off, shall attend properly to their stock as hitherto usual.
8th. During crop, the mill gang, crook gang, boilermen, firemen, still men, and any other person employed about the mill and the boiling house, shall continue their work during breakfast and noon hours, as hitherto usual; and the boilermen, firemen, megass carriers, etc., also, during evening hours after sunset, when required, but all workmen employed as aforesaid, shall be paid an extra remuneration for the work done by them in extra hours.
The boiling house is to be cleared, the mill to be washed down, and the megass to be swept up, before the laborers leave the work as hitherto usual.
The mill is not to turn after six o'clock in the evening, and the boiling not to be continued after ten o'clock, except by special permission of the Governor-General, who then will determine, if any, what extra remuneration shall be paid to the laborers.
9th. The laborers are to receive, until otherwise ordered, the following remuneration:
A. The use of a house, or dwelling-rooms for themselves andtheir children, to be built and repaired by the estate, but to be kept in proper order by the laborers.
B. The use of a piece of provision ground, thirty feet square, as usual, for every first and second class laborer, or if it be standing ground, up to fifty feet in square. Third class laborers are not entitled to, but may be allowed, some provision ground.
C. Weekly wages at the rate of fifteen cents to every first class laborer, of ten cents to every second class laborer, and of five cents to every third class laborer, for every working day. When the usual allowance of meal and herrings has been agreed on in part of wages, full weekly allowance shall be taken for five cents a day, or twenty-five cents a week.
Nurses losing two hours every working day, shall be paid at the rate of four full working days in the week. The wages of minors to be paid as usual to their parents, or to the person in charge of them.
Laborers not calling at pay time personally, or by another authorized, to wait till next pay day, unless they were prevented by working for the estate.
No attachment of wages for private debts to be allowed, nor more than two thirds to be deducted for debts to the estate, unless otherwise ordered by the magistrate.
Extra provisions occasionally given during the ordinary working hours are not to be claimed as a right, nor to be bargained for.
10th. Work in extra hours during crop, is to be paid as follows: To the mill gang, and to the crook gang, for working through the breakfast hour, one stiver, and for working through noon, two stivers per day. Extra provision is not to be given, except at the option of the laborers in place of the money, or in part of it.
The boilermen, firemen, the megass carriers, are to receive for all days when the boiling is carried on until late hours, a maximum pay of twenty (20) cents per day. No bargaining for extra pay by the hour, is permitted.
Laborers working such extra hours only by turns, are not to have additional payment.
11th. Tradesmen on estates are considered as engaged to perform the same work as hitherto usual, assisting in the field, carting, potting sugar, &c. They shall be rated as first, second, and third class laborers, according to their proficiency; where no definite terms have been agreed on previously, the wages of first class tradesmen, having full work in their trade, are to be twenty (20)cents per day. Any existing contract with tradesmen is to continue until October next.
No tradesman is allowed to keep apprentices without the consent of the owner of the estate, such apprentices to be bound for no less a period than three years, and not to be removed without the permission of the magistrate.
12th. No laborer is obliged to work for others on Saturday; but if they choose to work for hire, it is proper that they should give their own estate the preference. For a full day's work on Saturday, there shall not be asked for nor given more than twenty (20) cents to a first class laborer, thirteen (13) cents to a second class laborer, seven (7) cents to a third class laborer.
Work on Saturday may, however, be ordered by the magistrate as a punishment to the laborer, for having absented himself from work during the week for one whole day or more, and for having been idle during the week, and then the laborer shall not receive more than his usual pay for a common day's work.
13th. All the male laborers, tradesmen included, above eighteen years of age, working on an estate, are bound to take the usual night watch by turns, but only once in ten days, notice to be given before noon to break off from work in the afternoon with the nurses, and to come to work next day at eight o'clock. The watch to be delivered in the usual manner by nightfall and by sunrise.
The above rule shall not be compulsory, except where voluntary watchmen cannot be obtained at a hire the planters may be willing to give, to save the time lost by employing their ordinary laborers as watchmen.
Likewise the male laborers are bound once a month, on Sundays and holydays, to take the day watch about the yard, and to act as pasturemen, on receiving their usual pay for a week day's work; this rule applies also to the crook-boys.
All orders about the watches to be duly entered in the day book of the estate.
Should a laborer, having been duly warned to take the watch, not attend, another laborer is to be hired in the place of the absentee, and at his expense, not, however, to exceed fifteen cents. The person who wilfully leaves the watch, or neglects it, is to be reported to the magistrate and punished as the case merits.
14th. Laborers wilfully abstaining from work on a working day, are to forfeit their wages for the day, and will have to pay over and above the forfeit, a fine which can be lawfully deducted in their wages, of seven (7) cents for a first class laborer, five (5)cents for a second class laborer, and two (2) cents for a third class laborer. In crop or grinding days, when employed about the works, in cutting canes, or in crook, an additional punishment will be awarded for wilful absence and neglect by the magistrate, on complaint being made. Laborers abstaining from work for half a day, or breaking off from work before being dismissed, to forfeit their wages for one day.
