Native Life in South Africa Part 26

The 'Brotherhood Journal', the newspaper organ of the movement said: --

== Bear ye one another's Burdens

For Brotherhood men and women there can be only one response to their appeal.

For Brotherhood is not only between man and man, but between nation and nation, and race and race.

In our movement, at any rate, there can be no colour bar to love and justice.

If our Brotherhoods did not rise to a cause like this, we might well question the reality of their fraternal pretensions.

We are told that the problem has its difficulties. No doubt.

But they can be overcome, if only our statesmen will act in a spirit of courage and faith. Surely empire means not only privilege and power and glory, but also responsibility and obligations.

If it means only commercial profit, and injustice is to be done with impunity under the Imperial flag,

Of what worth is such an Empire?

This is a matter in which every one of our members should exert the force of opinion on the side of right. Let us open to our coloured brothers' cause our platforms and our hearts.

The five members of the deputation will be in this country for some months, and are prepared to address Brotherhoods and Sisterhoods, and to send information as to their case to any who wish it.

We doubt not that they will find in our midst not only a most sympathetic hearing, but active help in educating public opinion in this country, in order that a great wrong may be righted.

How unlike so many poor attempts at brotherhood, organized in the name of Christianity, especially in our part of the globe, where "they have made the welkin ring with the sorrowful tale of the unfortunate condition of the weak, but, like the rich man in the parable, they liked their Lazarus afar off," and considered their fraternal pretensions satisfied if they sent their dogs to lick his wounds.

No, the Brotherhood movement is no such parody. It is practical Christianity which knows no distinction of colour or boundaries between nations.

Our nine months' a.s.sociation with Brother Martin and Brother Timberlake, of the Shernhall Brotherhood, confirms this view; and our acquaintanceship with other members of this wonderful movement (which counts judges and members of Parliament as well as factory hands among its office-bearers) satisfied the writer that they are always ready to practise what they preach.

A noteworthy occasion in connexion with the campaign was our visit to the Southall Brotherhood on Sunday, March 14. We can hardly forget the day; it was on Crocus Sunday when thousands of Londoners went to Hampton Court in crowds to see the crocus bulbs in bloom.

It was a glorious day and we remember it as the second day in 1915 on which the European sun shone through a cloudless sky from sunrise to sunset.

Thousands of people attended at Hyde Park to witness the church parade, and still more thousands took advantage of the glorious spring day after a strenuous winter to flock to Epping Forest and other popular resorts.

In the afternoon we took part in an Imperial indoor demonstration organized by the "Southall Men's Own" at the Central Hall.

Mr. William Cross of Hanwell represented England; Mr. T. Owens, F.C.I.S., represented Wales; Mr. S. S. A. Cambridge, a black barrister, represented his homeland, British Guiana; Miss Ruth Bucknall, the celebrated lyric soprano, who artistically contributed the solos, represented Australia; while Scotland and the Emerald Isle were also represented in the orchestra and elsewhere in the hall; Mr. and Mrs. Lionel Boote, of Auckland, New Zealand, represented "the most English of the Colonies"

(unfortunately the Indian representative could not reach Southall in time), and the writer represented South Africa, the baby member of the British family.

Among such intellectual giants, one was inclined at the outset to feel somewhat out of place, but thanks to the encouraging Brotherhood cheer which always accompany their reception of a speaker, the stripling soon finds himself at home, as is always the case on any Brotherhood platform, and that was how we felt that day.

Mr. W. Cross said, in part, that one of the most striking proofs of the unity of the Empire was shown in the splendid way that men had come forward to a.s.sist the Mother Country on the battlefields of Europe from all parts of our Dominions.

The coloured men from India had come as free men and fellow-subjects to do their share. The Empire was composed of territories and people -- once separated by race and creed, now united under one flag.

There was a great resemblance between Brotherhood and Empire.

In it all kinds of religion were represented, yet all were united in one great principle. It had been said the soul of Russia was pity, of France reason, and of Britain justice. No Empire could be built to stand unless based on justice and freedom. The principle of freedom underlay Empire as it underlay Brotherhood also. There was no limit to the Empire that was founded upon unity, toleration, justice, and liberty; it surely had no end. Similarly there was no frontier to the kingdom of Brotherhood, and they looked for a kingdom out-spanning far beyond the roll of British drums -- the kingdom of Brotherhood -- the kingdom of Christ.

Referring to the limitations of colour in South Africa, Mr. Cambridge said: "Have you no cattle and sheep in South Africa? Are there no birds?

Have you not observed that they are of different colours and yet are not restricted in their flight on that account; and are you going to run counter to the work of nature in regard to human beings? The British Empire has a population of over 430,000,000, of which less than 100,000,000 are white, and there was a big problem to solve: 'How to rule with justice and equity this great mult.i.tude of various races and creeds and consolidate them as fellow-subjects of one great and mighty Empire.'

The future of the British Empire could be secured by following the high ideals of 'Brotherhood' which were foreshadowed by Christ in the Bible, and by great writers such as Shakespeare and Addison.

The fall of Rome was due to her failure to recognize the duty of welding her subjects together as brothers one and all under the Fatherhood of G.o.d. . . ."

It is a pity that the argument used by Mr. Cambridge would not go down with the majority of the rulers in South Africa. If it did one would remind them that even South African ladies pay higher prices for black silks than they do for white silks; that the value of domestic animals does not as a whole appear to be influenced by their colour: thus, whereas the fleece of white sheep commands a higher price in the South African wool market than the fleece of black sheep, their mutton has about the same flavour.

