Darkest India Part 14

CHAPTER XVIII.

THE OVER-SEA COLONY.

As in England, so in India, the establishment of a colony over the sea will in the end prove the necessary completion of our scheme for supplying work to the workless. There are sure to be found eventually in overcrowded centres many for whom work at home cannot be found, and for whom vast reaches of unoccupied territories in other lands wait to afford a home.

Happily this will not be an immediate necessity in India. Over the extended area occupied by the various races which comprise the Indian Empire, large tracts of land still wait to be conquered by well-directed industry, and the numerous settlements which it will be possible to form in different parts of the country may for some time to come absorb the surplus labour, add to the wealth of the country, the stability of the Empire and the more rapid advancement of the Kingdom of Christ. Since, however, we must look forward to emigration as the ultimate solution of the problem which confronts us, we shall briefly indicate the lines upon which we propose to carry it out.

In the establishment of Over-sea Colonies we shall follow very closely the lines laid down in "Darkest England."

At present the continuous stream of emigrant labour flowing into existing colonies already overstocked with labor, is creating serious difficulties, and we have no idea of relieving a congested labour market in one country by overstocking another: this would be, not to heal the disorder, but only to shift the locality.

It may not be generally known how extensively emigration is already resorted to by the people of India. We know that the impression is abroad that Indians will not leave their country, that they fear the sea, are too much attached to their home and their customs, and are far too much filled with the dread of losing caste to yield to any pressure that may be brought to bear upon them to quit the sh.o.r.es of their own land for foreign fields of labour. As a matter of fact, however, emigration to a considerable extent already exists.

In Ceylon alone there are nearly 300,000 Tamil coolies employed on the Tea Estates, besides hundreds of thousands more who have permanently settled in various parts of the Island. Vast tracts in the Island are still waiting to be occupied. The former population of Ceylon is variously estimated as having been from twelve to thirty millions,--now it is only three! Is it impossible for us to suppose that it can be restored to its former prosperity? Immense tanks and irrigation works cover the entire country in tracts which are now unoccupied and desolate.

Many of these have been restored by Government, and there are now 100,000 acres of irrigable land in that country, only waiting to be occupied and cultivated. Government is ready to give it on easy terms.

Here, then, alone is a wide and hopeful field for Indian emigration, only requiring to be skilfully directed in order to find a home and living for millions of India's dest.i.tute.

Now what we propose to do is not to check the stream of emigration, nor yet to help it to flow on in its present channel until it overflows its banks and engulfs in ruin the colonies it might have enriched, but rather to dig out new channels, founding entirely new colonies in districts yet unoccupied, on the plan laid down in "Darkest England."

The stream which, diverted into 20 or 30 channels, would enrich and fertilize a whole continent, would if confined to one or two channels burst its banks and become a desolating flood.

We shall ourselves become the leaders of the coolies, and dig out channels in Ceylon, in Africa, in South America, and other countries, building up from entirely new centres new colonies and territories and kingdoms where the Indian colonist would find himself not a stranger in a strange land, unwelcome, neglected, or illtreated, but at home in a new India, more prosperous and happy than the one he had left behind,--a colony peopled and possessed and managed by those of his own race and language.

Emigration carried on simply in the interests of those who promote it and derive a profit out of it, without regard to the needs of the districts to which they are exported, and with absolute disregard to the comfort and convenience of the emigrant, and often attended with heartless cruelties, must necessarily be fraught with grave evils. These we believe we should largely be able to obviate. In vessels chartered by ourselves or in some way under our direction, and with every comfort and convenience which can be secured for the limited sum available for cost of transit, for men, women, and children, under the direct superintendence of our own trained officers, what a curtailment of human suffering and shame there will be in the transit of the Colonist alone!

On his arrival he will be met by those who, if strangers, are his friends, and who will secure for him comfortable quarters, communicate, or enable the emigrant to communicate, with his friends at home, introduce him to the particular industry to which he is a.s.signed, and who will not cease their personal care of him until he is happily settled in his new home, and who will afterwards be available for advice and counsel. He will find himself, not amongst people who are eager to secure their own profit at his expense, but a part of a commonwealth where each is taught to seek the good of his neighbour, and where the laws are framed to secure and perpetuate this desirable condition of things. A community where the blessings of home and education and sanitary laws and religion are valued and made available for all, and where liberty, which nowhere shines so sweetly as amongst a frugal, industrious, intelligent, simple and G.o.dly people, reigns in truth.

Moreover, our widely extended operations, our connection and oneness with the great social movement of the Army in various lands, and the regulations which will control the movement, will enable us invariably to convey our colonists to fields where their labours will be of the greatest value, and instantly to check any tendency to excess of labour at any given centre, and even at times to greatly relieve temporary gluts in the labor market arising from unforeseen circ.u.mstances.

In short, it is scarcely possible to overrate the blessings likely to flow from Colonies where drink and opium will be unprocurable, where vice will be repressed, where greed will receive little encouragement and have few opportunities to grow, and where the comparative absence of poverty on the one hand, and of extreme wealth on the other and the general contentment of the people, will make life on earth a joy to those who were once nearly starved out of it.

CHAPTER XIX.

