OCR Rendition - approximate

Relations between Civilized and Savage Life. 34 ) The headmen of the kraals, as far as I could learn, were less apt to object to the Government impost. Let me note in passing that direct taxation for the benefit of Government has a very considerable influence in superseding that authority of the great tribal chiefs, which it was the object of rulers like Chaka to destroy, and which is, in fact, in its unchecked exercise incompatible with the authority of any centralized Government. Indeed, it would not be difficult, did time admit, to show that in the great work of civilizing a South African Native community, taxation by Government exercises as great an influence as the security of individual rights in separate property and the enjoyment of good wages, which are among the most effectual practical means of promoting civilization in such communities. Before quitting this part of the subject, referring to the extent to which the European races have checked the advance, and are more or less Europeanizing the native races, we ought to consider whether there is anywhere evidence of a reflex action on the European Colonists ; whether the natives are anywhere pressing back the Europeans, or denationalizing them, or forcing them to conform to native authority and native ideas. Whether there is in South Africa any apparent possibility of the native races acting on the invading Europeans, as the northern barbarians of Europe acted on the Roman invaders in the decline of their empire, absorbing their civilization as well as their imperial power. Such a danger was apprehended by many acute observers from the Zulus before their power was broken, and it is clear that on the northern and north-eastern border of the Transvaal the European immigrants have not maintained the positions first taken up by the Trek Boers. They have been expelled from many districts they then occupied, and in others have been allowed to remain only on payment of tribute or black mail. Again, in Damaraland, though a considerable influx of Trek Boers took place about nine years ago, and at various periods since, it has been doubted whether they can maintain their own complete independence, or the degree of civilization which their fathers had preserved. It is not safe to predict results in such cases, but my impression is that the question is one of the comparative inherent vigour of the two races whose advanced guards are thus meeting. The Trek Boers, like the rest of the white colonists in South Africa, belong to the swarming European nations of northern Europe. They derive their impulse not merely from inherent love of independence or of change, but from the pressure outwards always felt by nations in the