sum should be put aside, in lieu of wages, for the worker, to be paid to him on discharge, has not been carried out in the Bill, which in paragraph 8 declares that the detainee shall not receive pay for any work which he may perform. The Committee would like to be informed whether the proposal has been dropped.

The Committee, feeling as it does, that the present Ordinance gives a dangerously wide power to the Officials of the Colony to set up Detention Camps in places where there is a shortage of labour, regrets that the measure was not framed with greater safeguards and in a more tentative form, and ventures to express the hope that the working of the measure may be subjected to very careful scrutiny by the Secretary of State.

SIR,

I have, etc.,
TRAVERS BUXTON, Hon. Secretary.

[REPLY.]

DOWNING STREET,

9th February, 1926.

I am directed by Mr. Secretary Amery to refer to your letter of the 14th of January on the subject of the Ordinance passed by the Legislative Council of Kenya to provide for the establishment of Detention Camps.

2. The Secretary of State has already taken up with the Colonial Government some of the points to which reference is made in your letter, a copy of which is also being sent to the Governor in continuation of the previous correspondence. As stated in the last paragraph of the letter from this Department of the 30th of November, the Governor has been asked to furnish a report on the working of the system after it has been in operation for a reasonable time, and your Committee may be assured that the progress of the scheme will be closely watched.

The Honorary Secretary.

The Anti-Slavery and Aborigines

Protection Society.

I am, etc.,

(Signed) W. C. BOTTOMLEY.

Kenya Colony.

WHITE PAPER*

THIS paper describing official tours by the Acting Governor last year in the Provinces of Kenya, including the Native Reserves, deals with the questions of compulsory labour and the newly-established Native Councils in Kikuyu Province. Mr. Amery stated in Parliament, in reply to a

* Cmd., 2573.

question of November 23rd last, that the total number of labourers conscripted for railway construction was 3,094, and, it having been decided that there should be no further recruiting, that all the men had returned home before August 13th.

NO OBJECTIONS TO FORCED LABOUR.

Mr. Denham is emphatic in his reports that the labour turned out for the railways was really given, and in Nyanza Province no representations were made to him anywhere against the exercise of compulsion; in only one district has the labour been compulsorily obtained: "the natives," he wrote, "went out cheerfully and willingly for the work."

Again, in the Kikuyu Province, Dr. Denham wrote that enquiries made in each district confirmed information received elsewhere, that no objections or complaints had been raised, and no desertions had taken place. The strictest medical inspection took place in each case.

WOMEN'S COMPLAINT.

In the Kitui Reserve two hundred men were compulsorily recruited for railway work. When the Acting Governor inquired whether any complaints had been received, he was told that the only representations came from a body of old men who complained that the women would not work in the shambas as the young men had been called away. When the women were interviewed they

explained that the action taken by them was due to the appeal made to them by the young girls, who complained that they were deprived of their dancing partners at Ngomas by the young men being taken to work on the railway. It was pointed out to them that the men only worked for sixty days and then returned to their homes, and the elder women expressed their opinion that it was very desirable that the young men should be made to work. They then returned to work on their husbands' shambas,"

and no further complaints were heard.

At the beginning of the railway work, the Akamba, "a notoriously volatile and excitable people " deserted in some numbers but most of them had returned to work and there was no need for any prosecutions.

MORE WORKERS GOING OUT.

The Administrative Officers of Nyanza Province agreed that there were no signs of decrease in the number of young men going outside the reserves to work; they can no longer win renown as warriors, and have to find a new outlet for their energies. Thus they begin to desire the things which money can buy. Natives are stated to make the fullest inquiries as to the employer who desires their labour, and sometimes decline to work on certain shambas. The Acting Governor therefore thinks that, while the demand for labour in Kenya will undoubtedly increase, it rests chiefly with the settlers to take steps to secure and retain it. At present it is increasing rather than diminishing. He holds that the young man prefers to go out

to work, but that such work" does react favourably on native production." (i.e., in the reserves.)

GOOD ROADS MADE.

The Acting Governor comments on the magnitude of the work accomplished in the Kikuyu Province in making the road round the mountain, a very arduous task, which was done by primitive methods and with few tools in dense bush country, up hills, down valleys and across rivers, by the natives of the district under their Administrative Officers in little over two years. About one thousand people worked on the road at one time on different sections, and competed with one another as to which section could be finished first. But for this road thousands of persons must have died in the Famine of 1918.

NATIVE COUNCILS.

Following the advice given by the East African Parliamentary Commission, Native Councils have been established in several districts of the Kikuyu Province, and are a cause of great satisfaction to the people, who feel that as they can now raise levies, take part in controlling public expenditure, they have secured some measure of self-government. The Councils carry out their own form of government through their elders. Much interest was shown in the elections and a large number of natives voted. The Councillors elected were generally of a good standard of intelligence, and while elders and Headmen predominated, the more progressive younger men educated at Mission schools were also represented. The Acting Governor, who opened the Councils with some ceremony, considers that they have already begun to justify their existence, but declares that the responsibilities of government in the reserves are only further increased by native contributions, and that it would be both unwise and unjust to reduce Government expenditure on the ground that the people are taxing themselves for educational and medical services; "the more the natives are willing to do to help themselves, the more help they should be given by Government." A popular levy should not be imposed above a figure which every native can willingly and easily pay.

