THE BLACK PROBLEM

Evening Post, Volume CVI, Issue 36, 11 August 1923, Page 19

THE BLACK PROBLEM

"Bayete!"- By G. Heaton Nicholls. . London: George Allen and Unwin, T' Ltd.

"Bayete!" is a novel that all who view the restlessness of. coloured people, especially those of African origin, should read, and that with care: and thoughtfulness. The word "bayete" means "Hail to the' King!" and it serves as a sort of password among the educated coloured people in Africa and the united States and West Indies. In the guise of 'fiction Mr Nicholls clothes "many facts, seme of the astounding, some exceedingly grave for the future of the white races, and ths British in Africa most of all; The latest political developments in Kenya make "Bayete" particularly 11 teresting reading. It was written oVer eight years ago, but publication" was withheld, and the author gives hig reasons for this —they are wise:reasons; but he thinks .'the time has. now come to speak,'and.'this he ttoes.^vith the voice of. authority imparted" by the; most intimate knowledge of' the, ambitions and> aspirations of the' African people's" and" their kinsfolk in America. He says: "I send this book forth as a warning." It certainly reads like that. When Mr Nicholis says he "lacks the skilful touch of the storyteller,", he is correct; but his book is of greater importance than a mere tale. All the, same it is of. absorbing interest, and the reader can scarcely resist its fascination. It opens iviththe death o"f ■ the "Ma'tabeJe king, Lobenguela, and the consternation of his people. History records that at the fight with the British at the JShangani Biver, •when Major Alan Wilson and all with him, fought to the last man and were killed by the Matabele, Lobenguela and liis remnant of an army.retired to the Zambesi where they became a prey to smallpox and fc-ver, and Lobenguela died, the war ending with his death; the novel opens with Lobenguela falling down dead from a last shot from Wilson's heroic band as it want down before the native charge by the banks of the Shangam. The point that Mr. Heaton makes is the rising of the black man against the white, and so ho shows how when Lobenguela died and the Matabele- power •was broken, authority .-was taken not •without grave persona] risks, by Balumoata, son of an Arab father, by a Central African mother. He saw that the Wntinuance of the fight against the Eng lish was hopeless, and said so, in spite of,the advice-of witch doctors and soothsayers, and he prevailed." So Balumbata .goes to the United States; on borrowed money from the Matabele, there he takes ■(the name of Nelson, passes through an American university, is recognised by the Africans as the spiritual head of African Christianity, leader in a great work of propaganda of war for freedom to worship as Christians in peace and' in their own. independent way. Balumbata, or Nelson, has: a vision similar to that of Jacob, and the vision was that God epoke to him and told him that, "The whites have forgotten me. Into their hands I committed the heathen of Africa ard I gave them dominion over the land. But they have oppressed those whom they should have loved and taught, and

used them a3 slav?s to be exploited, 'io thee, Balumbata, I assign the guidance of the Church of Africa, where millions of my people have never heard me. Work on and be not afraid, for from thy efforts a new nation shall arise and Africans shall rule Africa."

Nelson is successful in rou3mg the blacks in Africa, making them believe that lie is in some sort a Messiah. A new Christian Church is established, and the white missionary finds his occupation gone. The Africans interpret the Scriptures in their own way. They point out that the Psalmist prophesied that Ethiopia should stretch out her hands to Jehovah, and the Nelson mission is nothing more or less than a fulfilment of that prophecy. The npshot of the spread of African Christianity is conversion'by compulsion, and a great and sanguinary rising against the whites in all Southern Africa; beginning with a paralysing^ strike on the Rand, and culminating in fire and slaughter in Capetown. Nelson is found to. be human, for he makes passionate love to the wife of the Prime Minister of the Union Govern-' meat at that time, and she very unwisely, but with the best of motives, has secret meetings with him in a garden. I She pays for her folly with her life, bei ing shot by Nelson's jealous native wife, an educated coloured woman. But before she dies she hears from the lips of j a friend wh>it th© author evidently wishes his readers to understand, and it is this: "You have always believed that Nelson considered that the two races could live side by side, each developing along its own lines, territorially and socially separated, but politically equal, mixing only for industrial purpose*, each race. realising that the one was necessary to the development of the other. That is the orthodox view. It is the Booker T. Washington view. But it was never Nelson's view. And Booker Washington only urged this in order to gain, strength for his people—until thoy became rich enough, educated enough, and numerous enough to become a political force which the whites of the United States could not ignore. It is a comfortable faith—for the while, this orthodox view. It would save such a lot of trouble for us all if we could keep black and white in separate compartments. But Nelson's idea of a separate compartment is a Black Africa. Ijb is an American idea. There were' always many negroes in America who were not content with Booker Washington's round-about way, and who wanted to take a short cut to nationality. And so, back-to-Africa has always had its advocates, and the appeal from an African nation has always inspired response amongst all sections of the American negroes. It is they who have. furnished the money for Nelson's work. Nelson, therefore, represents not only the aspirations of the race-conscious Bantu, but also the Black Africa Movement in America."

In this paragraph, although it is addressed to a dying woman in the novel, is_ summed up the idea that the author wishes to share with his readers. He shows the possibility of mobilisation of an immense black force in Africa and its arming with the latest weapons of precision; he lays bare the black aspirations for nationhood, ..and the means by which they .may be realised; he shows how educated black men regard the contempt with which they are treated by whites, eipeoially the ■so-called "mean whites, of Africa"'; he shows, too, the weaknesses in the African character. Altogether, :■ this "is a remarkably • enlightening book. It loses r/)thing of its /purpose, in the many, "well-described scenes of Africa,--the..veldt • and the jungle and the wild animals in them. There is' a most thrilling account of an adventure with an angry hippopotamus in'ihe Zambesi.