Laborers not coming to work in due time to forfeit half a day's wages.
Parents keeping their children from work, shall be fined instead of the children.
No charge of house rent is to be made in future, on account of absence from work, or for the Saturday.
15th. Laborers wilfully abstaining from work for two or more days during the week, or habitually absenting themselves, or working badly and lazily shall be punished as the case merits, on complaint to the magistrate.
16th. Laborers assaulting any person in authority on the estate, or planning and conspiring to retard, or to stop the work of the estate, or uniting to abstain from work, or to break their engagements, shall be punished according to law, on investigation before a magistrate.
17th. Until measures can be adopted for securing medical attendance to the laborers, and for regulating the treatment of the sick and the infirm, it is ordered:
That infirm persons unfit for any work, shall, as hitherto, be maintained on the estates where they are domiciled, and to be attended to by their next relations.
That parents or children of such infirm persons shall not remove from the estate, leaving them behind, without making provision for them to the satisfaction of the owner, or of the magistrate.
That laborers unable to attend to work on account of illness, or on account of having sick children, shall make a report to the manager, or any other person in authority on the estate, who, if the case appears dangerous, and the sick person destitute, shall cause medical assistance to be given.
That all sick laborers willing to remain in the hospital during their illness, shall there be attended to, at the cost of the estate.
18th. If a laborer reported sick, shall be at any time found absent from the estate without leave, or is trespassing about the estate, or found occupied with work requiring health, he shall be considered skulking and wilfully absent from work.
When a laborer pretends illness, and is not apparently sick, it shall be his duty to prove his illness by medical certificate.
19th. Pregnant women shall be at liberty to work with the small gang as customary, and when confined, not to be called on to work for seven weeks after their confinement.
Young children shall be fed and attended to during the hours of work at some proper place, at the cost of the estate.
Nobody is allowed to stay from work on pretence of attending a sick person, except the wife and the mother in dangerous cases of illness.
20th. It is the duty of the managers to report to the police any contagious or suspicious cases of illness and death; especially when gross neglect is believed to have taken place, as when children have been neglected by their mothers, in order that the guilty person may be punished according to law.
21st. The driver or foreman on the estate, is to receive in wages four and a half dollars monthly, if no other terms have been agreed upon. The driver may be dismissed at any time during the year with the consent of the magistrate. It is the duty of the driver to see the work duly performed, to maintain order and peace on the estate during the work, and at other times, and to prevent and report all offences committed. Should any laborer insult, or use insulting language towards him during, or on account of the performance of his duties, such person is to be punished according to law.
22nd. No laborer is allowed, without the especial permission of the owner or manager, to appropriate wood, grass, vegetables, fruits, and the like, belonging to the estate, nor to appropriate such produce from other estates, nor to cut canes, or to burn charcoal. Persons making themselves guilty of such offences, shall be punished according to law, with fines or imprisonment with hard labor; and the possession of such articles not satisfactorily accounted for, shall be sufficient evidence of unlawful acquisition.
23d. All agreements contrary to the above rules, are to be null and void, and owners and managers of estates convicted of any practice tending wilfully to counteract or avoid these rules by direct or indirect means, shall be subject to a fine not exceeding $200.
(Signed,)P. Hansen.
Government House, St. Croix, 26th January, 1849.—Knox,An Historical Account of St. Thomas, West Indies, pp. 248-255.
Footnotes:[397]Father O'Ryan.[398]He had obtained this brilliant military title on account of his fantastic attire.[399]Extract from Captain Irminger's Report to the Minister of Marine. Despatched 12th July, 1848.[400]Then Captain-General of Porto Rico.
[397]Father O'Ryan.
[397]Father O'Ryan.
[398]He had obtained this brilliant military title on account of his fantastic attire.
[398]He had obtained this brilliant military title on account of his fantastic attire.
[399]Extract from Captain Irminger's Report to the Minister of Marine. Despatched 12th July, 1848.
[399]Extract from Captain Irminger's Report to the Minister of Marine. Despatched 12th July, 1848.
[400]Then Captain-General of Porto Rico.
[400]Then Captain-General of Porto Rico.
A History of the United States, Vol. IV. ByEdward Channing, Professor in Harvard University. New York, MacMillan Company, 1917. Pp. 575. Price $2.75.
This is the fourth volume of what promises to be the most interesting and possibly the most valuable single work hitherto produced in this field. It begins with the discovery of the New World and when completed will come down to 1910. The volume herein referred to covers the period of "Federalists and Republicans from 1789 to 1815." The work, therefore, goes over ground which has been extensively treated by such writers as Richard Hildreth, James Schouler, Herman von Holst, and James B. McMaster. Professor Channing, however, has given this period an original treatment and incorporated into his narrative so much material of human interest that his history makes a more readable and at the same time a more informing work than any of the general histories of the United States.