"

PROVISION FOR MEDICAL TREATMENT.

It is too early yet to report fully on the activities of the native councils in the Kikuyu district," he writes, " but recommendations have been received from the Meru district that a levy of 25 cents. be imposed on all adult males and the proceeds of such a levy be expended on the erection of eight permanent out-dispensaries and eight dispensers' huts. This resolution represents a remarkable advance in the attitude of a very backward tribe towards European medical treatment. It is now proposed to station a medical officer in the Meru district, and advantage will be taken of the willingness of the people to co-operate with the Government to establish Government medical services throughout the district."

The Indians of South America.

A CONGRESS on Christian Work in South America was held last year in Montevideo, Uruguay, and an official report of the various Commissions has been published in book form.* One of these Commissions deals with the problem of the Indians distributed among the different Republics, the exact number of whom are unknown, for there has never been any real census taken; their numbers have been variously estimated at ten millions or only five.

The Indians are a mixed race, being blended with the Negro, Spanish and Portuguese populations, varying widely in conditions and degrees of civilisation. Some interesting facts about these Indian tribes emerge in the Report, though it should be remembered that the object of the Congress was to investigate the opportunities for Christian missionary effort in Latin America, and the condition and treatment of the Indian peoples are only dealt with incidentally, so far as they relate to the purpose of the Conference.

BRAZIL.

In Brazil the Indians have been estimated to number 1,500,000. Their interests are cared for by a Service for the Protection of Indians, which was established in 1910 as a Department of the Ministry of Agriculture, with General Rondon, an officer of experience, at its head. This Department is said to have" achieved a splendid record with small means." Its policy is marked by liberal and humanitarian ideas; the Indian Reservations are effectively defended against political interference and disorderly agents. The Administration is neutral in religious matters, but is described as friendly to Evangelical missions, looking for their co-operation in occupying just the regions where the Indians are attacked by the rubber merchants and land grabbers. The Government Department welcomes help from any responsible organisation in saving Indians from exploitation degradation and practical slavery.

THE PUTUMAYO AND OTHER Rivers of COLOMBIA.

The Report recalls the atrocities which made this vast and remote region notorious fifteen years ago, and remarks that "with the rubber business practically dead there may be no more atrocities, but social conditions must be still very bad." The Indians all live in a wild state and are largely nomadic.

Evangelical missions have not been able to do anything, for Indian hostility to foreigners, owing to ill-treatment, has made any approach difficult. The Report urges that special efforts should be made on educational and medical lines.

⚫ Christian Work in South America. Fleming H. Revell Co. 2 vols. $4 net.

PERU AND BOLIVIA.

There are many different tribes, more than half the population of Peru being estimated to be Indians, and in Bolivia about half. The Chuncho tribes, who are the most degraded, are highly superstitious, and are cursed also with the slave trade :

"Large bands of dissolute savages roam through these great forests, killing the protectors of the families and then carrying the women off to sell to white people who own large plantations in these interior regions. This slave-trading is encouraged by the whites, who offer large rewards to the savages, and urge them to bring the women and children to them, making as a pretext the desire of saving them from death, to which they have been condemned by witchcraft."

The Indians of Peru and Bolivia are given to drunkenness and coca chewing, and wages are often paid to them in liquor or coca. They are used by the State for road and house-building and for military service, oppressively treated, and kept in a state of abject poverty. Incidentally we are told that" the workmen are always included in the purchase of a farm and are transferred to the new owner."

ECUADOR.

There are four types of Indians in Ecuador. Some speak Spanish; many are hard workers on the soil, while others are not only industrious but very intelligent, treating with the authorities through their own leaders. The Indians on the river Napo are "for the most part in a condition of peonage, which is a form of slavery," commonly paid in supplies, not in money, in some cases "made savage by their ill-treatment by whites."

THE ARGENTINE.

The Argentine Government does practically nothing for its Indians, and the general attitude of the white settlers is one of harshness, disdain, arising partly out of fear and partly from aversion. Yet business relations are maintained between the two peoples, and even concubinage exists.

One of the speakers at the Conference said that every country in South America except Uruguay has its Indian problem, but few of them are dealing with the Indian in any well considered way. 'The Roman Catholic Church," said another speaker," does little to-day for the Indians outside of the cities, but the Protestants do even less."

The Brazilian Government appears to be an exception.

PEONAGE.

Another Commission, dealing with the Social Problems, refers to the Peonage system as one as one of the most crushing problems facing the South American peoples. Its general features that the peon holds a small grant of land varying from two to six acres, in return for which he renders certain services to the land owner. He is paid a pittance for his labour,