MISCELLANEOUS AGENCIES.

(1) THE INTELLIGENCE DEPARTMENT.

In connection with our Labor Bureau we shall establish an intelligence department, the duty of which will be to collect all kinds of information likely to be of use in prosecuting our Social Reform.

For instance, it would watch the state of the labor market, would ascertain where there was a lack of labor and where a glut, would inform the public of the progress of the movement, would bring to our notice any newspaper criticisms or suggestions, and would generally make itself useful in a thousand ways.

(2) THE POOR MAN'S LAWYER.

This would meet a long-felt want, and could also be worked in connection with the Labor Bureau.

The poor would be able to get sound legal advice in regard to their difficulties, and we should be able to help them in their defence where we believed them to be wronged.

(3) THE INQUIRY OFFICE FOR MISSING FRIENDS.

This has been established for some time in England with admirable success, our worldwide organization enabling us to trace people under the most unfavorable circ.u.mstances. No doubt there would be much scope for such a department in India. At the outset it would form part of the duties of the Labor Bureau, and would not therefore entail any extra expense.

(4) THE MATRIMONIAL BUREAU.

A thoroughly confidential matrimonial bureau which would wisely advise people desirous of getting married, would certainly be of great service in India. Its operations would no doubt be small in the beginning, but as it got to be known and trusted it would be more and more resorted to.

Even supposing that outsiders should hold aloof from it, we should have a large inside const.i.tuency to whom its operations would be very valuable, and it would be thoroughly in accordance with native notions for the mutual negotiations to be carried on in such a way.

Missionaries are everywhere largely resorted to in regard to questions of this kind; and we have every reason to believe that it would be so with ourselves, and we should thus be able largely to guard our people against ill-a.s.sorted matches, and to furnish them with wise counsel on the subject.

(5) THE EMIGRATION BUREAU.

The subject of emigration has been already referred to elsewhere. No doubt we shall ultimately require a separate and special office for this purpose in all the chief cities but at the outset its duties would fall upon the Labor Bureau and Intelligence Departments who would collect all the information they could preparatory to the launching of this part of the scheme.

(6) PERIODICAL MELAS.

In place of the "Whitechapel by the sea" proposed by General Booth, a suitable Indian subst.i.tute would I think consist of periodical "melas"

similar to those already prevalent in various parts of the country.

These might be arranged with the treble object of religious instruction, bodily recreation, and in order to find an occasional special market for the surplus goods that we produce.

Everything would be managed with military precision. The place would be previously prepared for the reception of the people. An attractive programme would be arranged. Everybody would be made to feel comfortable and at home. And no effort would be spared to make the occasion morally and spiritually profitable, as well as valuable for the relaxation it afforded to the bodies of those who attended, and financially profitable for the purpose of our Social Reform work.

CHAPTER XX.

HOW MUCH WILL IT COST?

In order to put the whole of the foregoing machinery into motion on an extensive scale, there can be no doubt that economise as we may, a considerable outlay will be unavoidable. True we are able to supply skilled leadership under devoted and self-sacrificing men and women for a merely nominal cost. True we have Europeans willing to live on the cheap native diet, and to a.s.similate themselves in dress, houses and other manners to the people amongst whom they live. True that we have raised up around us an equally devoted band of Natives, in whose integrity we have the fullest confidence and whose ability and knowledge of the country will prove of valuable service to us in the carrying out of our scheme. True that around our 450 European and Native officers, we have enlisted and drilled a force of several thousands of earnest soldiers of the Cross, who are pledged abstainers from all intoxicating liquors and drugs, who have renounced all forms of impurity and sin,--who have promised to devote their lives to the social, moral and spiritual regeneration of their fellow countrymen,--who are accustomed to pray and preach in their leisure hours, without being paid a cowrie for doing so, and who not only support themselves and their families by their labor, but contribute for the support of their officers.

Nevertheless, while it is a fact that this cheap and efficient agency exists for the carrying out of the reforms that have been sketched in the foregoing pages,--it cannot be denied that a considerable sum of money will be needed for the successful launching of the scheme.

Once fairly started, we have every reason to believe that the plans here laid down will not only prove strictly self-supporting, but will yield such a margin of profit as will ultimately enable us to set on foot wholesale extensions of the scheme. No doubt there will be local disappointments and individual failures. We are dealing with human nature, and must antic.i.p.ate that this will be the case. But the proportion of success will far outweigh the fraction of failure, and when the profits and losses of the scheme came to be balanced year by year we have no doubt that socially, physically, morally and financially we shall be able to show so enormous a gain that the most unreasonable of our critics will be silenced.

And yet when we come face to face with the details of the scheme, we find that the scale of our operations must necessarily depend on the amount of capital with which we are able to start. The City Colony, with its Labor Bureau, Labor Yards, Food Depots, Prison and Rescue Homes, and Salvage Brigade, will involve a considerable initial expense. Although we are able to supply an efficient supervising staff for a mere fraction of the ordinary cost,--rents of land and buildings will have to paid.

And although work will be exacted from those who resort to our Yards and Homes, yet the supply of food to the large numbers who are likely to need our help will at the outset probably cost us more than we are able to recover from the sale of the goods produced.