Professor Channing does not fall a victim to the mistakes of his predecessors. Hildreth is prejudiced, Schouler is dry and ex parte, von Holst is lost in the debates over slavery, and McMaster, at times, sinks beneath the load of his undigested material. Realizing that the problems of peace are greater than those of war and that the mere proceedings of legislative bodies cannot altogether be depended upon to reflect the political development of a country, Professor Channing is making his history economic as well as political. It is just as important to him to know the prices of commodities in 1800 as to know the terms of Jay's treaty. In other words, Professor Channing has a new point of view. He aims not to set forth an interesting narrative but to marshall his facts so as to make interesting his well-balanced account of the various forces which have operated to make this country what it is to-day. The smooth style, common sense, and thoroughness with which he is now doing this task will doubtless make this the standard history of the United States.
In reading this valuable work, however, one cannot but express regret that Professor Channing did not see fit to spell the word"Negro" with a capital letter and to say more about the people of color. In the volumes to follow the treatment of this element of our population will probably be more extensive in keeping with the increasing importance of the Negro as a factor in history of the later period. Professor Channing will hardly be so unfortunate as most writers of American history, who in their voluminous works give space for honorable mention of every race but the black, considering it sufficient to mention it, merely as the cause of the great agitation which finally rent the nation and the present cause of the race problem in the United States. The bearing of worthy achievements of the Negroes on the development of this country should be mentioned along with the deeds of others who have helped to make the nation.
The Early History of Cuba, 1492 to 1586. ByI. A. Wright. The MacMillan Company, New York, 1916. Pp. 390.
This book begins with the discovery of Cuba by Columbus and ends with the raid of Sir Francis Drake in the West Indies in 1586, by which it was demonstrated that Great Britain ruled the sea and that the retention of the Spanish possessions in the New World required that they be provided with means of local defence rather than be left in the position of dependence on protection from Spain. With this change is connected the subsequent economic development of Cuba and the success of the Spanish colonial policy.
In writing this book the author had an advantage over most historians in this field. It was compiled from documents now available at Seville, Spain. Miss Wright, however, did not use the documents found in other archives. What documents she had access to, however, are considered sufficient as they contain "letters and reports of the island's governors, of royal officials and lesser clergy, of municipal and ecclesiastical councils, of distinguished and humble citizens." This large collection, too, contains some of the documents copied by Munoz in his collection preserved at Madrid and some printed in the unsatisfactory series ofDocumentos Ineditos. The author, therefore, gives this book to the public as the only exhaustive treatment of Cuban history of this period, which has hitherto been published, despite the estimate we have placed on such works as those of De las Casas, Oviedo, Gomara, Solis, Bernal Diaz del Costillo, and Herrera.
The introduction of slavery and the treatment of the bondmen, although not objective points in this treatise, are given considerablespace. The slave trade was authorized in Cuba in 1513 and we hear of Bishop Ubite in the possession of as many as 200 slaves in 1523 and later of Bishop Maestro Miguel Ramirez with a license from the crown to take half a dozen slaves and two white slave women. The writer shows how the failure of the native captives to meet the demand for labor eventually led to declaration making them the free vassals of the crown and authorizing the enslavement of Negroes in sufficiently large numbers to make up the deficiency. It was necessary to issue another order rescinding the license of the slave-traders because of the fear of servile insurrection, should the slave population too far exceed that of the whites. This restricted importation of Negroes, however, did not prevent their uprising in 1533, which, however, was easily quelled, the four Negroes defending themselves to death.
The author explains too how slavery in Cuba or in the Spanish possession differed from that of other nations in that although the Spaniard regarded the black as socially and politically inferior, he did not look down upon him as a "soul-less son of Cain condemned to servitude by divine wrath" but recognized the black's equality with him before the altar of the church. When he became free and even before he became free the slave had rights before the law. "This attitude of mind of the Spaniard—so very different indeed from that of the slave-holding North American,—partly explains the facility with which he mingled his 'pure, clean' white blood with black, so begetting a mulatto population to be reckoned with later." Free blacks, therefore, soon appeared. By 1568 forty in Havana had bought their freedom. Others, though still slaves, lived independently, the men doing such as working at trades and the women running eating houses, but all reporting their earnings to their masters at intervals.
C. B. Walter.
Sierra Leone: Its Peoples, Products and Secret Societies. ByH. Osman Newland, F. R. Hist. S., F.I.D. John Bale, Sons and Danielsson, London, 1916. Pp. 247.