Again of horned cattle, which give the same quality of beef, irrespective of colour; farmers will tell you of them that coloured cattle are among the best for farming and other purposes, while white bullocks are subject to sore eyes, and white cows continually suffer from erythema of the nipples ('Garget-mammitis'); yet we have not heard that this peculiarity had any influence on the quality of their beef or the quality of the milk they give.

The springbuck, whence the best South African venison is obtained, has the colours of black, white and brown; and this blend has not prevented it from having the reputation of being the prettiest and most graceful antelope in the world. But argument in this respect is simply wasted on the ruling caste in South Africa: there, Mr. Cross's views about "freedom, liberty," etc., will simply be laughed out of court, unless he limits them to white men; so that one sometimes wonders whether Christ's metaphor about "casting pearls before swine" does not find an application here. Look at the weighty arguments delivered inside and outside Parliament against the Natives' Land Act.

Surely no legislature with a sense of responsibility could have pa.s.sed that law after hearing arguments of such force and weight against it; but the South African legislature pa.s.sed that Act and seems to glory in the wretched result of its operation.

Mr. Boote expressed his pride in finding how shining was the native policy of New Zealand when contrasted with the native policy of South Africa.

"Why," said Mrs. Boote to us, with evident satisfaction, "we have got Maori members of Parliament and our country is all the better for it." She had every justification to look pleased at the comparison which reveals the justice of her country's rule, for we remember how the women of New Zealand got the vote.

The white members of Parliament in New Zealand were equally divided on the Women's Enfranchis.e.m.e.nt Bill; but for the native members, there would have been a tie, as was the case in South Africa three years ago, when the white members of the South African Parliament, as seemed likely there, wheedled the Women's Suffrage Bill out of the House.

Happily for Women's Franchise in the Antipodes the Maori members voted solidly for the Bill and secured the pa.s.sage of a reform which, judging by the satisfactory results in Australia and elsewhere, gave the lead to the rest of the Empire.

It was at Hammersmith, where the chairman after hearing our story of the operation of the Natives' Land Act, in moving a resolution, in a sympathetic speech, asked: "Why did we spend 240,000,000 Pounds and kill 10,000 men in the South African War if this is the result?" He asked the permission of the audience to change the last hymn on the programme and sing the Brotherhood Song of Liberty.

As the newspaper 'South Africa' seems to insinuate that the Brotherhood movement by allying itself with our cause had deviated from its aims and objects, we would explain that the chairman did not run out of the meeting to borrow a book from somewhere containing that song. The song is No. 26 of the 'Fellowship Hymnal' -- the hymn-book of the P.S.A. and Brotherhoods.

At subsequent meetings it had often been our pleasure, after delivering the message from the South African Natives, to sit down and hear the chairman give out that hymn, and the orchestra lead off with the tune of Costa's March of the Israelites.

A pleasant variety was lent to it at the Victoria Brotherhood in Monmouthshire, which we visited on the first Sunday in 1915.

There the chairman gave out the now familiar hymn, and the grand organ chimed the more familiar tune of "Jesu, lover of my soul" (Hollingside's), and the variety lent extra freshness to the singing of the Brotherhood Song of Liberty, which is reproduced: --

Men whose boast it is that ye Come of fathers brave and free, If there breathe on earth a slave, Are ye truly free and brave?

If ye do not feel the chain When it works a brother's pain, Are ye not base slaves indeed -- Slaves unworthy to be freed?

Is true freedom but to break Fetters for our own dear sake, And with leathern hearts forget That we owe mankind a debt?

No! true freedom is to share All the chains our brothers wear, And with heart and hand to be Earnest to make others free.

They are slaves who fear to speak For the fallen and the weak; They are slaves who will not choose Hatred, scoffing, and abuse, Rather than in silence shrink From the truth they needs must think: They are slaves who dare not be In the right with two or three.

J. R. Lowell.

------------------------------------------------------------ P.S.A. and Brotherhood Societies Addressed by the Deputation and the Order in Which They Were Visited ------------------------------------------------------------ [Modified from original table format]

[a] Society. [b] Name of President or Secretary.

[c] Where Meetings are Held. [d] By Whom Addressed.

[a] 1. London Federation of Brotherhoods [b] Mr. John McIntosh [c] 230, Bishopsgate, E.C. [d] Mr. Saul Msane, Dr. W. B. Rubusana

[a] 2. Tooting Brotherhood [b] Rev. E. Aldom French [c] Wesleyan Central Hall, Tooting, S.W. [d] Mr. Saul Msane, Dr. W. B. Rubusana

[a] 3. Willesden Green Men's Own Brotherhood [b] Mr. H. J. Weaver [c] Baptist Church, High Road, Willesden Green [d] Mr. Sol T. Plaatje, Mr. T. M. Mapikela

[a] 4. Westbourne Park Brotherhood [b] Dr. J. Clifford, MA.DD.

[c] Baptist Church, Bayswater, W. [d] Dr. W. B. Rubusana

[a] 5. Willesden P.S.A. [b] Mr. W. Springbett [c] Primitive Methodist Church, Willesden Green [d] Dr. W. B. Rubusana, Mr. T. M. Mapikela

[a] 6. East Ham Brotherhood [b] Rev. W. H. Armstrong [c] Central Hall, Barking Road, East Ham [d] Dr. W. B. Rubusana, Mr. T. M. Mapikela

[a] 7. Tooting Graveny Brotherhood [b] Mr. A. Riding [c] Central Hall, Tooting, Broadway [d] Mr. Saul Msane

[a] 8. Men's Brotherhood [b] Rev. A. Clifford Hall [c] Congregational Church, Greenwich Rd., S.E. [d] Mr. Saul Msane