Consequently he is
hated and despised withal, being of the same colour as, while assuming
such excessive superiority over, his former equals. No one also is more
hopeless about the civilisation of Africa than the semi-civilised African
returning to the 'home of his fathers.' He feels how hard has been his
struggle to emerge from savagery; he acknowledges, in his own case, a
selection of species; and he foresees no end to the centuries before there
can be a nation equal even to himself. Yet in England and in books he will
cry up the majesty of African kings,--see, for a specimen, Bishop
Crowther's 'Niger Diary.' He will give his fellow-countrymen, whom he
thoroughly despises, a thousand grand gifts of morals and industry. I have
heard a negro assert, with the unblushing effrontery which animates the
Exeter Hall speechifier, that at some African den of thieves men leave
their money with impunity in the storehouse or on the highway. I read the
assertion of a mulatto, who well knew the contrary, 'A white man who
supposes himself respected in Africa, because he is white, is grievously
mistaken.' The 'aristocracy of colour' is a notable and salient fact in
Africa, where the chiefs are lighter hued and better grown than their
subjects; and the reason is patent--they marry the handsomest women.
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