This work consists of the observations on a journey by canoe, rail and hammock through Sierra Leone. To this is appended fifty-three pages of matter on "Practical Planting Notes for Sierra Leone and West Africa," by H. Hamel Smith. Subject to sufficient demand, however, it is proposed to issue this book, annually or biennially, with amendments and additions to date, as a SierraLeone Year Book and with a Who's Who section. Accordingly, it treats of the geographic and economic conditions of that land and the rule of 1,500,000 Africans, largely by less than 900 Europeans. Taking up the elements of population the author devotes much space to the Creole and Aborigine elements, giving the characteristics of these classes. He then considers the river system, the railroads, life in the interior, the rubber industry, the native chiefs, the amusements of the people, native law, peculiar customs of the people, their secret societies, the important products and the management of estates.
The author undertakes to answer the questions as to whether this is a country for a black or white man to live in, which of the two should rule, whether the people are becoming Europeanized in their habits and religion and whether it is a place for commerce and capital. Answering the last question first the author asserts that there are in Sierra Leone many possibilities for smaller capitalists and companies. As for the climate, Sierra Leone is much maligned, especially so since science has reclaimed its swamps and decreased the death rate. The writer too is satisfied with the progress with which the natives are taking over European civilization, although he is not anxious to see the African adopt this culturein totobecause of the difference in climate. Unlike some other travelers, he found the natives industrious, honest, and truthful. Moreover, he does not share the prejudices foreigners have against the Creoles and blacks. He believes that the white man should rule not so long as he is white but so long as he can prove his superiority. "The black man," says he, "will only respect the rule of the white man as long as the latter can prove his superiority, and consequently, reasonableness." The natives have such a keen sense of justice that they are not blinded by hypocrisy. The writer believes that neither the white man nor his religion must rule because they are white and not black. The administrators, too, must not rule for themselves but as representatives only. "It is Britain that must rule—Britain which has one law for all, and administers it not for white or black, but for all who own her sway whatever their colour, race, or religion." While the portraiture of the sense of justice of Great Britain does not square with her colonial policy, the caution to those administering the affairs of Sierra Leone is well put.
After all that he says, however, the writer does not seem to be so sanguine as to future of West Africa. "Probably WestAfrica," says he, "will always remain a land of romance, mystery and imagination," Science may reclaim the swamp. The iron railroad may open up tracks for the engineer and planter to exploit its vast resources. But Nature, unchecked by man, has been allowed too long to run riot there among its impenetrable forests. Never, perhaps, will it be entirely subdued. As with the primeval forest, so with the people. Mohammedanism, Christianity, modern education, have all tried their civilizing influences upon the West African, and nowhere, perhaps, with more success than in Sierra Leone. But the old Adam dies slowly. Civilization is too tame, too quiet for those who love noise and mystery. And this feeling is infectious.
J. O. Burke.
Trade Politics and Christianity in Africa and the East. ByA. J. MacDonald, M.A. With an introduction bySir Harry Johnston. Longmans, Green and Co., London, 1916. Pp. 296.
This is a dissertation awarded the Maitland Prize at Cambridge in 1915 for an essay on the thesis,Problems raised by the contact of the West with Africa and the East and the part that Christianity can play in their solution. The work shows scientific treatment. The facts used were obtained largely from the Government Blue Books, the Minutes of Evidence attached to Reports of the Committee of Inquiry into the Liquor Trade in Southern Nigeria together with the reports of the United Races Committee, the Journal of the Anglo-Indian Temperance Association, the British Quarterlies, the publications of the Society for the Suppression of the Opium Trade, and the reports of the Proceedings of the First Universal Race Congress.
The writer traces the development of contact with the natives by means of trade which, supplying them with what they want rather than with what they need, often demoralizes them. Then along with the problem of trade comes that of labor, giving rise to labor contracts or forced labor, and this with another problem of preventing the native population from too far exceeding that of the whites. Then comes the consideration of the liquor question, the opium trade, education and self-government, and inter-racial marriage, with the merits and demerits of the methods of those who have attacked these problems. Caution is given in the assertion that Christianity must be the life-principle. "Imperialism," says the author, "is a matter of religion." The extension of theempire, therefore, is an extension of religion. The success of an imperial policy then depends upon the degree of attention paid religion, which lies deeper than statesmanship, deeper than civilization, which is, indeed, the inspiration of both. Administrators, therefore, must not neglect Christianity, as they are only imperialists so long as they remember that they are in spite of themselves religious men. "Translated into practical terms," says he, "the theory means that if the black and white races are unequal in intelligence and social capacity they are equal on the basis of common Christianity. The old doctrine of the 'solidarity of humanity' needs to be revived and to be applied over a wider area. The Empire can only be extended securely by the extension of its religion, but that means that settler, trader and administrator must realize in the black man a capacity to receive Christianity." The Church, too, must cease to regard the propagation of the gospel as its own task and missionaries must no longer retard the extension of the empire by carrying on their work as members of an independent organization.
