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PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

Reference :-

C.O.885

19 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON

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e yourself dwelt upon the principal that can be, and has been, raised which is that it tends to perpetuate fy the isolation of the tribe, and their to the conditions of a nomadic life," same problem might recur in future. ord Lansdowne conceded in principle, ved in the particular instance, "the administrative reserves under proper

nd the policy has been continued in

I.

..

eness is the whole point of reserves. are excluded in order to safeguard s within the reserved area. The ceptance of the policy of native re- rote Lord Lansdowne in the same implies, of ecurse, an absolute that the natives will, so long as e it, remain in undisturbed and ex- ssession of the areas set apart for Accordingly, I notice that, in re- cent native reserves in East Africa, issioner for Lands has laid down, as in dealing with requests for land by Missionaries. that if the Chiefs will shall make no objection to their a1 plots of ground inside a reserve, for a house and garden; but that if a larger area, they must seek for it

the same terms as other settlers,"

+

I have said that a system of native ight to be regarded as no more than ry makeshift. unsound in principle tereotyping exclusiveness and non- , and only to be defended on the score ar local circumstances as a necessary of the natives for the time being; but eserves and reserves, and a reserve in e purely savage tribes are allowed to molested is one thing, while a reserve ganised and really unler proper ad- & control" is another. A reserve of the Iis, I take it, Basutoland, where there organised tribal system with chiefs white officers, and now possessing an onneil. The Resident Commissioner ant Commissioners answer, if I under- atly, to what in India and the East ralled Residents, and such a reserve he made a good training ground for itizenship.

pect of Reserves, viz., as a training we'l brought out in the Natal Report : The way must be opened for them ate in locations, where they should be pervised, induced to become better and be influenced by the direct ap of civilising agencies, The visible these reformative agencies would be

1, the missionary, the medical man,

acher: each, in his own sphere, help-

e the standards of thought and life,

ring them to forsake the trammels of

{

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tribalism, and enter by progressive stages into the higher status of individualism."

(B) The system of Residents has been most highly developed and most conspicuously success- ful with Indian princes and Malay Sultans. I know no reason why it should be less successful with lower gradles of native races; and as a matter of fact, to a greater or less extent, under one name or another, it exists in most if not all native territories in the British Empire. Northern Nigeria for instance is allotted out among Residents and Assistant Residents, and I take it that here as elsewhere they are the advisers and controllers of the native chiefs.

The Malay Sultans were, as I understand, despots, and the chiefs under them were mainly connected by blood with the ruler for the time being. There was little or no system, but more or less anarchy. Our Residents in these States are nominally advisers; they are Englishmen governing in and through the Sultans; they deal, it is true, with a semi-civilised race, and the whole population of the country is under them; there is therefore no separation. But there is no prima facie impossibility of having such a system for a part of a country or a part of its people. It is only a matter of difference in degree, not of difference in kind. Where the system is most -developed, the Residents are most numerous and best qualified.

The evils of a separate native organisation, one would think, would best be met by giving the personal element, the want of which the Natal Commission deplores, in the form of British Residents with the native head-chiefs. In South Africa there appears to Le. in the - different colonies, a large machinery for dealing with the natives; but in 1905 (whatever may have been done since) the Native Affairs Com- mission formed the conclusion that in the Transvaal, and in a lower degree in Natal, and elsewhere, there is in largely populated native arcas a numerical insufficiency of magistrates and Native Commissioners qualified by experience to deal with natives" (Report pp. 33-4); and, to judge from the recent Natal report, there is in that Colony at any rate a want of "highly skilled and carefully selected officers "in direct control of the natives (page 6), and an insufficient number of magistrates (page 18); there appears also to be a want of executive and advisory officers as distinct from the magistrates, who. in Natal, and, I think I am right in saying, elsewhere in South Africa, generally, for ob- vious reasons of economy, combine administra- tive with judicial authority,

(7) The Natal report seems to regard the appointment of Commissioners or white advisers as a valuable means of breaking down the authority of the Chiefs. The Commissioners. “should be used to supplant the chiefs in the estimation of their people, and this gradually help with other agencies to break down the tribal