PART VI AFRICA OF TO-MORROW-THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS THE Great War has shaken to its foundations the whole world, and Africa more, perhaps, than at any other period in the history of the continent. What of to-morrow for Africa and the African? Will the immediate effect be that of shattering at last the chains which have bound the African race, giving to the African the opportunity to develop to the full stature of manhood? The answer will come, whence alone it can come, from the Christian nations of the world. The cardinal fact is that the Eternal Father of men "hath made of one blood all nations of men to dwell on all the face of the earth." The lifestream of the whole human race is one, flowing from one source, flowing towards one goal, animated by one and the same desire for freedom and progress, impelled by one certain hope that justice will ultimately overcome all barriers erected by avarice, envy, prejudice and hatred. The African of one blood with the European and Asiatic claims, and rightly claims, his place as a free man-free to sell the labour of his hands to the highest bidder, free to till his own soil, free to multiply and replenish the earth, free to voice his opinions in the religious, social and civic upbuilding of his own country. The momentous event in the history of Africa is the League of Nations-momentous because it heralds a break in hoary political institutions and breathes into the continent the breath of a new life. True, the League of Nations Covenant is subject to geographical limitations, but the living principles which it enunciates will either shatter, or overflow, all arbitrary boundaries until their beneficent and healing influences reach the uttermost recesses of darkest Africa. The League of Nations Covenant operates over the whole of the late German colonies in Africa, that is about 1,200,000 square miles, and affects some 12,000,000 African people. The main principles resemble so closely those of the Berlin Act that before many years have passed other vast tropical areas of Africa should be brought into harmony with the Covenant. But civilization cannot stop at that point, it must aim at bringing all areas not colonizable by the white races under the Covenant, that is, all those tropical and subtropical lands where industry and domestic life are only possible for the African race, and where white men and women can neither labour nor bring up their families. The foregoing represent to-day both the actual and the potential geographical boundaries of the League of Nations. The principles laid down by the League of Nations are living principles capable of growth. The duty of maintaining and applying them belongs to the Mandatory Powers, but upon |