Taking up inter-racial marriage, the author raises many questions. He does not seem to fear race fusion, as there is evidence "to prove that the crossing of the different races does produce definite physical and mental results in succeeding generations." He contends that the white man's objection to connection with women of colored races and to the children who spring from those unions has no scientific justification. The exclusive attitude of the white man is accounted for by the difference in degree of civilization, the so-called superiority of the white race. Although he does not show how science has uprooted the idea of racial superiority, the author does raise the question as to whether the integrity of the dominant races has been maintained. As evidence of this he cites the facts that the Pelasgii of Greece were, according to Professor Sturgis, of African origin, that Sir Harry Johnston traced Negro blood across India and the Malay States to Polynesia, that a negroid race penetrated Italy and France, according to recent discoveries, leaving traces at the present day in the physiognomy of the people of Southern Italy, Sicily, Sardinia, and Western France, and even in parts of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, and that even to-day there are some examples of Keltiberian peoples of western Scotland and western Wales and southern and western Ireland of distinctly negroid type.
W. R. Ward.
The following letter was addressed to theNew Orleans Daily Statesby Mr. W. O. Hart:
Louisiana Governors.New Orleans, La., April 19, 1917.EditorDaily StatesDear Sir:—Recently your paper published a very interesting account of many governors of Louisiana at one time being in the Cosmopolitan Hotel, but in giving the names of the ex-governors you omitted three, William P. Kellogg, P. B. S. Pinchback and General Joseph R. Brooke.Kellogg while never elected was inaugurated in January, 1873, and served a full term of four years, having been upheld in office by President Grant.Pinchback, who was elected President of the Senate when Oscar J. Dunn, elected lieutenant governor, died, in 1868, became acting governor on December 10, 1872, when Governor H. C. Warmoth was impeached and served until the inauguration of Kellogg, January 13, 1873.There are now on the statute books ten laws passed at this extra session and which bear the approval of Pinchback; they will be found bound with the Acts of 1873, pages 37 to 50.Pinchback's title as acting governor was upheld by the Supreme Court of Louisiana, in the case of Morgan vs. Kennard, decided in March, 1873, and reported in the 25th An. Reports, page 238, which was a contest over the office of Justice of the Supreme Court between John Kennard, appointed by Warmoth, and P. H. Morgan, appointed by Pinchback, and the judgment was affirmed by the Supreme Court of the United States in the case of Kennard vs. Morgan, reported in 92d U. S. 480. The opinion was rendered by Chief Justice Ludeling and concurred in by Justices Taliaferro and Howell, and Justice Wyly dissented. The case was tried in the Superior District Court before Judge Jacob Hawkins who decided in favor of Morgan and this judgment was affirmed by the Supreme Court.Judge Kennard was appointed to the Court on December 3, 1872, vice W. W. Howe resigned; Morgan was appointed on January 4, 1873, and at the end of the litigation took his seat as a member of the Court on February 1st, serving until the Manning Court went into office on January 9, 1877.After the eventful fourteenth of September, 1874, when General Emory took charge, he appointed Colonel (now Brigadier General retired) Joseph R. Brooke, military governor of Louisiana, but he only served one day, because President Grant disapproved of the appointment and ordered General Emory to reinstate Governor Kellogg.W. O. Hart.
Louisiana Governors.
New Orleans, La., April 19, 1917.
EditorDaily States
Dear Sir:—Recently your paper published a very interesting account of many governors of Louisiana at one time being in the Cosmopolitan Hotel, but in giving the names of the ex-governors you omitted three, William P. Kellogg, P. B. S. Pinchback and General Joseph R. Brooke.
Kellogg while never elected was inaugurated in January, 1873, and served a full term of four years, having been upheld in office by President Grant.
Pinchback, who was elected President of the Senate when Oscar J. Dunn, elected lieutenant governor, died, in 1868, became acting governor on December 10, 1872, when Governor H. C. Warmoth was impeached and served until the inauguration of Kellogg, January 13, 1873.
There are now on the statute books ten laws passed at this extra session and which bear the approval of Pinchback; they will be found bound with the Acts of 1873, pages 37 to 50.
Pinchback's title as acting governor was upheld by the Supreme Court of Louisiana, in the case of Morgan vs. Kennard, decided in March, 1873, and reported in the 25th An. Reports, page 238, which was a contest over the office of Justice of the Supreme Court between John Kennard, appointed by Warmoth, and P. H. Morgan, appointed by Pinchback, and the judgment was affirmed by the Supreme Court of the United States in the case of Kennard vs. Morgan, reported in 92d U. S. 480. The opinion was rendered by Chief Justice Ludeling and concurred in by Justices Taliaferro and Howell, and Justice Wyly dissented. The case was tried in the Superior District Court before Judge Jacob Hawkins who decided in favor of Morgan and this judgment was affirmed by the Supreme Court.
Judge Kennard was appointed to the Court on December 3, 1872, vice W. W. Howe resigned; Morgan was appointed on January 4, 1873, and at the end of the litigation took his seat as a member of the Court on February 1st, serving until the Manning Court went into office on January 9, 1877.
