Native Life in South Africa [183]
areas is as much as 70 to 90 persons to the square mile. In density of population, some of these "rural" native districts are second only to Capetown, Durban, and Johannesburg -- South Africa's most populous centres. Not one of the other South African "cities" can show a population of more than 20 to 30 persons to the square mile. So that every individual inhabitant of a city occupies a larger space than some of these native farmers can have for themselves, their livestock and agricultural pursuits. So says the Census Report (U.G. 32-'12), which is fully borne out by the writer's own observations in a travelling experience of more than ten years.
The average density of the rural population in white areas is about five to eight persons per square mile. In native areas the average is ten times that number, while the black belt along the Indian Ocean contains from 100 to 140 Natives per square mile (see Schedule F. and Tables XIII-XVI, of the Census Report). Yet the Commission would saddle these congested native areas with additional populations from the Colony Proper and raise the density to something over 200 souls per square mile.
The density of cattle to the square mile in Cape Colony is 6.39 in white areas, and 61.15 in native areas (see U.G. 32h. 1912. pp. 1227-1228). Adopt the Commission's Report and you will have in white areas 0.24 and in Native areas 163.26 cattle per square mile.
Is it fair or reasonable that the indigenes of an open country who pay taxation for the benefit of their rulers and not of themselves, should be forced to live the overcrowded lives of the Belgians without Belgium's sanitary arrangements, or the precautionary hygienic measures necessary in other thickly populated areas?
Is it natural that their cattle should be subjected to this starvation process, while the grassy tracts of their God-given territories are mainly untenanted and preserved as breeding grounds for venomous snakes and scorpions?
Has it come to this that the standard of our unfortunate country has sunk so low that dog-in-the-manger stories are now read in Parliamentary publications?
It is clear that under the proposed arrangement native cattle must starve and their owners with them. For it has come out in evidence that even now (while many Europeans hold large tracts of idle land) some of the blacks have not enough grazing for their stock. But that little difficulty the Commission solves by proposing that Natives should be taught to give up cattle breeding, which alone stands between them and the required serfdom!
An African home without its flock and herd is like an English home without its bread-winner.
== "Von Franzius considers Africa the home of the house cattle and the Negro the original tamer. . . . Among the great Bantu tribes extending from the Soudan toward the South, cattle are evidence of wealth; one tribe, for instance, having so many oxen that each village had ten or twelve thousand head. Lenz (1884), Bouet-Williaumez (1848), Hecquard (1854), Bosman (1805), and Baker (1868) all bear witness to this, and Schweinfurth (1878) tells us of great cattle parks with two to three thousand head, and of numerous agricultural and cattle-raising tribes . . . while Livingstone describes the busy cattle raising of the Bantu and Kaffirs."*
-- * `The Negro' (Du Bois), pp. 108-109. -- ==
But the Commission would force us to give up our agrarian occupation when we are debarred by Acts of Parliament from following other profitable industries in our own country. This is equivalent to saying that Englishmen must be taught to close down their shops, stop their shipping industry and give up their maritime trade.
The Orange "Free" State
The Provincial difficulties I have endeavoured to point out become more serious when we regard the conditions in the so-called "Free" States. There the native position is rendered exceptionally desperate by a number of rigorous class enactments. Formerly these discriminating laws were eased by the action of the State Presidents who
The average density of the rural population in white areas is about five to eight persons per square mile. In native areas the average is ten times that number, while the black belt along the Indian Ocean contains from 100 to 140 Natives per square mile (see Schedule F. and Tables XIII-XVI, of the Census Report). Yet the Commission would saddle these congested native areas with additional populations from the Colony Proper and raise the density to something over 200 souls per square mile.
The density of cattle to the square mile in Cape Colony is 6.39 in white areas, and 61.15 in native areas (see U.G. 32h. 1912. pp. 1227-1228). Adopt the Commission's Report and you will have in white areas 0.24 and in Native areas 163.26 cattle per square mile.
Is it fair or reasonable that the indigenes of an open country who pay taxation for the benefit of their rulers and not of themselves, should be forced to live the overcrowded lives of the Belgians without Belgium's sanitary arrangements, or the precautionary hygienic measures necessary in other thickly populated areas?
Is it natural that their cattle should be subjected to this starvation process, while the grassy tracts of their God-given territories are mainly untenanted and preserved as breeding grounds for venomous snakes and scorpions?
Has it come to this that the standard of our unfortunate country has sunk so low that dog-in-the-manger stories are now read in Parliamentary publications?
It is clear that under the proposed arrangement native cattle must starve and their owners with them. For it has come out in evidence that even now (while many Europeans hold large tracts of idle land) some of the blacks have not enough grazing for their stock. But that little difficulty the Commission solves by proposing that Natives should be taught to give up cattle breeding, which alone stands between them and the required serfdom!
An African home without its flock and herd is like an English home without its bread-winner.
== "Von Franzius considers Africa the home of the house cattle and the Negro the original tamer. . . . Among the great Bantu tribes extending from the Soudan toward the South, cattle are evidence of wealth; one tribe, for instance, having so many oxen that each village had ten or twelve thousand head. Lenz (1884), Bouet-Williaumez (1848), Hecquard (1854), Bosman (1805), and Baker (1868) all bear witness to this, and Schweinfurth (1878) tells us of great cattle parks with two to three thousand head, and of numerous agricultural and cattle-raising tribes . . . while Livingstone describes the busy cattle raising of the Bantu and Kaffirs."*
-- * `The Negro' (Du Bois), pp. 108-109. -- ==
But the Commission would force us to give up our agrarian occupation when we are debarred by Acts of Parliament from following other profitable industries in our own country. This is equivalent to saying that Englishmen must be taught to close down their shops, stop their shipping industry and give up their maritime trade.
The Orange "Free" State
The Provincial difficulties I have endeavoured to point out become more serious when we regard the conditions in the so-called "Free" States. There the native position is rendered exceptionally desperate by a number of rigorous class enactments. Formerly these discriminating laws were eased by the action of the State Presidents who