After the eventful fourteenth of September, 1874, when General Emory took charge, he appointed Colonel (now Brigadier General retired) Joseph R. Brooke, military governor of Louisiana, but he only served one day, because President Grant disapproved of the appointment and ordered General Emory to reinstate Governor Kellogg.
W. O. Hart.
In the January number of theSouth Atlantic QuarterlyGilbert T. Stephenson, Judge of the Municipal Court of Winston-Salem, North Carolina, writes on the subject, "Education and Crime among Negroes." Although he accepts as facts certain unreliable statistics concerning the criminality of Negroes, he nevertheless presents the subject in a liberal manner. His following conclusion is interesting.
"All the available statistics and the unanimous opinion of men in a position to know the facts would seem to be proof that education—elementary or advanced, industrial or literary—diminishes crime among Negroes. The alarming high rate of Negro criminality is as much a condemnation of the community in which it exists as of the offending Negroes themselves. Having discovered that the Negro school is, at least, one institution which successfully combats crime, the community cannot afford to withhold its active interest in and generous support of its Negro school. The more money spent in making such schools responsive to the special needs of the race, the less will have to be spent on crime, and if it comes to a question of cost, it is cheaper in the long run to maintain and equip schools—Negro schools, even—than police departments, courts, jails, penitentiaries, and reformatories; for the school, properly conducted, makes the Negro a greater asset, while the court finds him a liability, and nearly always leaves him a greater liability to the community."
"All the available statistics and the unanimous opinion of men in a position to know the facts would seem to be proof that education—elementary or advanced, industrial or literary—diminishes crime among Negroes. The alarming high rate of Negro criminality is as much a condemnation of the community in which it exists as of the offending Negroes themselves. Having discovered that the Negro school is, at least, one institution which successfully combats crime, the community cannot afford to withhold its active interest in and generous support of its Negro school. The more money spent in making such schools responsive to the special needs of the race, the less will have to be spent on crime, and if it comes to a question of cost, it is cheaper in the long run to maintain and equip schools—Negro schools, even—than police departments, courts, jails, penitentiaries, and reformatories; for the school, properly conducted, makes the Negro a greater asset, while the court finds him a liability, and nearly always leaves him a greater liability to the community."
Some interesting articles in various publications are: "Problems of Race Assimilation," by Arthur C. Parker, in the January number ofThe American Indian Magazine; The Cavalry Fight at Carrizal, by Louis S. Morey, inThe Journal of the United States CavalryAssociation; The Present Labor Situation, in the January number ofThe Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Sciences; Physic Factors in the New American Race Situation, inThe Journal of Race Development, by George W. Ellis; and La Independencia de Tejas y la Esclavitud, by Senor V. Salado Alvarez, in the Cuban journalLa Reforma Social.
Other such articles in this field are: Germany's Ambition in Central Africa, by Emile Cammaerts, in the October number ofThe National Review; The Present System of Education in Uganda, in the July number ofUganda Notes; The Gold Coast: Some Consideration of its Structures, People, and Natural History, by A. E. Kitson, in the July number of theGeographic Journal.
The arrangements for the biennial meeting of the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History have been almost completed. A majority of the members of the Executive Council desire that it be held on Wednesday, the twenty-ninth of August, and have so ordered it. The program has not yet been made up, but several persons of prominence have promised to attend and speak. Among these are Mrs. Mary Church Terrell, Dean Kelly Miller, Professor George E. Haynes, Dr. R. R. Wright, Jr., Mr. Monroe N. Work, and Dr. Thomas J. Jones. Two of the important topics will beSome Values of Negro HistoryandThe Negro in the World War.
I imagine, ladies and gentlemen, that when you first read the subject of the address to be delivered before this society to-day, you were a bit surprised, and, I trust, a bit interested. To claim an African origin for the Grecian civilization is hardly in keeping with the historical traditions inherited from our school days. It savors of a sort of heresy and passes far beyond the limits of popular opinion. There is a peculiar unanimity among all historians to state without reservation that the greatest civilization the world has ever known was pre-eminently Aryan, but historians are not always to be relied upon. They write for their own race and times and are careful to give as little credit as possible to races and events which fall within the pale of their prejudices. I question, however, if there is to be gained any ultimate good by subverting truth and popularizing error. Indeed, I believe that if to-day our historians, authors, press and pulpit would give the public the truth as far as it is possible to attain it, to-morrow would find us filled with a new vigor and a fresh determination to conquer the wrongs and inconsistencies of human life.
The old idea of the Grecian civilization was that it sprung, like Minerva, full armed from the brow of Zeus. It seemed to have no tangible beginning. The fabled kings and heroes of the Homeric Age, with their palaces and strongholds, were said to have been humanized sun-myths; their deeds but songs woven by wandering minstrels to win their meed of bread. Yet there has always been a suspicion among scholars that this view was wrong. The more we study the moral aspects of humanity the more we become convinced that the flower and fruit of civilization are evolved according to laws as immutable as those laws governing the manifestations of physical life. Historians have written that Greece was invaded by Aryans about 1400 B.C., and that henceforth arose the wonderful civilization; but the student knows that such was an impossibility and that some vital factor has been left out of the equation. When the Aryans invaded Greece they were savagesfrom Neolithic Europe and could not possibly have possessed the high artistic capacities and rich culture necessary for the unfolding of Ægean civilization. "Of thorns men do not gather figs, nor of a bramble bush gather they grapes."
Speaking of the two foremost Grecian states, Herodotus writes as follows: "These are the Lacedæmonians and Athenians, the former of Doric, the latter of Ionic blood. And, indeed, these two nations had held from very early times the most distinguished place in Greece, the one being Pelasgic, the other a Hellenic people, and the one having never quitted its original seas, while the other had been excessively migratory." "The Hellenes," wrote Professor Boughton in theArenasome years ago, "were the Aryans first to be brought into contact with these sunburnt Hamites, who, let it be remembered, though classed as whites, were probably as strongly Nigritic as are the Afro-Americans." "Greek art is notαυτοχθονυς," said Thiersch some fifty years ago, "but we derived from the Pelasgians, who, being blood relations of the Egyptians, undoubtedly brought the knowledge from Egypt." "The aptitude for art among all nations of antiquity," remarked Count de Gobineau a few years later, "was derived from an amalgamation with black races. The Egyptians, Assyrians and Etruscans were nothing but half-breeds, mulattoes." In the year 1884 Alexander Winchell, the famous American geologist, upset Americans with an article appearing in theNorth American Review. From it I quote the following: "The Pelasgic empire was at its meridian as early as 2500 B.C. This people came from the islands of the Ægean, and more remotely from Asia Minor. They were originally a branch of the sunburnt Hamitic stock that laid the basis of civilization in Canaan and Mesopotamia, destined later to be Semitized. Danaus and his daughters—that is, the fugitive 'shepherds' from Egypt—sought refuge among their Hamitic kindred in the Peloponnesus about 1700 B.C. Three hundred years before this these Pelasgians had learned the art of weaving from Aryan immigrants. In time they occupied the whole of Greece and Thessaly. Before 200 B.C. they established themselves in Italy. Thus do we get a conception of a vast Hamitic empire existing in prehistoric times, whose several nationalities were centered in Mesopotamia, Canaan, Egypt, Northwestern Africa, Iberia, Greece, Italy, Sicily, Sardinia and Central Europe—an intellectual ethnic family, the first of the Adamites to emerge into historic light, but with the records of its achievements buried in gloomalmost as dense as that which covers the ruder populations that the Hamites everywhere displaced. To this family, chiefly, are to be traced the dark complexions of the nations and tribes still dwelling around the shores of the Mediterranean."
It was to be expected that such statements as the foregoing would throw the scholastic world into a ferment. There was a scramble to bolster up the cause of Aryanism and to preserve this one civilization, at least, to the credit of the Caucasian race. Homer was scanned with a patience unknown to college students and the classic myths were refined in the alembics of master minds. Yet there were some who cared for truth more than for racial glory and among them was Dr. Schlieman. Armed with a spade he went to the classic lands and brought to light a real Troy; at Tiryns and Mycenæ he laid to view the palaces and tombs and treasures of Homeric kings. His message back to scholars who waited tensely for his verdict was, "It looks to me like the civilization of an African people." A new world opened to archeologists and the Ægean became the Mecca of the world. Traces of this prehistoric civilization began to make their appearance far beyond the limits of Greece itself. From Cyprus and Palestine to Sicily and Southern Italy, and even to the coasts of Spain, the colonial and industrial enterprise of the Myceneans has left its mark throughout the Mediterranean basin. The heretics were vindicated. "Whether they like it or not," declared Sir Arthur Evans before the London Hellenic Society a short time ago, "classical students must consider origins. The Grecians whom we discern in the new dawn were not the pale-skinned northerners, but essentially the dark-haired, brown-complexioned race." Perhaps Sir Arthur's words will carry weight with you when I remark that his wonderful discoveries in classical lands have brought him the honor of election last year as president of the British Association, the most notable assemblage of scholars in the world. I might further mention that Professor Sergi, of the University of Rome, has founded a new study of the origin of European civilization upon the remarkable archeological finds, entitled "The Mediterranean Race." From this masterly work I choose the following: "Until recent years the Greeks and Romans were regarded as Aryans, and then as Aryanized peoples; the great discoveries in the Mediterranean have overturned all these views. To-day, although a few belated supporters of Aryanism still remain, it is becoming clear that the most ancient civilization of the Mediterraneanis not of Aryan origin. The Aryans were savages when they invaded Europe; they destroyed in part the superior civilization of the Neolithic populations, and could not have created the Græco-Latin civilization. The primitive populations of Europe originated in Africa and the basin of the Mediterranean was the chief center of movement when the African migrations reached the center and north of Europe."
What, then, are some of those discoveries which have so completely destroyed the ethnic fetish of the Caucasian race? The greatest and most conclusive of them all was the discovery of the palace of Minos by Sir Arthur Evans. In 1894 this scientist undertook a series of exploration campaigns in central and eastern Crete; it has so happened that some years previous he had been hunting out ancient engraved stones at Athens and came upon some three or four-sided seals showing on each of their faces groups of hieroglyphics and linear signs distinct from the Egyptian and Hittite, but evidently representing some form of script. Upon inquiry Sir Arthur learned that these seals had been found in Crete, and to Crete he went. The legends of the famous labyrinth and palace of Minos came back to him and were refreshed by the gossipy peasants, who repeated the tales that had come down as ancestral memories. In wandering around the site of his proposed labors Sir Arthur noticed some ruined walls, the great gypsum blocks of which were engraved with curious symbolic characters, crowning the southern slope of a hill known as Kephala, overlooking the ancient site of Knossos, the city of Minos. It was the prelude to the discovery of the ruins of a palace, the most wonderful archeological find of modern times.
Who was Minos? In the myths that have come down to us he was a sort of an Abraham, a friend of God, and often appears as almost identical with his native Zeus. He was the founder and ruler of the royal city of Knossos, the Cretan Moses, who every nine years repaired to the famous cave of Zeus whether on the Cretan Ida or on Dicta, and received from the god of the mountain the laws for his people. He was powerful and great and extended his dominions far and wide over the Ægean Isles and coast lands, and even Athens paid to him its tribute of men and maidens. To him is attributed the founding of the great Minoan civilization.
I will not have time today to review the mass of archeological data which the discoveries of this civilization have produced.They consist of cyclopean ruins of cities and strongholds, tombs, vases, statues, votive bronzes, and exquisitely engraved gems and intaglios. That which is most valuable in establishing the claim of the African origin of the Grecian civilization is the discovery of the frescoes on the palace walls. These opened up a new epoch in painting and are of the utmost interest to the world. The colors are almost as brilliant as when laid down more than three thousand years ago. Among these frescoes are numerous representations of the race whose civilization they represent. It was a race neither Aryan nor Semitic, but African. The portraitures follow the Egyptian precedent and for the first time the mysterious Minoan and Mycenean people rise before us. The tint of the flesh is of a deep reddish brown and the limbs finely moulded. The profile of the face is pure and almost classically Greek. The hair is black and curling and the lips somewhat full, giving the entire physiognomy a distinct African cast. In the women's quarters the frescoes show them to be much fairer, the difference in complexion being due, probably, to the seclusion of harem life. But in their countenances, too, remain those distinguishable features which link with the African race.
You will pardon me, I trust, if occasion is taken here to impress upon you the value of genuine archeological evidence. Historians may write anything to reflect their vanity or their prejudices, but when the remains of ancient civilizations rise out of the dust and sands and give the lie to their assertions there is nothing more to be said. Egypt, Mesopotamia, Phoenecia, Greece, and Rome, have all been claimed for the Aryan, but the spade has unearthed stone that bears sentient witness to the fact that Africa has been the pioneer in the field of civilization. We wonder, then, why the historians continue to ignore these remains and persist in continuing falsehood. There can be but one answer and that is racial vanity prefers falsehood to truth and prejudice demands suppression rather than expression.
Yet these frescoes of Crete need not be such a surprise to scholars and public after all. The very classics themselves have more than hinted of the great part played by Africa in the development of Grecian civilization. Let us revert to the myths and trace the descent of Minos and his progeny. You will recollect that the ancient heroes of Greece were divided into the older and younger branches, the former belonging to the house of Inachus, distinctlyHamitic, while the latter belonged to the race of Japotus, distinctly a mixture.
The Pelasgic races of the south traced their descent from Inachus, the river god and son of Oceanus. The son of Inachus, Phoroneus, lived in the Peloponnesus and founded the town of Argos. He was succeeded by his son, Pelasgus, from whom the aforementioned races of the south derived their name. Io, the divine sister of Phoroneus, had the good fortune, or perhaps misfortune, to attract the attention of the all-loving Zeus and as a consequence incurred the enmity of Hera. She is transformed into a beautiful heifer by Zeus, but a gadfly sent by Hera torments her until she is driven mad and starts upon those famous wanderings which became the subject of many of the most celebrated stories of antiquity. Æschylus reviews her roamings in his great tragedy, "Prometheus Bound," and makes Io to arrive at Mount Caucasus to which the fire-bringer is chained. It is here that Prometheus delivers to her the oracle given him by his mother, Themis, Titan-born. He directs her to Canobos, a city on the Nile, and tells her that there Zeus will restore her mind.